The World Orienteering Championships (WOC) commence tomorrow in Kiev, Ukraine. Live coverage will be available from the web site http://www.woc2007.org.ua/

Australia has a team of 5 men and 5 women, including defending Sprint Orienteering World Champion Hanny Allston from Tasmania. Hanny has been training hard and is also capable of winning the Long Distance as well, as her 2.45 marathon debut in January this year demonstrates.

As ever, Hanny's greatest rival will be the Swiss multiple World Champion (12 gold medals in 5 years) Simone Niggli, but the Finns Minna Kauppi and Heli Jukola have been running well recently.

Last year Hanny combined with Jo Allison and Grace Elson for 4th place in the Relay, and will be hoping to break into the top 3 this year.

Troy de Haas and Julian Dent will be looking for top 10 placings in the Sprint and Middle Distance events.

The terrain and expected warm conditions in the Ukraine should suit the Aussie team, which is known as the Boomerangs. Their blog is at http://www.auswoc2007.blogspot.com/

Start times for the Sprint Qualification races are now available on the WOC website. Kiev is 7 hrs behind Eastern Australia time, and 5 behind WA. The first starters are at 3pm local time (10pm EST, 8pm WST), and the races are 2-3km, so the faster runners will take around 13-15 minutes. If you're not familiar with orienteering, this may seem slow, but bear in mind the runners don't know the course until they are given a map at their start time. They have to visit up to 20-25 control points during the course, using the map to find them. I'd guess the top men will be running at the equivalent of 8/8.5 3000m pace when they are not actually slowing to punch a control point.

There are 3 heats, with the top 15 in each heat going through to the final, which will be just before the closing ceremony next Sunday (26th). Australian starters are:
Men: 3.03pm Julian Dent, 3.25pm Rob Walter, 3.30pm Troy de Haas.
Women: 3.57pm Anna Sheldon, 3.58pm Grace Elson, 4.12pm Hanny Allston, 4.16pm Kathryn Ewels

All 3 men, are a strong chance to make the finals, while Grace and Kathryn might just get there too. Hanny will be favourite in her heat, and expect her to win, which would give her one of the favoured last starter positions in the final.

You can watch Hanny's World Championship win from last year at http://www.veoh.com/videos/v5508884HDgNMwf?c=wootv

Julian Dent through to the final - 12th in a tough heat in 13:28, won by one of the hot favourites Thierry Gueorgiou of France in 12:15. Unfortunately Rob Walter missed the final by one place, and Troy de Haas doesn't seem to have fired today.

Waiting now for the women to start.

Hanny, Grace Elson and Kathryn Ewels all into the final! Hanny finished an easy 3rd in her heat, Kathryn 10th and Grace 12th. However, former World Champ and 2nd last year, Simone Niggli of Switzerland is obviously in good form - 1st in her heat, almost a minute faster than Hanny. The final will again be a case of waiting for Simone, who will probably be the last starter.

The races today are the qualifying heats for the Long Distance final, which will be run on Thursday. While Hanny is the Sprint Distance World Champion, the Long Distance is probably her best event. However, its also the best event for Simone Niggli, the Norwegian Marianne Andersen, and the Finn Minna Kauppi. Hanny starts at 10.06am (5.06m EST, 3.06pm WST).

Kathryn Ewels starts at 9.38 and Anna Sheldon at 10.04. In the Men, Reuben Smith is starting for the Boomerangs at 10.09, and David Shepherd at 10.43. Once again, there are 3 heats in both men and women, with the first 15 in each heat progressing to the final. Hanny should again qualify easily, and Kathryn and Shep also have good prospects of making the final.

In the men's race, all the Finns, Norwegians, Russians, Swedes and Swiss would be expected to qualify, along with 1 or 2 from each of the other major European nations. The favourite again this year is 2006 Champion Jani Lakanen of Finland.

In contrast to yesterday's sprint races, which were mostly in a park, with some forested areas, the Long Distance is entirely in forest. The men will be running around 10km and the women 6-7km. Winners will take around 55-60 mins for the men and 45-50 mins for the women. There will be aome intermediate timing points - don't know how many as the live coverage at the web site is down at the present time.

Great run by Anna Sheldon to qualify in 6th place in heat C. Hanny qualified 10th in heat B. Kathryn, Shep and Reuben all missed by around 3 minutes.

Two Kiwis will run in the finals - Tania Robinson had a great 5th place in Women B heat, and Chris Forne was 12th in Men A.

All the favourites survived - Simone Niggli won her heat by 3 minutes from Minna Kauppi who is probably 2nd favourite, and it looks like she will add to her record 12 gold medals tally.

thanks for the updates simmo.
keep em coming mate.
like the blog too.
bro.

Thanks Undercover Brother - glad you're enjoying it!

Today was the last of the qualifying races, and after a rest day tomorrow, the real business gets under way, with the Middle Distance final on Wednesday, Long Distance on Thursday, Relay on Saturday, and the Sprint final on Sunday.

In today's Middle Distance (women 4kms, men 5kms) in very complex and apparently quite thick and bushy forest, all three Aussie women and one Aussie man qualified for the final, which will be held on Wednesday.

Hanny Allston had a great run to finish 2nd in her heat, and she will start either 2 minutes before or 2 minutes after Simone Niggli (who was also 2nd in her heat) in the Final. Julian Dent also had a scorcher to finish 3rd in his heat. Grace Elson and Jo Allison also qualified, while Troy de Haas and Rob Walter missed out. Web link was dodgy, and full results have not been posted yet, so not sure about the Kiwis, except the commentary mentioned that Ross Morrison qualified.

Just to summarise - Hanny has qualified for all 3 finals, and must be a chance for a place in at least one of them. Julian Dent and Grace Elson are in two finals (sprint and middle), and Anna Sheldon (long), Kathryn Ewels (sprint) and Jo Allison (middle) are through as well. Grace, Jo and Hanny are obviously in good form, which bodes well for the relay. Simone Niggli from Switzerland is also in all 3 finals, giving her 4 opportunities including the relay to add to her tally of 12 WOC gold medals.

There are some great photos on the WOC web site http://www.woc2007.org.ua/ , and some videos of the action on the World of O web site http://worldofo.com/

Hi Simmo

I also wanted to say thank you for the updates!

Good to see that Hanny has run so well to be well placed for all of the finals.

Cheers

Andrew

Tomorrow (Wednesday) sees the first of the WOC Finals - the Middle Distance. Start times have been posted on the WOC website.

Some background: In orienteering, competitors start at intervals - in the Middle Distance the interval is 2 minutes. The interval basically prevents you from seeing which routes previous runners have taken from the Start. In the WOC the start times are based on qualifying race results, with the fastest qualifiers starting last. At this level, it is unusual to gain 2 minutes on the runner in front, unless they make a navigation mistake. This can happen, resulting in groups forming. While competitors are not allowed to collude, two or more runners together looking for the same control point will often find it quicker than one. Also, if you've caught someone, you have effectively gained 2 minutes on them, so you want to stay with them to maintain that advantage. If you are one of the favourites, your opponent may be happy to stay with you hoping to be dragged into a good time.

So, where are the Aussies starting tomorrow? In the Men's race, Julian Dent finished 3rd in his qualifier, and is the 6th-last starter. He is sandwiched between two Norwegians who happen to be two of the top-rated runners in the world. 2 minutes ahead is Anders Nordberg, winner of this year's O-Ringen (biggest orienteering event in the world with 15-20,000 competitors, while last year's Middle Distance World Champion Holger Hott is 2 minutes behind. If Julian can stay with these guys he will get a podium (top 6) finish, if not a medal.

Jo Allison and Grace Elson are starting 4 minutes apart, and between them is New Zealander Tania Robinson. These 3 could well surprise and perform better than many of the faster qualifiers.

Hanny Allston is the 5th-last starter, 2 minutes behind Swiss multiple World Champion Simone Niggli, who in turn is starting 2 minutes behind last year's runner-up Marianne Andersen of Norway. Provided she doesn't make a mistake, Hanny should stay ahead of the 4 runners behind her. Simone will definitely be trying to catch Marianne, and if either makes a mistake, Hanny can catch them and win the race. Even if she doesn't catch them on the course, I believe the race is between these three, and Hanny can win by keeping mistakes to a minimum.

The broadcast will commence at 9.30am (4.30pm EST, 2.30pm WST) with the women's race, followed by the men at 11.11am. The last woman starts at 10.59am and Hanny is at 10.51, so as the race should take around 30-35 minutes, it will be really exciting at around 6.30pm EST. The final moments of the men's race will be at around 8.00pm EST.

Have been too busy to report, so now there are two races to tell about - and two races still to go.

First up, the Middle Distance run on Wednesday, and won easily by the two favourites, Thierry Guergiou of France and Simone Niggli of Switzerland. 'Tero' won his 4th Middle Distance gold, after missing out last year, taking just over 32 mins for 6kms of very tough terrain (see map reference below), and winning by over 2 minutes. This is the equivalent of Buster Mottram winning a 5000m world champs by the length of the straight - and half the bend as well! Simone also won by over a minute, 32.13 for 5kms. Middle Distance is not Hanny Allston's favourite discipline, and she was also suffering from a stomach complaint, but she battled into 13th place, the best ever by an Australian in middle distance. Grace Elson finished 32nd and Jo Allison 44th. Julian Dent was caught by last year's champion Holger Hott, and raced him for most of the 6km to finish in 24th, 6 minutes down on Tero, but only 4 minutes behind the silver medal.

Today was the long distance, with 18.2km for the men, 12.9 for the women, in 33 degree heat. We had no men in the final, which was won by nearly 4 minutes by the young Swiss runner Matthias Merz from 2005 champion Andrey Khramov of Russia. Hanny Allston and Anna Sheldon were running for Australia in the women's final, and Hanny was easily the best of the early starters, leading 'in the clubhouse' for most of the day. It came down to the last 6 or 8 runners, with the Finns Minna Kauppi and Heli Jukkola eventually tying for first, just ahead of Simone Niggli. Hanny remained in 6th place, 4 minutes down, and equalling her 2005 podium finish. Anna finished a very creditable 30th. Just a few years ago we could never have envisioned one of our women beating all the Swedes at a WOC long distance, let alone achieving 2 podium finishes at 21 years of age - well done Hanny!

Route choice tracking: the following link gives a map for the middle distance with the routes for the top 6 runners. You can show each route separately, or compare all the runners, and you can also replay a simulated race, which shows that Tero took the lead at control 5 and just went further and further ahead.
http://2007.woc2006.dk/files/routes/event....nt=2007-08-22-m
Change the last letter of the link from 'm' to 'f' and you will get the women's race - Simone led from the start, but only pulled away over the last few controls. Notice how 'green' the map appears; green on an orienteering map indicates thick bush. The lightest shade of green is 'slow running', the darkest is 'fight' (literally!). Also notice the contour detail - lots of small hills and depressions, and very confusing to navigate through.

Tomorrow is a rest day - its actually Ukraine's National Day. On Saturday is the Relay, and with the impressive form of last year's winners Finalnd (women) and Russia (men) in the long race today, its obvious they will be hard to beat again.

Have got the live audio of the women's relay up
http://woc2007.org.ua/live/audiostream.html

1st leg has been completed, Sweden and Russia in the lead, Jo Allison in a group just over 3 mins behind. Usually in a relay however, the lead will change dramatically throughout the race.

The courses are 'forked', that is runners go to slightly different control points, and they are not told which fork they are on. There are several forks in the course, so that maybe only 5 or 6 out of 40-odd competitors are running exactly the same course.

Grace Elson running the 2nd leg for Australia, still in the 2nd group of runners, about 4 mins behind the leaders.

Grace Elson made up 3 places to 8th, then Hanny made up 2 minutes and one place - couldn't quite catch the 6th team, so finished 7th, just missed the podium. Favourites Finland won, from Sweden and Norway - the 3 most successful teams in 50 years of World Championships.

Men have started, first leg completed with Troy de Haas 11th, in a large group only 2 minutes behind the leaders Finland and Russia.

Australia finished 13th in the Men's relay, 9 minutes down on the winners, pre-race favourites Russia. Sweden and Finland took silver and bronze. Julian Dent maintained 11th place in the 2nd leg, but Rob walter was passed by Estonia and Czech Republic on the final leg.

Tomorrow is the last event, the finals of the Sprint Distance, at which Hanny Allston is defending World Champion. The men will be starting first, from 9.30am (4.30pm EST), with Julian Dent starting at 9.42, 2 minutes behind defending champion Emil Wingstedt of Sweden. However, look out for some of the later starters, especially home favourite Yuri Omeltchenko of the Ukraine, long distance winner Matthias Merz of Switzerland, and the middle distance winner Thierry Gueorgiou of France, all in very good form.

The women's race starts from 10.21 (5.21pm EST), but Hanny has one of the favoured late starting positions at 10.59. The race won't be over until the very last starter (11.06) and hot favourite Simone Niggli, finishes. In their current form, we can't discount the Finnish joint winners of the long distance, Minna Kauppi and Heli Jukkola. Grace Elson starts at 10.32 and Kathryn Ewels 10.39, and they will do very well if they can get into the top 15.

Sprint race has started, have the live coverage audio and results display. The mens race is first, Julian Dent has started, current leader is from Finland in 15min22sec.

Julian finished 5th in 15.55, 40 secs behind defending champion Emil Wingstedt who leads at the moment. Chris Forne NZ is 6th. However, Wingstedt says he made some mistakes, so later runners will probably overtake him.

Amazing race between the two last starters, gold medallist in the middle distance Thierry Gueorgiou (Fra) and gold medallist long distance Matthias Merz (Sui), with Gueorgiou winning by 0.9 sec. Julian eventually 22nd 1min11 behind.

Simone Niggli a clear winner to go with her middle distance win, and her 12th gold medal at WOCs. Hanny in 9th place, 1min 20secs behind. Grace Elson finished in 30th, 2.36 behind - a very good run. Kathryn Ewels was 46th.

That's the WOC for 2007, not as good as last year for Australia, but still pretty good - best nation outside Europe. Next year is in the Czech Republic from July 10-20 2008.