Last week, the World Championships hosts warmed up for next summer’s World Orienteering Championships 2022 in Denmark with an impressively sizeable elite from most of Europe competing for world ranking points.
The autumn holidays offered World Championships warm-ups for both orienteering runners and the organizers of next year’s World Championships in orienteering. Next year’s Danish local organizing committee staged a sprint race on Saturday and a Knock-Out sprint on Sunday with great international support with glorious autumn sun and colors.
Almost 200 runners competed in the elite classes – the vast majority of them with foreign passports, who, in addition to the weekend’s competitions, also participated in the recent WOC training around southern Denmark.
Dorthe Bloch Rosenvinge, Event Director – Office, Marketing and Communication, WOC 2022, says:
– The competitions in recent days have given us invaluable experience in the work of arranging the World Championships in the Triangle Region next summer. We are proud that so many international top runners made their way to Denmark and gave both training and competitions a boost. This gives us the best conditions to be able to create the optimal world championships next year in collaboration with the municipalities of Vejle, Kolding, and Fredericia, as well as Sport Event Denmark.
Maps and courses are the cornerstones of every orienteering race, and that is precisely why it is extra essential for the participants to prepare as well as possible in Denmark.
Simona Aebersold, Swiss national team runner with 11 medals at international championships, says:
– It was a very nice training camp and to end it with two nice competitions is great. The terrain here is different from what we are used to in Switzerland. It has more edges and walls, so you must be confident and read the map carefully. I especially look forward to the individual sprint distance at the World Championships in Denmark.
– It has been very high standard with good courses in challenging cities, so I think we will have some very interesting World Championships next year, and we will need to be well prepared, adds Thierry Gueorgiou, national coach of the Finnish national team and 14-time world champion runner (for France)
-It is a dream scenario to be allowed to test your event set-up. The organizers of the World Orienteering Championships gained valuable experiences. Equally important; the participants go home with good experiences. We saw it a month ago, when Haderslev tested their XCM set up for the UCI MTB World Championships, says Lars Lundov, CEO, Sport Event Denmark, that partners most of the major, international sporting events in the coming years in Denmark. The Triangle Region and Sport Event Denmark are partners behind the event next year. Here, too, there are high expectations for next year.
In the photo the Danish national team runners Caroline Gjøtterup and Hedvig Gydesen, number one and two in the quarterfinals at Sunday’s Knock-Out Sprint in Billund. Photo: Helge Lang Pedersen / Danish Orienteering Federation.