world orienteering
championships 2015
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Bobach went into the race as one of the favourites, and after
losing a little time early on she recovered well to finish with a
lead of nearly three minutes. Her win capped an excellent World
Championships for Denmark, who have taken four of the nine
gold medals on offer. She was ecstatic at the finish and credited
her victory to the time she had spent training in Scotland, adding
“I pushed really hard all the way, but I was in control the whole
way round. I’m so happy – it feels unreal!”
Mari Fasting of Norway took silver, while last year’s champion,
Svetlana Mironova of Russia, took bronze. For Great Britain Claire
Ward finished 36th, while Charlotte Watson, making her World
Championship debut in this race, was 29th.
However, the outstanding British performance of the day came
from Cat Taylor, who ran superbly to finish sixth, less than a
minute from a medal: another excellent result at this World
Championships to go with her fifth place in the Middle race at
Darnaway. “I’m very happy now,” said Taylor. “I can relax!”
The three medallists in the men’s race were the same as last year,
with Gueorgiou finishing in just under 100 minutes to win his third
consecutive gold medal in this discipline and the thirteenth World
Championship gold of his career. Switzerland’s Daniel Hubmann,
who won the Middle race earlier in the week, took silver, with
bronze going to Norway’s Olav Lundanes.
The British men all ran steadily, with Hector Haines finishing
17th, just 17 seconds ahead of his team mate Graham Gristwood
in 18th. Ali McLeod, from Evanton in Easter Ross, finished 26th.
McLeod acknowledged that his race hadn’t been perfect, saying “I
made some mistakes, but I kept pushing all the way and I loved
every minute of my run.”
In total around 350 athletes from 51 countries competed in Scotland
over the six races of the 2015 World Orienteering Championships.
The WOC2015 website at
www.woc2015.org
Image courtesy of Martin Ward
44 Issue 09