WOC: Rancan and Alexandersson KO Sprint Champions

Riccardo Rancan (SUI) and Tove Alexandersson (SWE) claimed the World Championship titles in Knock-Out Sprint Tuesday afternoon.

Central Edinburgh welcomed the 72 athletes back from the qualification in the morning with heavy showers for the quarter finals before it eventually stopped raining for the semi finals later in the afternoon.

Once again the centre of the Scottish capital offered courses with many complex route choices in the narrow passages, stairways and detailed courtyards.

All courses throughout the afternoon were without forkings and course choice and created some thrilling races for the big crowd at the arena in St. John Street.

Thrilling women’s final
Women’s final were off to a dramatic start, as the reigning World Champion Tove Alexandersson slipped on some cobblestones and fell into a wall, thus losing some seconds to the rest of the field in the final, consisting of Venla Harju (FIN), Simona Aebersold (SUI), Cecile Calandry (FRA), Karolin Ohlsson (SWE) and Megan Carter Davies (GBR).

On the long leg to control 5, Megan Carter Davies dared to take her own route choice to the north and gained eight seconds on the rest and went into a small lead.

Eventually her lead was caught up and after some confusion at the second to last control, Tove Alexandersson sprinted her way to her 21st WOC gold medal. Behind her, compatriot Karolin Ohlsson won the sprint for silver ahead of Simona Aebersold.

That’s Ohlssons first individual WOC-medal.

Cecile Calandry achieved the biggest result of the career finishing fourth ahead of Carter Davies and with Venla Harju in sixth position.

Great atmosphere
After getting the heart rate down a bit, it was time for the men’s final. Once again the crowd at the arena was hammering the advertising boards along the run-in, creating an great atmosphere before the start.

Sweden and Switzerland both had two athletes in the final, Martin Regborn, Jonatan Gustafsson, Joey Hadorn and Riccardo Rancan respectively and also Jørgen Baklid (NOR) and Alvaro Casado (SPA) had managed to qualify.

Friday’s Sprint World Champion Martin Regborn took the lead in the group early on, with Rancan, Hadorn and Casado staying in the back of the group, clearly trying to read ahead on the map.

That how things stayed until leg 7, where Riccardo Rancan chose a different route on a short leg, placing him in a small lead.

On the way to the last control Regborn, Hadorn and  Gustafsson all lost a few seconds on a small dead end.

Rancan stayed on course towards the gold medal, while the mistake suddenly placed Jørgen Baklid in silver position, which he defended on the last meters in his first ever WOC-race.

Jonatan Gustafsson put up a massive sprint in the run-in and went from fifth to third position, thus defending his bronze medal from WOC in 2022.

Joey Hadorn was fourth, Regborn fifth and Alvaro Casado secured his careers best result with the sixth place behind them.

Find all results, GPS-tracking and photos from the Knock-Out Sprint in IOF LIVE

The intense  Knock-Out Sprint finals ended a well-arranged World Orienteering Championships in the best possible way with an enthralling atmosphere in the arena.

The organizers and the many hundreds of volunteers received well-deserved applause at the closing ceremony, where IOF’s newly elected President Tom Hollowell handed over the IOF flag to next year’s WOC organizers in Finland.

All photos: Kristina Lindgren