WOC 2009


I can't see Chris getting round to updating my blog with a WOC post any time soon, so I have decided to do a wee one for him, even though I have been watching all the way from my comfy couch in Trondheim! It has been very exciting to follow this year's World Orienteering Champs in Miskloc, Hungary.

Being in the same time zone has made it possible to watch the races live, even though I have mostly seen it via the silly 'live commentary' and 'live results' thing available on the event website. I have had some regular skype sessions with Chris, so I have been able to catch up on the latest gossip. Overall Chris has been stoked with how he has gone - managing to qualify for the finals in all three

He was 34th in the middle final, which he has never run before. The middle was technically challenging, and temperatures were pretty warm! The team had a rest day, then Chris and Ross both qualified for the sprint final.

Jam up on the last control

They had to run through a zoo with tricky paths everywhere. The sprint was mostly in the forest, and Chris was really pleased with his 20th placing, the best for a NZ male in a WOC final! Then Ross came in 30th place, also a very strong result (I am excited about how fast Ross will run in Trondheim next year when he even has the luxury of his very own shoes! (-: )

Speedy Ross

The next day was the relay - some crazy things went on at the front of the men's field from the sounds of it! The top 3 runners stopped and lost their positions to help an injured fellow competitor. So the results for the men's relay were a bit meaningless in the end - still NZ came in a respectable 19th. The Norwegian women won the relay, so that was quite exciting.

Greg starting off the first leg of the relay

I talked to Chris last night before the long final and he was feeling like his legs were getting pretty tired. However, when I read the race reports this morning that is was raining, muddy and cool conditions for running I knew Chris would be loving it!

Hot temperatures again (photo is actually from Qualification)

Sure enough, sounds like he had a fantastic race finishing in 17th equal place...which is awesome!!!!!!! I am sure he will be so pleased and (I have just been reading all the comments on Maptalk) he will have appreciated all the great Kiwi support he has had on there too.

I am sure he was giggling all the way (-;

All and all it has been a great sporting week from my couch - I also have been following Team Orion Health make their way to victory in the Ecoprimal Quest, well done guys!

Thanks for the photos from: World of O and World of O Runners

Comments

NaC said…
Hi Emily,
I like your long posts - they are filled with interesting stuff, so they're fun to read. Say Congratulations to Chris from me and Nadine. Have fun over there!
Casp
August 23, 2009 at 1:22 PM
Anonymous said…
All good :-) Great to hear Chris had such awesome runs at WOC. Thanks for all the blog updates!!
August 29, 2009 at 7:39 PM
Mark said…
Nice posts Em and congrats to Chris! I'm sure we'll catch up on all the behind the scenes gossip that didn't make it onto the blog when we meet up with Cris in a couple of days.
September 3, 2009 at 1:22 AM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Journey Through the Baltic

Image
After the Rogaine we spent another fun night at the local farm stay with the other Kiwis, then headed away in the morning with Julian, Jana and Sylvia in a large silver hire van. Most of us were pretty hobbly (with the annoying exception of Chris and Julian) so we drove back to the nice wee town of Otepa and spent the day hanging out in a pizzeria and visiting the 'Canyon' the largest in Estonia apparently... This photo is actually from before the Rogaine in Tallinn when Viv had the brilliant idea of hiring the terrifying 'Octibike', it proofed a highly entertaining and attention seeking way of zooming round Tallinn. We camped in a deserted campground and it was truly freezing, so the following morning all feeling chilled to the bone we decided to find a nice cabin for that night. We drove to the town of Tartu and wandered through its pretty cobbled streets. We took a visit to the KGB museum and saw grim pictures of Ghettos in Siberia – after which we definitely n
Read more

Cloudy Peak Mission

We've been back in New Zealand for 5 months now and I haven't managed a single post! The shame! The trouble is not lack of fun trips to write about, it's lack of time afterwards to do it! I have started studying again and seem to find zero spare seconds in my day. Nevertheless, I am determined to do some trip posts again. Since Christmas there have been several 'highlight' trips, one being a 5 day sea kayak adventure we did in Marlborough Sounds, another was a week's mountain bike orienteering carnival down in central Otago. But the one which I really want to write about on here was an amazing trip I did up Cloudy Peak with my friends Grieg and Clare. It was the same weekend as Sprint theBays Orienteering up North, which Chris had decided to do. We decided we needed to do a really good trip to make him jealous. We had a three day weekend, and I foolishly left Greig entirely in charge of the trip planning without paying the slightest attention to what he had in m
Read more

Good Godzone Prep! The Takahe Traverse

Image
An exploratory adventure in Fiordland with its remoteness, steepness and dense bush holds a definite allure for those of us who enjoy that sort of thing. Since back in 2004, when we bush bashed down the Neale Burn, swimming at times up to our necks in the meandering river to avoid the near impenetrable bush on either side, packrafting seemed like the answer to Fiordland travel to me. So, with this thought in mind (and knowing that in a few months we would be racing Godzone in this exact territory), a group of trampers (myself, Chris, Nick, Dan, Georgia, Patrick) jumped aboard a watertaxi and hooned across North West Fiord in late December with a mission in mind. Our Route Earlier in the day, after frantic packing in Queenstown, we had received our certificate of 'didymo checked' from the DOC office in Te Anau. The water taxi man eyed the certificate suspiciously. He looked at us sternly, clearly unconvinced by our humongous packs, running shoes and light hearte
Read more