Poll: Orienteering Achievement of 2014 - Men

» Runner profile Søren Bobach

    Vote for Søren Bobach

Story
Søren Bobach was an extreme talent as a junior. Already at the age of 17 the Dane won the JWOC middle distance - earning him a nomination for the Junior of the Year 2006. Bobach continued to run well as a junior - taking JWOC medals both in 2008 and 2009. As a senior he has struggled a lot with injuries. After a really long break in 2012/13, he started all over in May 2013 when he could start running again. With only 91 hours of running in 2013 and 167 hours of running in 2014, he surprised the orienteering world by taking the gold medal at WOC sprint in Venice. - You hear about people who run maybe 600h a year. I can't run that many hours. My bones would simply fall apart, Bobach comments.

» Runner profile Oleksandr Kratov

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Story
Oleksandr Kratov has shown for years that he is a master of technical orienteering. Famous for putting in a lot of extreme orienteering technical trainings - if possible in darkness. In 2013 he was part of the Ukrainian WOC bronze team - but individually Kratov has struggled to take the step up onto the podium in World Cup races or in the international championships. 2014 has been a turning point for the Ukrainian: In the spring he won two very different World Cup races: A technical middle distance in Spain and a tough long distance in Norway. Then in Italy in july the pinnacle of the career so far: Bronze at the World Orienteering Championships in Asiago, Italy.

    Vote for Rune Haraldsson

Story
For most 96 years old, traveling from Sweden to Brazil is a challenge too big to master. Rune Haraldsson did a lot more than that. As the only starter in Men 95, the Swede fought only against himself - but what a challenge! Mastering horrible rainy weather at the sprint qualification and fighting the Brazilian "jungle" in hot weather at the long distance. The long distance took Haraldsson one hour and 51 minutes - but he never gave up. Haraldsson could finally return to Sweden with gold at both WMOC sprint and WMOC long. It is incredible how a man in this age can manage this.
Photo: Peter Holgersson

» Runner profile Olav Lundanes

    Vote for Olav Lundanes

Story
Olav Lundanes is known as a man for the long, tough races with gold medals from WOC long distance in Norway in 2010 and Switzerland in 2012. He has showed many times earlier that he can also master the middle distance, but had yet to succeed in the biggest occasion - WOC. The preparations for the race were special: Lundanes struggled a lot in 2013, and decided to stop the 2013-season already in June and take a long break. In 2014 he was back in shape - but disappointed himself severely by "only" taking bronze at WOC long distance. Two days later the Norwegian shaked of the disappointment and took the WOC middle gold. From that day on Lundanes has also topped the World Ranking list in orienteering.

» Runner profile Daniel Hubmann

    Vote for Daniel Hubmann

Story
2014 was the first season back in full training after the achilles rupture at EOC in Falun in 2012 for Daniel Hubmann. The Swiss showed that he was back better than ever - starting with a win in the first World Cup race in Turkey - and continuing with a impressive 5 World Cup wins and 3 second places. In addition Hubmann took two individual EOC gold medals, two individual WOC silver medal and the WOC relay silver with Switzerland. In the end Hubmann stood alone at the top of the overall World Cup podium with 1059 points - more than twice the number of points as Fabian Hertner in second with 519 points.

» Runner profile Gustav Bergman

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Story
Gustav Bergman had a number of very strong long distance races early in the season - showing that he had the skills to fight for gold at the long distance in both the European Champs and the World Champs. To the surprise of many, Bergman decided to sacrificed his own individual medal chances at the long distance and focus 100% on winning the relay with the Swedish team - both at EOC and WOC. Bergman performed at his best at both occasions - anchoring his team to victories. The Swede’s performance at the WOC relay was spectacular - crushing his opponents Thierry Gueorgiou and Matthias Kyburz on the last leg in a way nobody thought possible before the start. When taking stock the end of the season, Bergman had no individual WOC or EOC medals - but two fantastic gold medals with his team mates in the relay.

» Runner profile Thierry Gueorgiou

    Vote for Thierry Gueorgiou

Story
Thierry Gueorgiou took his first WOC gold medal in Switzerland back in 2003 at the short distance. 11 years later the devoted French orienteer took his 12th WOC gold medal - this time at the long distance - defending his title from Finland in 2013. Gueorgiou has been known as "The King of Middle" after his many extraordinary performances in the most technical discipline in the sport. Gueorgiou is now simply called "The King of Orienteering" after showing for the second year in a row that he masters the tough long distance better than anyone else, adding to that WOC gold medals in all disciplines through the last 11 years and topping it with anchoring his club Kalevan Rasti to vitories in both Jukola and 10Mila this season.

» Runner profile Tim Robertson

    Vote for Tim Robertson

Story
Tim Robertson had one big goal for the season: Improving last year's bronze medal at JWOC sprint. That is a bigger goal than it may sound like. Taking a medal in the men's class at JWOC Sprint is so difficult that nobody had ever done it twice before Robertson took his second in 2014. Matthias Kyburz has one JWOC sprint medal, so has Søren Bobach, Jonas Leandersson, Olav Lundanes, Florian Howald, Vojtech Kral, Eskil Kinneberg, Kris Jones and Rasmus Thrane Hansen. Tim Robertson has two. And why is it so difficult? 150 runners at the start - no qualification - somebody always "gets lucky" - and there aer only a few seconds from gold to the bitter 4th place. Just to prove he is an extraordinary talent: After JWOC Robertson travelled to Junior MTBO World Champs in Poland and won the middle distance.