The Trail-O selection committee is pleased to announce the team that will represent TeamUSA at the World Trail Orienteering Championships taking place from July 1-7, 2023 in Zakupy, Czech Republic.
Ten athletes have been selected to represent TeamUSA in the Open and Paralympic classes. In addition, two athletes will join the team to compete in the public race.
Congratulations & good luck to our TeamUSA Trail-O Team!!
The TeamUSA WOC Selection Committee (Jeff Saeger, Glen Tryson, Peggy Dickison) is pleased to announce the 2023 US WOC Team for the 2023 World Orienteering Championships to be held in Flims Laax, Switzerland in mid July. Here’s the lineup:
April 29 Update: Bridget Hall, originally selected for the WOC ’23 team, secured a summer internship and has withdrawn from the team. Evalin Brautigam, originally selected as 1st Alternate, has been moved into Bridget’s spot on the team roster.
| MEN | WOMEN |
| Thomas Curiger | Ali Crocker |
| Danny Riley | Evalin Brautigam* |
| Joe Barrett | Syd Fisher |
| Anton Salmenkyla | Izzy Bryant |
| 1st Alternate: Greg Ahlswede | 1st Alternate: Alison Campbell |
| 2nd Alternate: AJ Riley | Declined: Bridget Hall* |
The competition was tough, the results were often very tight, and we saw some impressive results. This year saw the most competitive Team Trials in many years, which meant that it was harder than ever to make it on to the Team.
Congratulations to all of you who were selected to represent TeamUSA on the world stage!
Peggy Dickison, on behalf of the WOC Selection Committee
This summer young orienteers from both the National Team and the Youth Development Program will be embarking on a three week summer trip to Europe to take part in two major international orienteering events. The trip will run from approximately June 19th through July 10th.
First stop on the trip will be to the European Youth Orienteering Championships (EYOC) in Velingrad, Bulgaria. Since US Youth are not eligible for the EYOC Championships, they will participate in the concurrent EYOC Tour events June 23-25th.
From Bulgaria, the group will travel on to Baia Mare, Romania for the 2023 Junior World Orienteering Championships (JWOC) running from July 2-9th. Twelve US youth were recently selected to compete at JWOC this year. Non-JWOC youth will take part in the JWOC Tour races being held during the same period.
Plenty of opportunities for sightseeing and cultural activities will be built into the itinerary around the competition days as well as time to do what kids like to do – have fun… A series of fund-raising efforts are planned to help raise money to provide stipends to attending youth to offset travel costs for this trip.
First up will be this weekend at West Point! On Sunday, April 16th, juniors will be hosting a bake sale to raise funds for summer youth travel. Stop by to enjoy some delicious cakes and meet our talented juniors. They would also welcome (and appreciate!) any donations of baked goods. If you’re planning to bring any, please email Keegan at keegan@nullharkador.com to let us know.
There will also be a “Control Challenge” where donors can pledge a particular amount based on the number of controls youth participants visit over a fixed time period – April 17th – June 4th. Final details on the control challenge can be found on the National Team Blog.
You can also make a donation directly to support the Junior Summer Trip by using our secure donation form and pay by credit card, bank ACH or PayPal. The future of our sport depends upon youth and we thank you for supporting this amazing opportunity for our National Team and Youth Development Program youth to gain such valuable experiences in Europe this summer.
Below are a few photos from last summers youth excursions in Portugal and Switzerland.
Now that the JWOC Team Trials are done and the JWOC 2023 Team has been announced, its time to set our sights on the WOC 2023 Team Trials which will be held this coming weekend at the 43rd West Point National Ranking Event. Since last year’s WOC was a Sprint WOC, this year’s World Orienteering Championships will focus on the forest disciplines of Middle, Long & Relay.
WOC 2023 will be held in Flims Laax, Switzerland from July 11-16. A strong field on both the men’s and women’s side are vying for coveted spots on this year’s team. In order to properly challenge our athletes, the long TT course for the women will be approximately 9.6km with 405m of climb and the men’s TT course will be 13.7km with over 500m of climb on the optimal route. And this is at West Point folks, so it will be a truly epic battle. The M-21+ and F-21+ winners for each race (Middle & Long) will earn an automatic spot on the WOC Team, as well as the athletes with the best combined results. You can read the full WOC Selection Criteria here.
Let’s take a look at who is currently entered, starting with the women. Names in bold type are current members of the US National Team and they are ordered by their current Eventor World Ranking score. Good to see some Junior Squad members stepping up to take a shot.
Over on the men’s side, an interesting mix including three of our european based TeamUSA athletes. Our top two contenders both reside in Switzerland where WOC will be held, but not far behind them are perennial local favorites Greg Ahlswede and Joe Barrett, both of whom have a pretty good handle on what West Point may throw at them, particularly in the long. They will be a couple of interesting races to watch for sure. Who do you think is going to come out on top?
See how well you can predict who will make the US Team to compete in the World Orienteering Championships in Switzerland this summer!
Pick four Team members and one alternate of each gender. (This may not be the eventual team size.)
Donations are encouraged, but not required. To donate, go to the Donate page on the OUSA website, and select “4 TEAM USA:National Foot-O Team.” Funds will help the team with WOC expenses.
Donation Form (orienteeringusa.org)
The person/people who most closely choose the Team members will get a shout-out in the OUSA Newsletter, (and maybe a map souvenir from WOC).
DEADLINE: please submit this form by 8 AM EDT, 15 April, 2023.
The JWOC Selection Committee – Jon Torrance, Ali Crocker, and Cristina Luis – is pleased to announce the 2023 US Team selected to compete at the Junior World Orienteering Championships (JWOC) to be held July 2-9, 2023 in Baia Mare, Romania. Accompanying the team will be coaches Evalin Brautigam, Thomas Laraia, and Caroline Sandbo.
Congratulations to our 2023 JWOC athletes!
The 43rd West Point NRE will host the US Team Trials for the 2023 World Orienteering Championships for the second consecutive year. This year’s WOC will be held in Switzerland, 11-16 July. Following last year’s inaugural Sprint WOC, this year is back to a forest-race WOC, with a Middle, Long, and Relay. Therefore, only the Middle and Long races at the USMAOC event will be used as Trials qualifiers.
The M21 and F21 winners for each race will earn a spot on the WOC Team, as well as the athletes with the best combined results. The Review Panel (Peggy Dickison, Jeff Saeger, and Glen Tryson) will name the remaining athletes, based on a scoring list and petitions. Athletes who wish to be considered for the WOC Team but are unable to compete at West Point must register for the event, selecting “Yes, Competing for selection to the US WOC Team” and “Not participating” under the Race Selection section.
See the Selection Criteria below for more information.
Peggy Dickison
ESC Chairman/Review Panel Chair
Additional information and caveats:
Update (5 Feb, 2023): This post has been updated to reflect a press release covering the Long & Relay events at EYSOC ’23. Updates can be found beneath the map image below.
The European Youth Ski-Orienteering Championships are now taking place in Madona, Latvia from January 31-February 5, 2023. Countries from outside Europe are also able to take part. TeamUSA is being represented by Erik Fey, age 14, who is competing in the 17 and under male youth category. Erik was 16th place in both the sprint race Tuesday and the medium distance Wednesday which the announcer said is the best US result in European Ski-Orienteering Youth Championships ever improving upon Erik’s best result of 18th place last year. Erik was especially pleased today to meet his goal of having the best result of anyone born in 2008 or later.
The sprint race and the medium race were both won by Ritvars Lepeskins from Latvia ahead of Lavio Mueller from Switzerland and Eemil Koskinen of Finland. When asked about his race Erik said, “I am pleased to be in the top 20 and felt better about my race today than yesterday even though the results were the same. Today I had three people in 12 seconds in front of me, so I know I can improve my results if I can push just a little bit harder and eliminate the two small orienteering mistakes I had today. My skis were very fast today. I really look forward to the long race on Friday as it is a mass start race which will be in a one man relay format as I love mass starts. I would also like to thank Orienteering USA for their support and my coaches my father Carl Fey and Henri Hämäläinen for training me.”
This year the European Youth Ski-Orienteering Championships are being covered on web-TV, so you can watch them and see complete results and GPS tracking at: https://orienteering.sport/event/european-ski-orienteering-championships-2/middle/ European Championships continue on Friday with the long distance race and conclude on Saturday with a relay.
For more information or to send a message to the US Team at the races, please contact: carlffey@nullgmail.com
February 5th update:
On Friday, February 3rd, 2023 the long race of the European Youth Ski-Orienteering Championships for people under 17 took place in Madona, Latvia. Erik Fey (age 14) was the only American participant and ended up in a solid 16th place, ironically the exact same place he obtained in the sprint and middle distance races earlier in the week. Erik had the best result in the race of anyone born in 2008 or later. The race was won by Ritvars Lepeskins from Latvia followed by Eemil Koskinen from Finland and Filip Mairich from Czech Republic.
On Saturday, February 4th, 2023 was the relay. The home crowd was excited to see Latvia take a step forward in the ski-orienteering world and win the European Youth Ski-Orienteering Championships. Finland took the silver medal and Czech Republic the bronz. Since there were not three Americans, Erik Fey teamed up with two Swedish skiers Ludvig Markhester and Andreij Kuzmin to ski the relay unofficially—teams with people from more than one country do not count in the official standings. All three skiers had solid performances and the team ended up unofficially in 4th.
The 2024 European Youth Ski-Orienteering Championships will take place in Austria together with the Junior World Championships and the World Ski-Orienteering Championships in late January. Hopefully more American ski-orienteers will take place in those races.
Many thanks to Carl Fey for providing OrienteeringUSA with timely press releases and the photos from Latvia.
The Selection Committee of Peggy Dickison, Eric Weyman, and Matt Smith are pleased to announce the 2023 US National Orienteering Team.
Placements were based primarily on the Selection Criteria, including OUSA ranking scores, IOF ranking scores, and head-to-head competition. In general, we were most flexible/inclusive with the Juniors, who we understand are still improving and have less consistent results; less flexible/inclusive with the Performance Squad; and least flexible/inclusive with the Elite Squad.
We are excited to see our team grow, with two athletes returning to the Team after breaks, and six Juniors new to the Team.
