Ik word Hollander

Gelet op de toestand van de landsgrenzen voor 12 november 1807, toen met het Traktaat van Fontainebleau Lommel met Luyksgestel geruild werd tussen Frankrijk en de Noordelijke Nederlanden, gelet op de duidelijk Hollandse familiale oorsprong ten tijde van de Hoekse en Kabeljauwse twisten en de iets dichtere band nog van de familie van der Kleij (kleine v!), heeft Lommel OK unaniem besloten om vanaf volgend jaar voor Nederland uit te komen in het oriëntatieoriënteringsloopseizoen. Dat teneinde paal en perk te stellen aan de pestprocedures van de Belgische oriënteringsloopbond waar oriënteringsloopselecties aan de hand van een stratenloop worden gemaakt.

Scherper nog dan Tom Boonen stonden wij vandaag aan de start in Oudergem, maar het mocht niet baten. De tijd die Thomas op een nachtoriëntatiewedstrijd over een volledig parcours op Fabien verliest was nu al na 2 van de 7 ronden voorbij. Dries van der Kleij deed een kamikazewanhoopspoging, maar moest dat met een terugval bekopen. Zelf startten wij rustig, het nodige tempo, maar zelfs dat bleek niet genoeg om de onvermijdelijke inzinking halfweg te verteren. 25 seconden te traag en meer zat er vandaag echt niet in!

Wie haalden het wel: Fabien en Pieter, uiteraard. Bart Delobel liep de fysieke test al eerder om naar EOC te mogen, maar moest vandaag nog eens de limiet halen om ook op selectieweekend mee te mogen. Wat een wereld. Ken en Michel hadden vandaag ook de benen om het te halen en daar houdt het bij de mannen bij op. Bij de vrouwen zijn er twee kandidaten: Miek en Kim, die laatste in bloedvorm na haar 10e plaats van vorige week op het BK veldlopen en de eerste ook niet al te tevreden over haar tijd, maar zeg, de tijd doet er niet toe, alleen de limiet halen.

Herkansing op 19 april, maar eerst morgen zien wie het van de comebackende, maar stiekem trainende Bruno De Lat kan halen op de nationale MD in Bel (Ik niet). Vandaag doet Lommel OK dingen waar het wel goed in is: de meest efficiënte zetelhouding vinden om Milaan-San Remo te bekijken.

Resultaten

Belgian night champs: Pasquasy and Oeyen strike again

Yesterday evening the Belgian national champs night distance took place in Chevetogne. In class H21E and D21E we had exactly the same winners as last year (results 2009).

Fabien Pasquasy had some problems with his back since more than week, but he was still the big favourit to win this event. As last runner he started his race, but came out of the forest with the new besttime. He made some small mistakes (2 minutes in total, he thought), but was satisfied about his performance. At control 19 he made his biggest mistake when he saw Pieter Hendrickx (who started 6 minutes ahead of him and who took the bronze medal). Pasquasy was happy about his victory but worried about his back. During the race he fell again and everything felt more painfull again afterwards. Hopefully he'll be able to run the physical testrun with the national team next week.
Thomas van der Kleij finished in 2nd place (the same position as in 2009) 5 minutes slower than Pasquasy. He was satisfied about his technical performance, but physically it was no fantastic day despite his good feeling about the race. Also van der Kleij didn't run injuryfree, he's suffering a knee injury since more than 6 months.

Results H21E (7.9km and 335m climbing):
1. Fabien Pasuasy 50'
2. Thomas van der Kleij 53'
3. Pieter Hendrickx 55'
4. Joost Talloen 55'
5. Bart Delobel 58'

Map H21E (routechoices Desmond Franssen)

In class D21E we expected a fight between Greet Oeyen and Miek Fabre. The Hamok-runner ran a steady race and won 4 minutes ahead of Miek Fabre. So Greet Oeyen took again the gold medal despite a heavy trainingsweek. She's preparing for the physical testrun, which will take place next saturday in Brussels. She's a little bit worried about it and it will depend on her form of the day, she told us. She prepared for this test as good as possible and even trained in the area this week.
Miek Fabre isn't really worried about the testrun, but plans an easy trainingsweek. Only 2 trainings next week and then she'll be in topshape on saturday...

Results
Splits
Map H21E
Photos (Jochen Verdeyen)

JWOC Selections:
At the Belgian night champs all junior runners were absent because of the selection races for JWOC in Denmark. They are competing this weekend in Holland and ran the sprint and middle distance yesterday. Today they will run the long distance, which Koen de Jongh ran yesterday (comments from Koen de Jongh about the long distance). Also Wouter Foppen ran this race 2 weeks ago (comments from Wouter Foppen).

Poland and Springcup:
Yesterday the Belgian runners performed strong in Poland at the early Springcup, all of them (Ken Peeters, Wiet Laenen, Luc Melis, Marc Meeuwssen and Koen Meynen) finished in top3. Today they will run the relay competition.
In two weeks the real springcup will take place in Denmark. A Belgian team will be present: Joost Talloen, Thomas van der Kleij, Jeroen van der Kleij, Dries van der Kleij and Benjamin Anciaux will run in the Belgian all stars team. Jeremy Genar and Ken Peeters will defend the colours from Sibbo-Vargarna and Bart Delobel and Wouter Leeuws for IF Brahe. In the long distance only Thomas van der Kleij is selected for H21E1, the others will run in H21E2 or H20E (startlist).

Coming up: Belgian Night Champs

Startlist

England wins interland (once again)

...but is hasn't been that close the last few years.

Last year in England, there was a 57 point gap between England and Flanders, this year only 7 points separated the two. Maybe next year in Germany, the fifteen year long English hegemony will come to an end. The Walloon region became third, with the newly participating Northern French team fourth, The Netherlands fifth and the German Nordrhein-Westfalen region sixth.

The JWOC '97 relay map of Hechtelse Duinen was used today. This means nice open forest, rather large sand dunes in some areas, but smaller ones in others. Combined with sunny weather, although rather cold (-3°C early on), it was one of the days you know why you like orienteering that much.

Last week, De Laatste Post announced a fight between Graham Gristwood and Fabien Pasquasy in the men's elite class, but they were both absent for various reasons. England still had Matthew Crane in the team, along with Nick Barrable and Duncan Archer. Barrable took the overall victory in the Sylvester 5 days on this map 2 years ago, but he wasn't really in great shape during the last Sylvester, so it was unknown what he was up to.

The German team included Alexander Lubina. He should like these fast runnable terrains. Jonn Are Myhren is back in the Netherlands and present at the competition, however, Dutch rules unfortunately didn't allow him to participate in the competition. Instead Myhren won the regional event ahead of the Frencham Tinchant (results). This course was the same as the junior course from the Interland.

The Walloon team lacked Fabien, but was still strong, with Michel Bastin and Nicolas Sillien. The Flemish team included the three best Flemish runners of the national event last week, so the expectations were high on the Flemish side.

After the race, it was clear that the usual order had to be respected. A clear victory for Crane, 3 minutes faster than Barrable, and 4 in front of Archer. Next up where the three Flemish runners, followed by the two Walloon ones...

Things were completely different in the women's class. Flanders' Miek Fabré was the clear winner here. She was a few minutes faster than the German Esther Doetsch. Places three and four were Flemish again, with Saartje Sallaerts and Greet Oeyen. The best English women didn't participate, but it wouldn't have been easy for them to beat Fabré's time.

England was the strongest in the D-20 junior class, taking the four best positions there. The same happened in almost all of the younger girls classes. This is what decided England's victory.

H-20 saw Flanders' Yannick Michiels in the top position, 1 minute ahead of Germany's Christoph Prunsche and with a two minute gap to French runner François Joly.

In the overall ranking, England scored 245 points, Flanders 238, Wallonia 167, Nord-Pas De Calais 112, The Netherlands 102 and Nordrhein-Westfalen 94 points.

Results
Splits
Team ranking, Junior Cup ranking
Map regional event (same map, different course)