Record medal haul for Forth Valley Orienteers' stars down south

Forth Valley Orienteers’ delighted sprint medallists from the recent Jan Kjellstorm Festival (Photo: Submitted)

The Jan Kjellstrom Festival in Yorkshire brought major success for local athletes, with a record number of medals coming north after three hard days of racing.

Forth Valley Orienteers’ Sophie Edward rocketed round in the W12 Sprint in Sheffield city centre to take the title in 10.34, for her first major event win, with the fastest split on nine of the 18 legs.

FVO duo Alison Cunningham (W60 – 11.31) and James Hammond (M20 – 16.17) defended their titles for the third and fourth years respectively.

Peter Molloy was the second seed in an M21E field that had more than 150 starters, and worked hard to win the silver medal (15.17).

Liz Godfree's sprint form needs no introduction, with multiple World Masters medals on her record, and she took the W75 silver in 14.19.

Like Liz, Rachel Kirkland has a preference for the Sprint discipline, and a fine bronze in 14.08 is her third JK Sprint medal in four years, while Will Hensman was third (16.57) in M45, for his sixth medal in ten years at the JK Sprint.

The JK awards forest medals only for the combined results of the Middle and Long days, but there were nine FVO athletes on the podiums, including two overall class winners.

There was an intriguing local battle in M14, as Lucas Baikie struck first with the Middle distance title (26.31) with James Edward third (28.49).

However, James had the final say, winning the Long race in 43.27 to take the overall title and leave Lucas in second.

Andy Llewellyn was untroubled in M35, winning both stages by a combined margin of more than 15 minutes for his third consecutive honour at the festival.

Sophie Edward backed up her Sprint win with the Middle gold (29.33) but was run back into overall Silver in the Long race, where she was second (36.41).

Grace Molloy was 2nd in both W21E stages, and took the silver medal by ten minutes, and there were bronze medals for Janine Inman (W45), Marcus Pinker (M50) and Alison Cunningham (W60).

Both James Hammond and Will Hensman mispunched on the first day, while in the lead and within sight of the finish, but both secured the Long distance crown on day 2.

There were also Middle distance bronzes for Ben Stansfield (M55 – 37.41) and Liz Godfree (W75 – 31.16) and a silver for Graham Gristwood (33.22), a Long distance silver for Dave Coustick (M80 – 62.12) as he was two seconds off the win and a silver too for Vicky Thornton (W60 – 55.25)