Orientation | Crossing the river caused an uproar at the European Championships in orienteering – the track master was apparently not aware of the rule

“Incomprehensible moka”, wrote the value race planner of the past years and has since worked as track master Tuomo Mäkelä on Twitter on Friday.

“It feels wrong,” said the Spaniard, who worked as an orienteering coach in Norway Raul Ferra.

Here are a couple of statements in the commotion that arose from the track master’s work in Thursday’s long-distance race at the European Championships in Estonia.

“I don’t remember such a match happening before,” said the top orienteering expert from Joensuu Börje Vartiainen on Saturday for HS.

Vartiainen is one of Finland’s most distinguished track champions and has acted in that role at the Sotkamo World Championships in 2013, the Jukola relay in 2000 and several World Championships.

Vartiainen has a basis for comparison, as he has toured almost all the prestigious competitions of the sport since 1987 and is still present in Estonia.

“There has never been such a polemic related to the prohibited area and track master’s work,” Vartiainen said.

I’m on guard according to this, it was practically the case that the long-distance track champion of the European Championships did not know the current rules for crossing the river.

The competition area in the Rakvere region was crossed by a river. Based on old maps, the Finnish team, for example, knew how to speculate quite correctly that that river was crossed at the longest cross-section of both the men’s and women’s course, which was approximately three kilometers long.

Two bridges had been built across the river at a distance of about a kilometer from each other. According to Vartiainen, this partly explained that the track master was not aware of the current rule that you can cross the river from anywhere if the river is not marked on the map as a prohibited area.

“Here it happened that the track master didn’t know the rules of the sport and the supervisor didn’t know the rules of the sport.”

Before According to Vartiainen, the matter was brought up during the competition at the team leaders’ meeting, and possibly because of the language barrier, confusion arose in some teams so that the information did not reach the athletes.

There was a road leading to the second bridge in the direction of entry, but its use was blocked in a prohibited area, which was of course marked on the map but also on the terrain.

The end result was that many orienteers went around the forbidden area to the left, crossing the river. It didn’t require swimming or holding a map in your teeth, wading was enough. According to reports, the water was up to the waist at most.

Some orienteers, including the men’s EC bronze winner Elias Kuukkacircumnavigated the forbidden area by running in the river near its bank so that the water was only halfway up the leg.

But the circuit master’s idea was apparently that the forbidden area should be bypassed on the right, and thus cross the river via the bridge. This option was slower, but despite that, Sweden won the race in the end Martin Regborn chose it.

Vartiainen knows Finland’s current head coach very well Thierry Gueorgioubecause the Frenchman represented Kalevan Rasti from Joensuu throughout his top career, whose representation team Vartiainen led for a long period.

“As far as I understand, it was Thierry who strongly raised the question of whether to cross the river at the team leaders’ meeting. The Finnish team knew that the river could be crossed.”

Despite this, for one reason or another, Finns at least Miika Kirmula (10th in men) and Enni Jalava (women’s 12th) went around the forbidden area on the longer route from the right.

Vartiainen said he asked about the Finnish team because Kirmula represents Kalevan Rasti.

“I have not received an answer to that. It would seem that the winner Regborn made a conscious choice here and went around, because there are always risks involved in these situations. If the water in the river is cold, it can become stiff and it’s not so nice to run in wet conditions.”

Vartiainen said that even during the race, the course master had said in the field interview that those who crossed the river from other than the marked crossing places would be rejected.

“Then he was enlightened a bit, and the sound changed in the clock.”

Bronze medalist Elias Kuukka’s personal trainer Seppo Väli-Klemelä reminded that according to the current rules you can cross the river even by swimming.

Of the six medalists, only Regborn went around the forbidden area on the right at a long tick distance.

The river was also crossed a second time, but with a clearly shorter crossing distance. There, in addition to Regborn, also the winner of the women’s race Venla Harju crossed the river by a bridge, but the other medalists took a more direct route, wading across the river.

“Fortunately, this did not decide the top positions. Yes, competitors should know the rules. It should not have been unclear to anyone that they were not allowed to go to that river. But it’s strange if the team wasn’t informed that the river was shallow,” said Väli-Klemelä, known as a multi-tasker in orienteering.

Väli-Klemelä stated that Gueorgiou was known, among other things, in his career that brought 14 World Championship golds, for being very meticulous in preparing for the competition.

“When Finland has Thierry as the head coach, things like this will certainly not go unaddressed,” said Väli-Klemelä, who, like Vartiainen, will follow the games in Estonia.