By Simon

JWOC (Junior World Orienteering Championships) took place in Poland from 2nd to 9th July 2011. This event started with a sprint race third in a park and two-thirds in the downtown streets, both physical and technical.
On this distance Lucas Basset was the best and won the sprint in a time of 15'07.07. He took the first JWOC Gold medal ever for France, after big names like Thierry Gueorgiou or Philippe Adamski never succeed. This was the beginning of a good week for the French team. Note also the good result of Isia Basset who finished in a good th position, 1'28 behind the winner Ida Bobach, while Olivier ended #76 in 17'25:04.
Next day took place the long distance, race in a relief of moraines with many contours.
Lucas brought a new medal for the French team but this time in bronze by ranking third of LD, 1'47 behinf the Norwegian Yngve Skogstad. Isia did once again a good race and finished #20 in 64'33 and Olivier #48 in 81'03.

At the end of the week took place middle distance and relay. Lucas realized the second time of the day in 26:08, but ranked only fourth as the three runners before him finished tied for first in 25:43. Oliver realized a good race by ranking #27 in 28:32. Isia realized a good start but made some mistakes after and finished #56 in 33:34.
To close this Jwoc 2011, the relay: men's team was made up of Philippe Joly, Olivier Blanc-Tranchant and Lucas Basset and finished as 10th nation. The girl's team made up of Isia Basset, Fanny Roche and Claire Sandevoir ended in the #14 position.



This year was the fourth and last JWOC for Lucas, so he finished it with style, good performance and ended as second athlete in number of medal of this championship.Isia and Olivier results were quite good for their first and give hopes for next Jwoc in 2012 which is taking place in Slovakia.
Isia's few words: "The Jwoc 2011 will remain in my memory as a great competition, being my first experience in a world championship. I am really happy with my races. The courses, my results and the nice atmosphere of the competition give a lot of motivation to train hard during winter in order to be able to take part to it once again and achieve good performance."
Lucas's few words: "This JWOC ended all my junior years the best way. It is great to be able to run great races when it really matters, and then to see good results follow. I had really put a lot of efforts this year towards this big goal that were the World Champs, increasing my training volume and moving to Sweden to try different orienteering culture. These medals I won at JWOC were a nice reward for the efforts I made. On the other hand, this is a little sad because I realize now that this year's JWOC was my last one: concerning the atmosphere, the experience gained and all the nice moments spent with people from all over the world, it's the best thing I have had the chance to take part to!"
Here is the map with the sprint winners choices:
http://jot.cal.pl/jwoc2011/2/maps/jwoc_sprint.M20_routechoices.jpg
Here is the map with the long winner's choice:
http://jot.cal.pl/jwoc2011/2/maps/jwoc_long.M20_routechoices.jpg
Complete results on JWOC website:
http://www.jwoc2011.pl/