O-Ringen

The O-Ringen is an orienteering competition based in Sweden. It takes place annually in different parts of the country. Orienteers from all over the world come to the event. The competition attracts significant media coverage and winning is often considered second only to the World Orienteering Championships in prestige.

The competition takes place in the month of July, and takes place over 5 days, where every active day is a competition stage. Competitors are assigned start times for the first four stages of the race, but on the fifth and final stage a "chasing start" is used. In a chasing start the overall leader in each class starts first and the remaining competitors start according to the total time they trail. This means that the first runner over the finish line on the final stage is the winner.

In 1965, the O-Ringen was first started in Denmark, Scania, and Blekinge by elite Swedish national team runners Peo Bengtsson and Sivar Nordström. They organised the competition at short notice from 19–23 July to fill the days between two already-organised weekend events in Simlångsdalen and Kallinge. Due to lack of available high-quality maps, the first day was organised in Hillerød. After being publicised in the Skogssport and the Idrottsbladet magazines, 156 participants attended the first event, during which guest of honour Torsten Tegnér was forced to help with organisation due to lack of volunteers. The events were organised in the evenings to allow for people who had to work during the day. Following the first event, participation levels then steadily increased.^[1]

The O-Ringen received its name from the union of Swedish national team runners that Bengtsson and Nordström were first part of; the union was started with the purpose to improve international orienteering in 1962 by ten Swedish national team runners, including most Swedish competitors at the 1962 European Orienteering Championships. Some of the first members included European Championships medallists Bertil Norman and Emy Gauffin. The O-Ringen union was important in organising the event through to 1978, and held some administrative roles until 2003.^[1]

Up until today the highest participant level was in 1985 in Dalarna/Falun were there were 25,021 participants.

The O-Ringen was included in the Orienteering World Cup series in 1998, 2007, and 2008.

In 2009 there were prize money in the Elite series, the main classes for both the men and the women, totalling to half a million kronor. The final result in the junior elite classes will count towards the Silva Junior Cup.

From 2008, multi-sport has been represented at the competition in the form of the O-Ringen Multi. The competition on the Tuesday will be a part of the Swedish Multi-sport Cup.

The O-Ringen Academy is a training program which consists of three sections; International, Leadership and Sports. The International section focuses on training orienteers from all over the world who want to learn more about orienteering in order to develop the sport in their home countries. The Leadership section is a leadership training course in the form of seminars and speeches. The Sports section is more concerned with the physical side with training camps of different sorts, including a week for juniors before the O-Ringen.

• The first ever stage of the Swedish 5-Days was held in Denmark.
• Ulla Lindkvist has the most titles in the women's class with eight wins.
• Lars Lönnkvist has won the men's class four times

• Tiomila
• Jukola relay
• List of sporting events in Sweden

• The 1973 edition at SVT's open archive (in Swedish)