Orienteers are named in GB national squads

There is significant local interest in the first GB orienteering teams of the 2022 international season with a number of Forth Valley Orienteers athletes named to squads for events across Europe.

Kris Jones, Chris Smithard (pictured) and Grace Molloy are in the senior team for the opening World Cup round in Borås, Sweden at the end of May and will line up in both Individual and Knockout Sprints as well as the Mixed Sprint Relay.

These races will also form the final trial event for this summer’s World Championships in Denmark and all three have an excellent chance of being selected as they are ranked in the world’s top 50 in this discipline.

August’sworld University Championships in Magglingen, Switzerland will be the first for five years and Grace is once again included, along with younger brother Peter. Final team declarations will be made later for this event but the expectation is that each of the 12 athletes in the student team will run at least one of the individual disciplines and one of the relays.

Peter’s international summer kicks off earlier as he’s off to Aguiar De Beira, Portugal for the first Junior World Championships in three years while James Hammond will make his long-awaited GB debut in the European Youth Championships in Salgótarján, Hungary, having been selected for last year’s cancelled championship in Lithuania.

Their nomination is well deserved after a great spring of selection races - Peter won five of the six events and was 12 seconds back in the sixth, while James left the selectors in no doubt as he won every race they threw at him.

The first step on the road to international selection for junior athletes is attendance at the youth programme summer tours, and five from FVO will be touring this summer. The Under 14 tour goes to Lagganlia in Strathspey and Rebecca Hammond and Scarlett Kelly get the nod after a fine winter of racing. The Under 15s are off to the seaside, and a camp at Findhorn, where Jamie Connor is amongst the party.

The final tour of the summer is the Under 16 trip to the Czech Republic, as a first look at the terrain for athletes in contention for selection to JWOC’24, and James makes the squad, along with Sam Hunt, who was unfortunate not to be called up for EYOC.