There will be athletes from 24 nations in the A-finals tomorrow Thursday July 11th, following today’s qualification races in Denmark. Heat winners include Kasper Fosser, Norway and Aston Key, Australia, champions in Long and Sprint respectively.
Kasper Fosser, Norway running in the Long distance race Photo: Malin Fuhr
The six heats, from which the top twenty in each heat qualify for the A-final, took place on the hills of Gjern Bakker on a fine summer morning. Each nation can have 6 women and 6 men in the competition, and best nation was Sweden with 11 qualifiers, followed by Denmark and Switzerland with 10. Finland and Norway had 9, and the Czech Republic and France 8. At the other end of the scale, Slovakia and Ukraine have 1 qualifying athlete and Australia, Canada, Germany, Spain and USA have 2.
Unluckiest athlete was Dominika Mero, Hungary who missed qualifying by just 1 second. Two Danes missed qualification by less than 10 seconds.
The Middle distance finals take place tomorrow Thursday July 11th, also in Gjern Bakker and using the same arena. Follow the finals here https://www.jwoc2019.dk/
Heat winners (last starters in the A-final)
Women
Heat 1: Fiona Bunn GBR by 0.09
Heat 2: Barbora Chaloupska CZE by 0.47
Heat 3: Tereza Janosikova CZE by 0.42
Men
Heat 1: Kasper Fosser NOR by 0.39
Heat 2: Aston Key AUS by 0.43
Heat 3: Søren Thrane Ødum DEN by 1.09