The Finns will have an excellent opportunity to follow the world’s most prestigious orienteering competitions in the coming years, as the Finnish Broadcasting Company YLE has secured the broadcasting rights for a large number of orienteering events.
With a new agreement between the national public broadcaster YLE, the Finnish Orienteering Federation and IOF – all World Orienteering Championships, European Orienteering Championships, World Cup Rounds and the traditional Finnish relays Jukola and Venla will be shown by YLE until 2026.
This means that the Finnish national team will have optimal opportunities to show themselves off in front of the home crowd in both 2024 and 2025 as the World Cup Final and World Orienteering Championships respectively are held in Kuopio, Finland.
– We are very pleased with this new long-term agreement that provides great opportunities to strengthen the knowledge of orienteering and the athletes over several years in Finland. We have improved the quality of orienteering broadcasts over a number of years and are proud to be shown the trust through this four-year agreement. It is part of IOF’s strategy to expand the sustainability of orienteering and to reach even more viewers is a step on that way, IOF’s CEO Henrik Eliasson says.
The first international orienteering competition to be shown under the new agreement is the World Cup Round 1 in Østfold, Norway from April 27-30.
Photo: European Long distance champion Venla Harju (FIN) during EOC 2022, by Donatas Lazauskas