Many surprises and a tight fight in the first stage of PreO at Malga Millegrobbe; a control was voided after a protest. It's been a long day in Millegrobbe; the 100 competitors are brought to the start and come back to the arena by minibus and have to face 12 tasks and 2 timed controls after the decision to cancel the last part of the course because of the heavy rain during the previous days.
Between control 1 and control 7 the athletes make only few mistakes, but the last tasks are extremely challenging and force many big names to go out of the time limit.
In the Open class Kyrychenko, Andersson and Pérez are the best on the course but all three go over the 75­minute limit, so the Slovakian Dušan Furucz is unofficially the leader.
After two protests, one of which (from the German team) is accepted, the 10th control is voided and the Italian Elvio Cereser, 7th this year at the European Championships, becomes the winner of the 1st stage. Furucz is second and the Japanese Koji Chino third. Five other competitors have the maximum point score of 11/11, among them last year's bronze medalist, the Swedish Marit Wiksell. World and European Champion Jari Turto is only 36th with 3 mistakes, while his teammate Rusanen is 9th with 1 mistake; everything can happen in the 2nd and final stage on Friday in Campomuletto.

In the Paralympic class great day for Sweden, which occupies the first two ranks with European Champion Michael Johansson and with Inna Gunnarsson; they have a gap of 1 points on 4 other competitors.

PreO Day1 - Open
1 Elvio Cereser Italy 11 points 74 seconds
2 Dušan Furucz Slovakia 11 75
3 Koji Chino Japan 11 79
4 Guntars Mankus Latvia 11 84
5 Krešo Keresteš Slovenia 11 90.5
6 Sharon Crawford United States 11 101

PreO Day1 - Paralympic
1. Michael Johansson Sweden 11 74
2 Inga Gunnarsson Sweden 11 92
3 Kari Pinola Finland 10 75
4 Egil Sønsterudbråten Norway 10 77.5
5 Arne Ask Norway 10 81
6 Bohuslav Hulka Czech Republic 10 90.5