Final Wrap for Taiwan

Well, the World Games in Taiwan is over and the South African orienteers are already back home. The remainder of Team S.A. is still in Kaohsiung, with the Rugby-7s boys still S.A.'s big hope for a Gold medal. Go Bokke! Further medal hopes lie with the Waterskiing team.

Pic: Taiwanese artistic design

Back to Orienteering, the WG Relay was won comfortably by the Russians after a nightmarish last leg from Sweden. Finland and Norway took silver and bronze, just edging out Australia into 4th place. Once again the weather was incredibly hot and humid, causing some concern as various runners collapsed over the hand-over line at the end of their legs. Performances seemed to be muted as various runners battled to overcome the strain of competing in these tough conditions in the previous two days. World Games organisers may well consider putting in a rest day between the Middle and Relay races, particularly in countries that will present such tough weather conditions.

The World Games proved to be a special experience for both of the South African competitors. It was also a superb gauge of their current abilities. Tania produced the best performances, far outstripping expectations and putting down two of the best senior performances from any South African female orienteer at International level. Her improved ability was certainly in part due to help from the SA Orienteering Federation, SASCOC and the National Lottery which had given both athletes funding that has allowed them to improve their training. One of the most important aspects to this was various tests that was done at the High Performance Centre in Pretoria, which produced results that allowed Tania to modify her training for better results. The success of this is very evident. Nicholas also managed to produce some decent results, with the better one coming in the middle distance. A big gap still exists however between the South African results and the top / middle of the field. This gap was strongly emphasized in Taiwan, where the reduced overall number of orienteers in the field makes it much more difficult for weaker nations to produce positive results. Both competitors however walk away with a much greater awareness of where they are and where they are going in the sport.

Pic: Nicholas, Tania and Sarah (CAN) waiting at a very artistic bus-stop in Kaohsiung

To the future, the host of the 2013 World Games has just been announced as Columbia. This means that the conditions, maps and terrain will probably be fairly similar to those experienced in Taiwan. i.e. the races will take place in parks and semi-urban settings, with warm and humid conditions once again prevalent. the World Games will thus once again take on a slightly different aspect than those of JWOC or WOC, with a strong focus on fast, sprint type orienteering. With the current crop of S.A. junior orienteers making their way through the ranks, it is probable, and indeed preferable, that these juniors will contest for the slots allocated to Africa at the 2013 World Games. It would be great to see a young team of 2 men and 2 women competing in the Relay event four years from now. The experience gained and lessons learnt by Tania, Nicholas and Ian will go a long way to making that possible.

Pic: Hong Kong city viewed from The Peak (great tram ride up here!)

Finally, the team enjoyed a stop over in Hong Kong on their way back home to South Africa. What an incredible city! It was also a great to compare two totally different East Asian cities. Hong Kong's skyscraper skyline even puts New York to shame!

Pic: The skyline of Hong Kong from the water's edge at the Ferry Terminal

One final note has to go to Taiwan for their love of fireworks. We watched 3 'official' firework displays down at True Love Pier. They took place each night. However, there were also plenty of impromptu fireworks displays on the streets. These normally involved roving 'gangs' of entertainers that would summarily close down various sections of streets and start a firework display without warning, leaving pedestrians and drivers diving for cover. Ian managed to get some great footage of one of these episodes.

Pic: Impromptu fireworks display on the streets of Kaohsiung

That's it for the World Games. The next focus for the SA National Team will be the World Champs in Miskolc, Hungary. The team comprises of Nicholas Mulder, Cobus Van Zyl and Eugene Botha. Unfortunately, no ladies took their places in this year's WOC team. Pieter Mulder is the team manager. Cobus is currently competing at the Swedish O-Ringen, whilst Nicholas will compete in the Swiss 6-Day prior to WOC. The team will then arrive 1 week early for a final training camp in Miskolc before the Champs get under way from 16 - 23 August 2009.

Will keep you updated!

Middle Distance

The middle distance final took place today at Chengcing Lake in Kaohsiung, Taiwan. The good news was that the Typhoon heading towards Taiwan a couple of days ago decided to swing past the island to the south. The even better news it that it still generated a lot of wind and some light rain overnight that have helped cool the city down to managable levels. It's still very warm and humid however.

Chengcing Lake proved to be a great place to orienteer. Most of the area was parkland, with some green and some undergrowth. However, almost all of this was still passable and many athletes preferred to stay in shorts and short socks for the race. Apart from the lake, we ended up running around quite a few monuments, canals and even a pagoda.

Pic: One of the buildings on the Chengcing Lake map

Pic: One of the views at Chengcing Lake

Results wise, there were some good results from the South Africans today. Tania Wimberley repeated her performance in the Sprint Race by finishing once again in 31st position with a time of 38:30. This put her 11 minutes behind the winning time of Australian Hanny Allston who is cleary back with a bang after beating second-place Minna Kauppi (FIN) comprehensively by 1:17.

Pic: Tania Wimberley starts her middle distance run

Pic: Tania Wimberley crossed a car park to the spectator control

Pic: Hanny Allston with her gold medal

In the Men's race, Nicholas Mulder produced a good clean run with few errors to finish in 37:23, also placing 31st overall and 9:40 down on the winning performance by Daniel Hubmann (SUI). Daniel also put in a easy victory, beating Russian Dmitry Tsvetkov by 33 seconds. Both Tania and Nicholas were extremely happy with their runs and their times, if not necessarily their final positions.

Pic: Nicholas Mulder during the Middle Distance

Pic: Nicholas Mulder punching one of the controls on the course

Pic: Daniel Hubmann poses with his gold medal after the Prize Giving ceremony

This brought to an end South Africa's participation in the Orienteering at the World Games as the team can't compete in the Relay event tomorrow, which is in a 2 men + 2 women format. We'll be there watching with great interest however as it will undoubtedly be an extremely tight and exciting battle. It would be very hard to find a favourite for the title out of Norway, Sweden, Finland, Russia, Switzerland and Great Britian. Any of a number of teams could spring a surprise on the day.

Pic: Travelling back to our hotel on one of the lavisciously decorated tour buses here in Taiwan

Otherwise we continue to enjoy Taiwan and have now gotten used to the sights, sounds and smells of the city. It is definitely a city that grows on you and which you slowly learn to enjoy. This evening after dinner (and the 30 minute bus ride to the catering centre) we popped in at the main South African hangout in Kaohsiung, the Pig and Whistle, which was hosting the SA Team for the evening. Boerewors rolls, Hunters Dry, DSTV Supersport (live!) and quite a few familiar accents were on offer. We even managed to drag the 2 Candians (Mike and Sarah) with in there with us. After that it was back to Love Pier for the nightly fireworks display as well as the 'Local Delicasies' market before heading back to our hotel.

Pic: Grilled squid at the World Games Plaza's at the 'Delicasies' Bazaar.

Pic: Bamboo juice on sale at the World Games Plaza

Pic: Mike Smith (CAN) takes in one of the local bars on our way home. One of many with some great names.

Sprint Race - Tania has great run

We've just returned from the World Games Sprint Race Final, which was held at the Museum of Fine Art in Kaosiung, Taiwan. As predicted it was hot and muggy (imagine trying to do a sprint race around Saint Lucia KZN in the middle of January!), although in reality it was probably a fraction more comfortable than the last two days.

Russia (Andrey Khramov) and Finland (Minna Kauppi) were the unsurprising winners of the race, although Khramov had a tough challenge from Switzerland's Daniel Hubmann, winning by only 1.6 seconds.

From a South African perspective though, it was Tania Wimberley who had a great run in the Ladies category, finishing with a time of 20:20 (6:07 behind the winner) to place 31st out of 36 competitors. This was a great effort that put athletes from Lithuania, Estonia, Canada and Slovakia behind her. Despite this, she still feels that she could easily find 2 or more minutes of mistakes on her part.

In the Men's race, Nicholas Mulder finished in a time of 17:24 (winner was 13:11) to put him 34th out of the field of 36 runners. As per Tania, there were probably about 1:10 worth of mistakes that could have seen a slightly higher position on the leaderboard.

Overall, this is a fair result for Team South Africa given the higher level of competition here then your regular World Champs. With fewer nations represented in the Orienteering at the World Games than in other World events, it is very tough to move away from the bottom of the field.

Tomorrow (Saturday) we have our second and final opportunity to impress with a good result when the Middle Distance takes place in the afternoon. The venue is Chengcing Lake, on the east side of Kaosiung. The weather should once again be very warm and humid, but the slightly longer distances could start proving difficult for some athletes in those given conditions. Starts are from 12h30 local time (or 06h30 S.A. time).

On Sunday is the Team Relay event, but unforunately South Africa doesn't have the 2 men and 2 women needed to enter a team.

(Sorry, no photos today, will get some more up tomorrow!)

Brilliant Opening Ceremony

Last night the Opening Ceremony of the World Games took place at the newly built Main Stadium in Kaosiung, Taiwan. This stadium is a remarkable piece of architecture designed and built specifically for the games.

Pic: Main Stadium, Kaosiung, Taiwan

The Opening ceremony was, as expected a grand affair, with an entertaining cultural and musical line up. The show was capped with the customary fireworks show, even better than the previous night's opening of the World Games Plaza.

Pic: Fireworks finale at the Main Stadium

The highlight though has to be walking into the arena with the rest of Team South Africa. We have one of the larger teams at the games and definitely the second largest presence at the opening ceremony, after hosts Taiwan. Just before entering the stadium in the parade of nations, we entered the tunnel below the main stand where the massed South African voices struck up a booming 'Shozaloza' to counter some patriotic war cry from the Swiss team close behind us. With the 100 strong team, it was enough to send shivers down any teams back. It is truly a priviledge to be here.

Pic: Team South Africa shortly before entering the Main Stadium

The Games were officially opened by the President of Taiwan before we were entertained to an enjoyable and interactive international music ensemble.

Pic: The 105 teams at the World Games lined up inside the stadium with Team South Africa in the foreground

Movie Clip: 40'000 stadium seats filled to capacity together with another 5'000 people watching and listening from outside

The Taiwanese people have been extremely gracious hosts and very friendly. We have been constantly greeted and encouraged wherever we go in and around the city. We've now had to stop and pose for countless photographs with the locals. One of the more remarkable encounters was with a South African-Taiwanese couple. He was originally from Ferndale, Randburg, a few blocks from where Tania lives. More amazingly, he and his wife were married in the exact hotel where we are currently staying. This in a city with hundreds of hotels.

Not everything yesterday was about the opening ceremony. Earlier in the day we also visited the official model event in preparation for the orienteering competition. This took place in the Central Park in the middle of the city. Conditions were of course hot and muggy, but we survived. The mapping is very good and it should be quite enjoyable.

Pic: Control point during the model event at Central Park, Kaosiung, Taiwan.

Later this afternoon is the first competition of the Orienteering at the World Games. It is the Sprint Distance Final. Tania starts at 14h03 local time with Nicholas off at 15h08. Taiwan time is 6 hours ahead of South African local time. As per the recent World Cup event in Finland, there will be live tracking of the athletes via a GPS transmitter that we wear on our back. Full live-updates and tracking will be available through the World Games website at http://wg2009.orienteering.org/

The World Games in Taiwan

Team South Africa has arrived in Kaosiung, Taiwan for the 8th World Games.

South Africa has a team of about 70 athletes representing the country in 11 of the sporting codes taking place at the Games. Orienteering is one of these, being represented by Tania Wimberley and Nicholas Mulder with Ian Bratt as the team official. In total, the Games is hosting about 4800 competitors representing 105 nations in 31 different sports codes. All these sports are Olympic recognised, but currently are not part of the Olympic programme. The World Games are in effect the younger brother / sister of the Olympics.

Pic: Tania and Ian at Kaosiung Airport

The SA team arrived in Kaosiung Airport to a rapturous welcome from the Games organising committee. We were quickly bussed to the accreditation centre and then our hotel. As the Orienteering programme is early in the Games programme (we will be the first SA sports discipline to compete at this years Games), we immediately left the rest of Team SA for our own orienteering hotel.

Pic: Ian, Tania and Nicholas at the accreditation centre

The weather here is Kaosiung is very warm and extrely humid. You break into an immediate sweat every time you leave the air-conditioned buildings. To make matters worse, the Sprint and Middle distance races (taking place on Saturday and Sunday) that we will be competing in, will take place in the early afternoon! To add a bit of spice, we also presently have a tropical depression bearing down on the country out of the Pacific, with an expected arrival late on Saturday.

Yesterday was our first full day in Taiwan and we used it to acclimatise and recover from jet lag. We took in a few of the sights of the city, including one from the top of a 17-storey department store.

Pic: Nicholas in front of part of the city skyline

Pic: We also managed to pose with the 2 mascots of the World Games, Gao Mei and Syong Ge

Last night was the official opening of the World Games Plaza, which is the cultural and entertainment venue for the World Games. The opening, music arena and cultural and food stands were packed with thousands of Kaosiung residents who also took in one of the biggest and best fireworks displays I've ever seen.

Pic: World Games Plaza opening fireworks display from the True-Love Pier

We also had a good walk around the food stands, immersing ourselves in the sights and smells of eastern cuisine. Needless to say, we didn't taste as we don't want to risk any unusual foods before our races.

Pic: Ian in front of one of the many food stands selling unusal (by western standards) cuisine.

Today we will be going to the official model event for the orienteering, before attending the Opening Ceremony at the newly completed 40'000 seater stadium that were purpose built for these Games.

We expect a superb celebration. One of the remarkable things is the level of support that the whole population of the city has given the World Games. They are truly treating is as the biggest ecent in Taiwan in 2009 and many years. Wherever you go in the city, you have questions as to which country you are here to compete for. The level of support from SASCOC has also been superb, due also to strong support from the National Lottery. We had a welcoming dinner at the SA Team hotel together with the South African dimplomatic representation to the country last night. Jointly, SASCOC and the National Lottery have enabled South Africa to send a strong team to the World Games in the hope of doing well in all the sports we're entered into. The team includes other sports such as Rugby 7's, Lifesaving, Dance Sport, Water skiing and so on.

I'll be keeping regular blog updates on the World Games in the next few days. In the meantime, more information about the Orienteering at the World Games can be found here. The information includes venues, race distances as well as the start lists for the Sprint Distance race taking place on Saturday.

Junior National Team in Italy

The South African Junior Team is currently in Italy, preparing for the Junior World Champs next week. The team consists of 6 women and 1 man, with 2 team officials. They're currently in the Italian Dolomites, near a town called Primiero, encountering lots of climb, spectacular scenery and plenty of mountain thundershowers.


The team (left to right) is Zoe, Bradley, Salome, Stephanie, Jessica H., Jessica L., and Sarah. Team officials are Richard Lund (manager) and Nicholas Mulder (coach).