Two or three things I know about it...

1. Next weekend will take place at North Zealand the fourth edition of the Danish Spring, an event that is a kind of start of the Orienteering season at regional level, calling not only athletes from Denmark, but from all Scandinavia. With the attractive extra of three WRE stages - Sprint on Friday, Middle Distance on Saturday and Long Distance on Sunday - the event has a number of entries around eight hundred athletes, including some of the big names in the world of Orienteering, namely the current World Champion in Sprint, the Danish Søren Bobach, his compatriots Maja Alm and Ida Bobach, the Russian Dmitry Tsvetkov and Galina Vinogradova, the Finnish Sofia Haajanen and the Swedish Lena Eliasson, among others. The competition starts tomorrow, with the Sprint course. Everything to follow at http://www.danishspring.dk/.

2. The Swiss Orienteering season started last Saturday with the Nacht Orientierungslauf Meisterschaft, the Long Distance Night National Championships, which took place in Aarau, attracting 615 athletes. In Men Elite class, Matthias Kyburz (OLK Fricktal) was the fastest to cover the 11.5 km of a demanding course, spending 1:05:19. Daniel Hubmann (OL Regio Wil) fight hard for the victory, being second with more 25 seconds than the winner. National Champion in 2014, Martin Hubmann (OL Regio Wil) was the third placed, with a time of 1:08:37. As in Men, also in the Women Elite class the fight for the national title was really tight, but in this case with three competitors for one title. Julia Gross (OL Zimmerberg) would eventually be the fastest, spending 1:01:44 to complete the 8.2 km of her course. With more 13 seconds, in the second position, stayed Ines Brodmann (OLG Basel) while Simone Niggli (OLV Hindelbank), still and always in great shape, concluded in the third place, 39 seconds after the winner. Sven Hellmüller (OLG Welsikon) and Kerstin Ullmann (OL.Biel.Seeland) were the winners in the Junior Men and Women classes, respectively. Full results at http://www.o-l.ch/cgi-bin/results?year=2015&event=Schweizer+Meisterschaft+im+Nacht-OL+Lang.

3. In the short time of two months, the Spanish Antonio Martinez reached his third victory in a World Ranking Event. It was last Saturday at Becerril del Carpio (Palencia, Spain), in the Long Distance course that opened the program of the International Orienteering Trophy "Nacimiento del Canal de Castilla" and that counted with the participation of more than six hundred athletes. However, a less achieved course in the Middle Distance stage brought a change in the first position with the Ukrainian Artem Panchenko, that won the Trophy overall. In the Women Elite class, the Ukrainian Olha Panchenko was the best overall, winning the Long Distance WRE stage and finishing second in the Middle Distance stage. In this last stage, the victory went to French Léa Vercellotti. Ona Ràfols finished in the third position, being ranked as the best Spanish athlete. All to check at http://orcapalencia.com/web/competitions/canal-de-castilla-international-trophy/.

4. Joining the victory in the TempO competition to the triumph in the PreO stage, John Kewley was the big winner of the British Trail Orienteering Championships 2014. With direction and course setting by Anne Braggins, the event took place in Twywell, joining 34 competitors, 4 of which in the Novice class. With four stations with five challenges each, the TempO stage saw John Kewley being the most accurate, offsetting in the best way the lower speed in answering, compared to many of his most direct competitors. At the PreO stage, there were four finishers tied in the first position, answering correctly to 19 of the 21 controls of the course. John Kewley decided again the dispute in his favour, thanks to the accuracy and speed in the timed controls. Fourth placed in PreO stage and second in the TempO stage, Ian Ditchfield was second in the Championships, while the third place fell to Nick Barrable, 7th ranked in the PreO and third in TempO. Complete results, maps and solutions to see at http://www.wimborne-orienteers.org.uk/wim/14%20BTOC/BTOC2014.htm.

Joaquim Margarido