1. Mit zwei Top-10 Plätze hat das österreichische Team bei der WOC 2017 international stark aufgezeigt. Was hat dich als Nationaltrainer in Estland besonders gefreut
Ã…ke: WOC 2017 was Ursula Kadan`s breakthrough on international top level. She showed that her training has given results. She has more potential and it will be exciting to follow her in the coming years. In the sprint relay, the Austrian runners really painted the competition. Ursula was the one who ruled most of the first leg and Matthias followed up with a perfect race. The Swedish TV commentator was impressed of Matthias performance. And with two stable races from Robbie and Laura the team finished on a really good 8^th place. This was Austria’s best result in the sprint relay in the World Orienteering Championship so far!

2. Die WOC-Wettkämpfe in Estland haben den Läuferinnen und Läufern technisch, physisch und mental sehr viel abverlangt. Wie hat sich das österreichische Team aus der Sicht des Trainers dabei geschlagen? Wo steht Österreich im Vergleich zu den Top-Nationen?"  
Ã…ke: This year we have come one step closer to the top. The results are difficult to compare depending on the different terrain types from year to year. In the individual distances we were much better than last year both on the women and on the men’s side. Ursula had not really picked up after the sprint on the long distance. Kerschi’s result is about what I expected, but he could have done a little better with better route choice, in addition, he was a bit unlucky when he got stuck in the green areas. In the middle distance, the results were good in the hard-tracked terrain, all our runners took World Cup points! In the relay we were never really close because we lost time on the first leg in both men and women class. If we had been in the top from the beginning, we have had really good chances of achieving a top result both for men and women. My feeling for the future is that we will have good chances even at forest distances. We need to continue to develop the technical details around map reading and running in the forest. In front of next year’s World Championship, which runs in similar terrain in Latvia. Your compass is your best friend when the terrain is diffuse. We will continue to work with this things.

3. Nach der WOC 2017 stehen heuer mit den World Games in Polen und den Weltcuprunden in Lettland und in der Schweiz weitere Prime-events auf dem Programm. Was  sind die Ziele und Erwartungen des Nationaltrainers für diese Wettkämpfe?
Ã…ke: In the upcoming international races, I want to see that the runners really believe in themselves. World Games in Poland gets as tough as WOC in Estonia. Two top ten places are possible. The sprint relay becomes interesting and the third place we got four years ago in Cali, will be tough but possible to achieve. WC in Latvia is an important preparation for WOC 2018. Middle, forest relay and sprint are the various disciplines at these competitions. I would like to see some of the younger runners take a step forward in these competitions. For the final WC in Switzerland there will be a sprint relay and individual middle and long distance races on the program. Hopefully we will have two runners in the top 15 in the overall World Cup and climb to the top ten in the Team World Cup that will be really perfect.

4. Your final comment?
Ã…ke: Austria has a very young team on which we can build the future. The good results at the EYOC give even more hope for longer perspectives.