European Ski Orienteering Championships: Middle distance golds to Russia and Norway
Posted on | February 13, 2013 | Category: News
The winning trio: Anastasia Kravchenko RUS, Yulia Tarasenko RUS, Mervi Pesu FIN. Photo: Erik Borg
Gold medals went to Russian and Norwegian athletes in today’s Middle distance race. Yuliya Tarasenko and Hans Jørgen Kvåle were the victorious athletes at the end of two hard-fought races.
Yuliya Tarasenko is IOF world-ranked number 3 and won the Long race in Switzerland on the SkiO Tour in January. Today she was fastest throughout and finished with a convincing victory of 56 seconds over her compatriot and yesterday’s gold medallist Anastasia Kravchenko. The bronze medal was most unexpectedly taken by Finland’s Mervi Pesu, who is making a come-back in international competition – her last significant results were a 3rd and a 4th place in World Cup events back in 2008. She is most remembered, though, for taking the bronze medal in the Long race at the World Ski Orienteering Championships in 2002 in Bulgaria.
The men’s race was a very close affair. Hans Jørgen Kvåle has for some time achieved consistently high results in international SkiO and is 2nd in the IOF World Rankings, but this was his first major success. It was very close, though, with victory by just 6 seconds ahead of the very experienced Finn Staffan Tunis. Third, a further 4 seconds down was Andrei Lamov, Russia, who was leading up to the spectator control.
Hans Jørgen Kvåle on his way to victory. Photo: Erik Borg
Further reports and comments from leading competitors in each day’s races can be found in the Around the Arena section at the foot of the IOF Home Page.
Tomorrow is the Long distance race, with mass starts.
Leading results
Women
- Yuliya Tarasenko RUS 40:35
- Anastasia Kravchenko RUS 41:31
- Mervi Pesu FIN 41:51
- Sonja Mörsky FIN 42:07
- Josefine Engström SWE 42:15
- Tatyana Kozlova RUS 42:27
Men
- Hans Jørgen Kvåle NOR 42:39
- Staffan Tunis FIN 42:45
- Andrei Lamov RUS 42:49
- Peter Arnesson SWE 43:16
- Andreas Holmberg SWE 44:30
- Kiril Veselov RUS 44:36
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