The final events at the European Champs and JWOC MTBO were the relays.
In the former the depth of the Danish men was demonstrated when their no 1 team incurred a mispunch but their no 2 team came through to win the gold, just 90 seconds ahead of Estonia, with Russia taking bronze.

The women’s event was even closer with Finland prevailing by just 25 seconds over Austria, with Denmark gaining another bronze medal.  On the last leg Finland’s Ingrid Stenmark started with a 90 second lead with Austrian champion Michi Gigon chasing hard. Adding to the intrique was that both girls were on exactly the same split. A 60 second mistake by Ingrid going to no 19 saw Michi get within sight but she couldn’t bridge the gap, despite taking fastest time for the day.

In JWOC Finland and Russia were the dominant nations.  In the boy’s relay Finland 1 had a clear 7 minute win over Finland 2, with Russia and Austria being next.  In the girl’s the favoured Russia no 1 team won by 6 minutes from Finland, Russia 2 and the Czech republic. This saw Svetlana Poverino collect her 3rd gold medal of these championships.

Adrian Jackson has just completed the 7 stage TransGermany event finishing a fine 20th (out of 180) overall and being part of the 4 man Merida Multivan winning team. On stage 6 he was 19th, and on stage 7 he placed a pleasing 16th, just 6 minutes behind the winner over a 3 hour race.

WOC MTBO News
Bulletin 3 is now available at the following link, with information on entrants, course details and terrains.http://www.nivut.org.il/mtbo/Bulletins.aspx
Unfortunately these championships will have the lowest ever entrants of the 7 WOCs run to date.  This is due to the worry caused by the fighting outbreak some months ago and thus many riders have chosen to prioritise the European Championships in Denmark rather than committing to WOC.  No NZ’ers are racing this year.
Men        Women
Israel 09         82               51
Poland 08      110               58
Highest ever  130 (2005)      72 (2002)