Sweden won the first gold medal at the European Ski Orienteering Championships in Finland, which began on Thursday morning with the Sprint Relay in the Kohtilathi terrain at Posio.
The Swedish team with Magdalena Olsson and Jonatan Ståhl delivered some solid performances and led the relay almost the entire way through the six legs.
A total of 25 teams set out in the brilliant sunny weather over Northern Finland, where home favorites Amanda Yli Futka and Niklas Ekström were the biggest threat to the Swedes.
In the first four legs, there were only a few seconds between the leading teams from the two neighboring countries, but on the fifth leg, Magdalena Olsson managed to make a decisive gap in the most hilly part of the terrain. Olsson also had the fastest time on all of her legs today.
Magdalena Olsson with Amanda Yli Futka on her tail. Photo: Timo Mikkola
The lead gave Ståhl a 42-second lead before the last leg, and the pursuers could not catch up with it over the 2.3 kilometers.
At the finish, Niklas Ekström cruised to the silver medals 19 seconds behind Ståhl. Two other Swedish teams followed before Styrk Kamsvaag led Norway to bronze, 38 seconds behind the Swedish winners.
Olsson celebrates with Jonatan Ståhl Photo: Timo Mikkola
Kamsvaag was teamed with Anna Ulvensøen, who won Sprint Relay gold at the last ESOC two years ago. At that time, World Cup-leader Jørgen Baklid was the male half, but he is injured during these European Championships.
Estonia 2 (Doris Kudre, Olle Ilmar Jaama), Bulgaria (Antoniya Grigorova, Stanimir Belomazhev) and Switzerland (Delia Giezendanner, Corsin Boos) took the subsequent places on the podium.
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First start at Friday’s Sprint race is at 11:30 EET (UTC +2) for the women and 12:15 in the men’s class.
Today was also the first race day at the Junior World Ski Orienteering Championships and European Youth Ski Orienteering Championships.
Here, Finland and Sweden continued to dominate. The home nation won both M20 ahead of Czechia and Latvia and M17, where Sweden took silver and Czechia bronze.
Sweden claimed W20 by a big margin ahead of Czechia and Norway. W17 was another Swedish triumph, where Finland and Switzerland also made it into the medals.
ESOC Sprint Relay
Top 6
1. Sweden (Olsson, Ståhl) 47:06 minutes
2. Finland (Futka, Ekström) + 0:19
3. Norway (Ulvensøen, Kamsvaag) +0:38
4. Estonia (Doris Kudre, Jaama) + 2:21
5. Bulgaria (Grigorova, Belomazhev) +2:54
6. Switzerland (Giezendanner, Boos) +3:46
Full results including the nations’ second-best and third-best teams can be found here.