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Julian Dent had a great qualifying run on Monday placing 10th in a field which read like a Who's Who of the orienteering sprinting elite. Simon Uppill also had a good run to qualify but there was a veritable battalion of Australian girls including Grace Crane, Rachel Effeney, Felicity Brown, Mace Neve, Jasmine Neve, Aislinn Prendergast, Kathryn Preston and Anna Sheldon whose great performances saw them all getting places in the final.
The Sprint Final at Wellington College was highly technical and demanded full concentration. Minor mistakes were severely punished with even some veteran campaigners being caught out by the tricky detail. Helena Janssen found herself on what looked like a perfect route along the red line only to end up staring at an uncrossable fence she had somehow missed in her route planning. Tove Alexandersson made the same mistake but was able to adjust and pick up the pace to take the title. Home grown talent Lizzie Ingham had a great race to take a very popular 3rd place. The men's final was hugely competitive as was to be expected, with mere seconds separating places. Mattias Kyberz, recently profiled in the IOF e-magazine, Inside Orienteering, was the winner, with Jerker Lysell of Sweden preventing the Swiss three Mattias' taking out all the top placings. Julian Dent was the best of the Australians with a 13th place, Simon Uppill placing 17th. Amongst the girls Grace Crane topped the Australian listings with 18th place and Rachel Effeney in 21st spot. Special note must be made of Felicity Brown who, in her first time representing Australia at World Cup level, delivered a very creditable performance in 28th place.
Sprint Final results:
Women:1st Tove Alexandersson Sweden,2nd Annika Billstam Sweden,3rd Lizzie Ingham New Zealand
Men: 1st Mattias Kyburz Switzerland, 2nd Jerker Lysell Sweden, 3rd Mattias Merz Switzerland
The first of the World Cup races at Oceania were held yesterday at Waikawa on the west coast of New Zealand's north island. The world's best orienteers had primed themselves for a stunning display of technical prowess and pure speed which delighted the spectators who lined the banks of the nearby estuary to watch the action.
For many of the international runners, this was their first trip to New Zealand but that didn't mean that the terrain came as a surprise. The Danes in particular felt at home in the technical sand dune areas mapped especially for these races, which are very similar to their own training areas in Denmark. Fabian Hertner of Switzerland held off Swedes Johan Runesson and Jerker Lysell to win the men's race, whilst champion Helena Jansson (Sweden) won the women's race with Ida Bobach (Denmark) and Tatyana Riabkina (Russia) hot on her heels.
Julian Dent, NSW, was the best of the Australians in 27th place in a race where the times were as tightly packed as those of a sprint race.
The next race for these international elites is the Sprint Qualification which takes place around Wellington on Monday with the Sprint finals on Tuesday.
After two days of running in soft dune terrain you might have been expecting NSW runners legs to be a bit sore for the first of the Australia/NZ Challenge races but Lynn Dabbs (Western Hills) and Maureen Ogilvie (Uringa) showed their stamina by winning their classes yesterday in New Zealand.
The New Zealanders dominated on their home turf and swept the majority of classes. The terrain was challenging for the Australians who rarely come across soft complex dune terrain in their national races, but the mapping of this new area for NZ was excellent and highly readable. Course setter Yvette Baker set a thoroughly enjoyable competition for the runners with courses which provided an interesting mix of short and longer legs, combined with quick changes of direction over the highly technical area.
There were good performances from the NSW contingent, with the Central Coast club having a particularly rewarding outing; Nick Dent 3rd, Colin Price 10th (M60A), Julia Prudhoe 3rd, Hilary Wood 12th (W55A), Robyn Pallas 5th (W60A) and Marianne Birch 4th (W21C). Newcastle's Russell Blatchford was 6rd (M50A) with Michael Burton 8th, Daniel Hill GO (M16A) Lawrence Jones UR 10th, Aidan Dawson GO 12th (M18A), Matthew Hill GO 9th (M20A), Kasimir Gregory NTOC 6th (M21E), Fedor Ishakova BNN 3rd M21A, Dale Wallace WP 3rd (M21AS), James Lithgow GO 7th (M55A), Peter Shepherd IKN 8th (M60A), Ross Barr GO 9th (M65A), Basil Baldwin GS 10th (M70A). Joanna Hill GO took 2nd with Sophie Jones UR 6th in W12A, Katie Wallace WP 3rd (W14B), Georgia Jones UR 7th (W16A), Nicola Blatchford NC 10th (W18A), Michele Dawson GO 8th(W20A), Barbara Hill GO 10th (W40A), Barbara Dawson GO 7th (W40AS), Debbie Davey WR 5th(W55A) and Jean Baldwin GS 2nd (W70A).
After a rest day the Oceania carnival moves on to the Sprint races in Wellington on Tuesday.
And you don't get much stronger than Julian Dent winning the Men's A. Julian had a cracking set of races in amongst some great competition which included World Orienteering Championship veterans, up and coming youngsters and European internationals stopping off on their way to the World Cup in NZ later in January. NSW had two other top 10 placings with Rob Preston at 5th and Kasimir Gregory at 9th. Grace Crane dominated the Women's A class; our best result was Lisa Grant from Garingal who has made the transition from summer street orienteer to forest force to be reckoned with.
The 5 day carnival was particularly challenging as each day provided a very different type of terrain, preventing runners from relaxing into the maps. Day 1 was traditional spur/gully running in the Chiltern Box-Ironbark National Park, followed on Day 2 at Barambogie, a model map produced for the Australian Champs in 2003, which provided steep slopes, granite and even a sprinkling of pine forest. Day 4 Rowdy Flat, that gold mining favorite, was a tester for all age classes with clever course setting by Blair Trewin making sure everyone worked hard on that tricky map. Temperatures stayed the comfortable side of warm, avoiding the high fire risk which the organisers had worried might interfere with the smooth running of the carnival.
With plenty of top ten results in the competition classes NSW had a great competition. Notables in the combined overall results were:
Men's B Matt Hill 6th
Women's B Phoebe Dent 4th,
Men's C Daniel Hill 6th
Women's C Paula Savolainen 1st, Carolyn Matthews 4th, Cath Chalmers 5th, Hillary Wood 6th,
Men's D Eoin Rothery 1st, Steve Flick 2nd, Robert Preston 5th, Gordon Wilson 6th,
Women's D Toy Martin 5th, Men's E Dave Lotty 4th,
Women's E Caroline Taurany 3rd, Caroline Rogers 5th, Becky Rogers 6th
Men's F Duncan Currie 3rd, Sam Rogers 4th
Women's F Joanna Hill 1st
Men's G Ewan Shingler 1st, Jared McKenna 2nd, Tom Kennedy 4th
Novice Ellen Currie 1st, Nea Shingler 3rd, Oscar Power 5th
Full results can be found on the Christmas 5 Day website here
