WOC 2008 in Czech Republic

A good crowd for the sprint final in Olomouc... orienteering until a little bit of pressure perhaps?


Late at night we arrived to the hustle and bustle of Prague. We caught a taxi to our rather shabby youth hostel with our tonnes of gear and slept until 1pm the next day! That afternoon we wandered the streets of Prague and ate pasta in the old town for dinner...a pleasant afternoon but not really taking to the 'clubbing scene' which draws Europeans to Prague we headed off to Olomouc (pronounced Olomoutz) the following day.

Olomouc is the base for this year's World Orienteering Champs (WOC). We cycled across town with huge packs strapped to our backs and arrived gratefully at the University Campus where all WOC teams stay. To our delight we were directed down a muddy little track through a wheat field to a massive mall containing 'Globus' which was soon to become the Kiwi's favorite destination due to its huge and well stocked supermarket and its multitude of cheap delicious eateries. (We were rather hungry at this stage).


Our apartment consisted of a small hall area, a tiny kitchen with all the Kiwi team members rooms off the hallway (or living area you could say). Seating in 'the living area' includes a comfortable seat in the cupboard.

Chris and I headed out for a orienteering run in the forest with the South African team in the morning and found ourselves running amongst a group of blueberry pickers. At the end of the training a thunderstorm rolled in so we scurried back to the car. The other Kiwi's turned up that afternoon and we shared stories about our Czech impressions so far.



After a couple of days training in various forests and a bit of mountain bike O on my part (and numerous visits to Globus!) the day of the sprint qualification arrived. The top 15 of each 3 heats were to go through to the final that took place that afternoon. All week the old town centre of Olomouc had been embargoed, so anticipation to watch the final and finally see the old town was rising.

Tom Reynolds had a really good first run, but not quite good enough to put him in the top 15. Chris squeaked into 15th place by 1 second and Ross stormed into 8th place in his heat.



After a lazy afternoon we caught the tram to the old town. The Finals took place in the beautiful town square with a huge and noisy crowd. Large TV screens projected the action to the crowd live via camera's out on the course, accompanied with an on coming thunderstorm the atmosphere was buzzing.



Chris took off as 2nd starter and charged around his course, but took a wrong turn and lost some time on control 1 so his overall time was not so flash, but he did pip all the Aussies. Poor Ross had a bit of a disaster in the form of some forgotten shoes at the start line, so he had too borrow some extremely large ones... not the recipe for a speedy sprint but I guess that's one mistake he will never repeat.



The finish was exciting and the Gold was taken out by a flying Russian. We ate dinner in the town at a local pizzeria as the light faded and the dripping cafe umbrellas dried out.

Tom had to head back to New Zealand the following day, having come to Europe principally for JWOC university was now pressing. However Georgia, Tessa and Todd had come to spectate, generally hang out and run the public races. While the guys had a rest day we (Jim, Maja and myself) headed to the Public race. Seeing as we were entering on the day we ran the 'Open category' which was a 8.8km, long and 380m climb! A whoper for me, but I managed it in a respectable time.

We had a cool finish charging down through the ruined terraces of an old castle. On the way out you wandered through the castle and amongst pavillions selling beer and sausages to hundreds of hungry orienteers... a bit different from a PAPO event!

Today was the Long Qualification which Neil, Ross and Mike were running. It was the first race for Neil and Mike, but they had trained well and were psyched to give it everything. Up on the grassy hill at the start a cool wind was blowing - ideal conditions for running. Neil raced into the finish first to our raucous cries of 'Go go go!' Ross came in with a pack of top runners and qualified in 15th place....tight, but he made it. Neil and Michael sadly missed out on qualifying in their heats having both had average runs.


I ran the open grade again that afternoon.. another 8km with 27 controls! I zipped round the first 11 very nicely but after that things went downhill through the swampy forest terrain.. it was a bit of a relief to finish. So tomorrow is another rest day for all, then Thursday brings the middle qualification and final both on the same day with a spectator race sandwitched in between, it will be an exciting day!

The WOC website has pretty good live coverage so check that out if you want to see the action.

I will post again with results from tomorrow!

Emily