Event Spotlight: JK 2024

The annual Jan Kjellström International Festival of Orienteering took place from 29 March – 1 April 2024 in the heart of the East Midlands. In this blog, we reflect on the incredible efforts of the volunteers who hosted this year’s event and share some of the key moments from each day.

Day 1 – Sprint Race and Pre-O at Loughborough University

The event kicked off at Loughborough University, where the atmosphere quickly became eclectic the more participants arrived at the venue. Alongside the sprint race and World Ranking Event, a Pre-O course was also made available courtesy of British Trail Orienteering. Participants also had the opportunity to take part in Biathlon Orienteering, which returned to the event after taking place at JK 2018.

All images are credited to Rob Lines and Wendy Carlyle.

Aside of a few unforgiving downpours, the weather held for the majority of the day, giving participants the opportunity to navigate the map area (1:4,000 2.0m contour interval to ISSOM 2007, updated in 2023 by Peter Hornsby).

As the final runners made their way across the course, it was soon time for the awards ceremonies to take place.

First up the WRE flower and award ceremonies took place, after which it was time for the British Orienteering Annual Awards! British Orienteering’s CEO Peter Hart presented the awards to winners of the Club, Coach, Volunteer and Mapping Awards 2023. If you missed out on who won the awards, please visit this link. Next the UK Urban League 2023 Awards took place, followed by the JK Sprint Race medals. Well done to everyone who received an award and was recognised for their efforts over the past year.

Results

The results from Day 1 are available here. Congratulations to the winners of all age categories including:

Trail O PreO results

Access the results from the TrailO PreO course here. Well done to the winners!

Day 2 – Middle Race at Beaudesert

Day’s 2 and 3 of JK 2024 moved to Beaudesert where participants of the Long and Middle Race navigated the forested area with streams and marshes, and intricate contouring and the famous bell-pits (deep holes with raised edges) proliferating.

Glorious blue skies greeted everyone on arrival and throughout the day as everyone embarked on the challenges of Beaudesert. The wet weather of recent months ensured a muddier and wetter challenge than usual in the area, but this didn’t stop over 2,000 people pushing themselves

W21E and M21E courses

There was a couple of controls that were misplaced (as in placed in the wrong place not lost) which impacted W21E and M21E courses.

Following some protests to the organiser and controller a judgement was made in that the W21E course was made VOID and the M21E course results were “truncated”.

Results

The results from Day 2 are available here. Congratulations to the winners!

Day 3 – Long Race at Beaudesert

It was a misty start for participants back at Beaudesert for the Long Race on Day 3 of JK 2024. Orienteers made their way into the forested area, exploring the much wider forest and challenges compared to the previous day.

Results

The results from Day 3 are available here. Congratulations to the winners!

Day 4 – Relay Race at Stanton Moor

The event closed with the Relay Race which headed into the Peak District at Stanton Moor.

As the relay teams battled the elements to win the JK trophy and it was the FVO Flyers who took first place, followed by Interlopers N and Interlopers S in third place.

In the junior relay, it was SYO Buzzy BEEs (SYO) who took the win, with ‘WE Cambridge, we saw, we conquered’ (WOAC) coming in second place, and ‘NOR wreaking HAVOC’ (HAVOC/NOR) finishing in third! Well done to all.

Results

The results from Day 4 are available here. Congratulations to the winners!

A link to overall results from JK 2024 is available here.

Thank you to all involved in this year’s event

Special thanks must go to the army of volunteers who helped put the event together this year. From those manning the general enquiries stalls, to recording the results, tending to the sponsors stalls, and of course our planners, mappers and controllers  especially in the face of unprecedented weather conditions in the lead up to this year's event.

A special thanks must go the clubs that organsied each day:

LEI, WCH and DVO.

We would also like to extend a huge ‘thank you’ to the four fantastic Day sponsors for the JK 2024:

Day 1: Altra / Shokz

Days 2/3: Revive / Instinct Trail

Day 4: Inov8

Whether it was trying the Altra shoes for yourself at the Sprint, testing the Revive supplements which are driving our GB athletes to the WOC, utilising the great trail packs from Instinct for the long JK event or grabbing some fantastic inov8 gear, we hope you enjoyed having them at the event! All competitors will have received an email packed full of discount codes from our sponsors too!

Final word from our CEO Peter Hart

“The Jan Kjellström as always was a large and complex event, was nothing short of spectacular, and it truly exemplified the dedication and passion you all have for our sport.

Every aspect of the event was executed well, and It was evident that meticulous planning and hard work went into making it a memorable experience for all the participants.

Beyond just this event, I want to express our appreciation for the ongoing contribution you make to the sport. Your unwavering commitment to creating opportunities for athletes of all ages and abilities is truly commendable. Events like these not only showcase the talent within the sport but also inspire future generations.”
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Images from the event can be found via Rob Lines or Wendy Carlyle’s Flickr accounts. With huge thanks to them both for volunteering to take photos of the event. You can also read an interview with coordinator of this year's event, Andy Yeates via this link.