JWOC 2023: Long Distance and Forest Relays Round up

Now that the Junior World Orienteering Championships and final results have been published, we look back on the last two days of the competition.

Day 5: Long Distance

The Long Event took place on Friday and was the last of the Individual races. There was double gold for Czechia with Lucie Dittrichova and Jakub Chapoupsky winning the women’s and men’s race respectively, and with after almost an hour of running, only 1 second separated gold and silver in the women’s event.

For the British Athletes, Euan Tryner was the leading athlete securing a top 20 finish in the men’s event, with Jim Bailey continuing his good running form to finish 27th. Rachel Duckworth was the first women home in 49^th place.

Results

Day 6: Forest Relays

On Saturday provided the final event of the competition took place – the Forest Relays. 54 men’s teams and 43 women’s teams took to the start line at the Cavnic Arena, with Czechia and Hungary taking the top spots respectively.

In the men’s relay, Sweden came in first on the first change, but Jim Bailey was not far behind. James Hammond and Euan Tryner kept the team in top 6 contention but eventually concluded the race in 7^th place.

The women’s relay team, made up of Imogen Pieters, Rachel Brown and Isobel Howard; also had a good race to finish in 7th position. In an event fixture where the leads completely changed, it quickly became clear that the last leg of the race would be decisive and that a sprint finish would decide who took the medals. Ultimately, it was Sweden’s Alma Svennerud who crossed the finish line first, though as she didn’t punch the second spectator control, she was consequently disqualified, and the gold medal went to Hungarian women’s team.

That concludes our coverage of JWOC 2023 this year. We would like to thank all who attended the event and shared photos of the athletes with us, and well done to all our team for their fantastic efforts throughout the competition! With thanks to JWOC Official for all the above photos of the event.

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Countdown to the World Orienteering Championships 2023

The next International event is the World Orienteering Championships 2023 held in Switzerland where the team are in their final preparations before the Middle Qualification on Wednesday. Learn more about who is part of this year’s team in our news story.