President’s introduction

Kia ora all. The new season has already begun with some really exciting events in Auckland and with more to come! Aside from the cheaper entry fees to these events, being a club member has other advantages like coaching support, these communications to keep you up to date, and inclusion into the club's enthusiastic community. We'd love to see all previous members return and additionally suggest to their friends how they can benefit by signing up.

Newsletter Contents

• Auckland Calendar of Events and first forest events/JWOC trials for 2024
• Training Opportunity ahead of forest events and Nationals 2024.
• A snap shot of key events on around New Zealand in 2024
  • Katoa Po
  • NZ Champs
  • Kings Birthday Carnival
  • Tūāraki-Northern Regional Championships - Labour Weekend
• Schools Orienteering
  • AKSS Sprint Series
  • NISS Champs
• North West's Bivouac Outdoor Rogaine Series 2024
• General Orienteering News - Orienteer-pod
• Member News
  • We need your help please
  • Club Membership Fees are now due

Auckland Calendar of Events & First Forest Events / JWOC Trials for 2024

For the first three months of 2024, we are in the Easy Season phase of the Auckland Events Calendar. This is when school events start and club orienteers are getting themselves ready for NZ Champs to be held over Easter.  (see January 2024 news for more detail).

While Summer Nav, the School Sprint series and other events continue, the first forest events for 2024 will be held over the weekend of 16 & 17 March.  These events double as the first public forest events and the JWOC trials for 2024.

Auckland Club will host the trial middle race at Riverhead on Saturday 16 March and North West Club will host the trial long race at South Head/Woodhill on Sunday 17 March.  

Public races will be held on both days following the JWOC race starts.

Event details are available here

Pre-entry will be preferred and will be live here soon

JWOC selection notice is here  All athletes interested in being selected should now have notified Convenor of Selectors, Al Cory-Wright (alistaircorywright@gmail.com)
An embargo notice for JWOC competitors is here

Training Opportunity Ahead of these March Events

North West Club Captain, Rob Garden encourages members to make use of the permanent controls set up in Riverhead Forest as a practice/training session ahead of the two forest events in March and the National Champs. The controls are next to the Robinson Rd entrance of Riverhead Forest on the LEFT side of the road. NB the RIGHT side of the road is embargoed to JWOC trialists. There will also be a model map in this area providing a warm up opportunity before the JWOC Middle Distance and Public event on 16 March. 

Download a map of the permanent controls here - print at home before you go
 

Other Auckland events

All upcoming events in the wider Auckland area for 2024 are on our NWOC website here
New Zealand wide events are on Orienteering New Zealand’s website here

Key events coming up around NZ

Katoa Po - Saturday 9 & Sunday 10 March

Katoa Po, or night relays, provides a unique weekend of orienteering. The night relay starts at dusk and continues into the small hours of the morning. This year’s programme includes the 44th Katoa Po Night relay. the relay is appropriate to all levels of skills and fitness and is ideal for keen school teams to test their navigation skills, ahead of events like the Hillary Challenge and/or the Secondary Schools Adventure Racing Champs (SISSARC).

Katoa Po are offering a valuable prize for the winning secondary school mixed adventure racing team in the Explorer event. The Explorer school team prize for the top team on the podium is a weekend coaching session with a top orienteer and adventure racing coach – either Tom Reynolds or Gene Beveridge. This session will be in a location to be agreed between the team and the coach, and will be tailored to the needs of your team.  Previous winners have been St Paul’s Collegiate, Taupo nui-a-Tia and Whakatane High School.

Make it a fun weekend in Taupō. There is lots to choose from including the urban/park event on Saturday afternoon, the Saturday evening relay or explorer format, then finishing the weekend with a Sunday morning rogaine. Camping will be available at the Event Centre.

Dates:  9 -10 March 2024
Pre entry closing dates : Relay 29 February , Explorer 3 March
Details: here
Enter here

North West needs more members of all abilities to make up our club teams - see below for specifics about the course level for each leg. 

5 or 7 person teams; Leg 1 White; Leg 2 Yellow; Leg 3 Orange; Leg 4 Orange/Red, Legs 5, 6 & 7 Red

Nick, Tahi & Quinn Harris are coordinating our North West teams - if you're interested in being in a team, please email Nick at northcotenick@gmail.com

New Zealand Orienteering Champs 2024

The 2024 New Zealand Orienteering Championships are being held between Rotorua & Taupo over Easter from 29 March to 1 April hosted by Orienteering Bay of Plenty

The Event website has all the detail here  The first event bulletin is available via the website.

Entries are open here - Please note that Early Bird entries apply until 11.59pm on Sunday 25 February. 

Note re entries; NWOC Club Captain, Rob Garden has been talking to the Course Setter for the events who has advised that the courses will be vague and hard; 'harder than Woodhill and about as hard as they get' and so Rob recommends that newer/;ess experienced orienteers enter orange rather than red courses. This may mean entering an Open Recreational Grade rather than your age grade.  This info is available in the Event Bulletin available on the Event website here  If you would like to discuss what course you shoulud enter, Rob is happy to advise you. Please contact him on 021597070

Event t-shirts are available for pre-order. 

More information is available on the website here. Orders for t-shirts close on Sunday 10 March. 

And lastly here's a video that's sure to get you looking forward to the events! Compiled by Greg Flynn, Controller for the Middle event on the Crater Block map, this DreamingDreams video is a must watch!  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kzVtvAWGB7I

Kings Birthday Carnival 2024

Nelson Orienteering Club (NOC) will host King’s Birthday 2024 in Golden Bay. The organisers promise:

• High quality orienteering on the way to and in Golden Bay, one bay ‘over’ from Nelson
• A compact orienteering weekend, with the first start on Saturday at 1pm, and course closure on Monday at 12 noon
• The Long and the Sprint are on brand-new maps. The Middle will take place on the stunning Canaan Downs South map, terrain described by former NOC president Matt Ogden as “Pure New Zealand orienteering, the spiritual epicentre for the sport"

More details here

Note - the Kings Birthday Carnival includes the trials for the NZSS team to compete at the Australian Schools Champs during the September School Holidays.

Tūāraki-Northern Regional Championships - Labour Weekend 2024

Counties Manukau will host this year's Tūāraki-Northern Regional Championships over Labour Weekend ie from Saturday 26 October to Monday 28 October. More details to come.

Schools Orienteering

The latest news about the Auckland Secondary School Sprint Series (Years 7-13) is availabe here Competition for most zones begins NEXT week ie the week of 19 February. 

All start dates have been published on the College Sport website, and all competition dates and venues are available on the Schools’ Orienteering website.

North Island Secondary School Champs 2024

North West is the host for this year's event which will be held from Thursday 25 April to Saturday 27 April. Event dates & locations are:

• Thursday 25 April: Sprint @ AUT Akoranga Campus, North Shore
• Friday 26 April: Long distance @ Mairetahi Forest, Wilson Road, South Head
• Saturday 27 April: Relay @ Barlow Road, Riverhead Forest

First starts from approximately 1.00pm on Thursday 25 April.

The event website, including Bulletin 1 is live here

Event entries opening very soon here 

There will be public races available on selected courses for the Sprint & the Long events once the students have finished competing on those days.

North West's Bivouac Outdoor Rogaine Series 2024

A big event on our North West calendar is our annual Auckland Bivouac Outdoor Rogaine Series. Three 90 minute Foot Rogaine Events will be held on:

• Sunday 19 May - Stoneybrook
• Sunday 26 May - Barlow Road, Riverhead Forest
• Sunday 9 June - Grass Track Road, Muriwai end of Woodhill Forest

All event info will be posted on our North West website here

General Orienteering News - Orienteer-pod

For podcast listeners, there's an orienteering option! Orienteer-pod features 3 orienteers, Ralph Street of Britain, Tim Robertson from New Zealand and Magnus Dewett from Denmark talking all things orienteering. The origins of the podcast were a group chat so it's a bit erratic in the beginning but now has over 150 listeners and is steadily growing.  What's on it?  A lot of chat and orienteer geeking which gives an insight into racing & training in Europe.

Here are a few you might like to dip into:
#5 podcast has insights on training & logging training 
#6 Ralph details the sprint and Tim talks about NZ's Sprint relay
#7 mentions Matt Ogden winning the NZ champs   
#10 The Danish club project and the astounding amounts of money some clubs have. Several NZ orienteers get a mention - Carsten Jorgensen as a "crazy fast runner", Alister Landels as the 1995 world cup victor as well as NZers Ross Morrison, Lizzie Ingham, Matt Ogden & Andrea Simpson
#12 Mentions the Junior camp in NZ  
Listen to Orienteer-pod on Apple, Google Podcasts or Spotify
Source - ONZ's Compass Point newsletter, January 2024

Member News

NWOC Hosted events in 2024 - We need your help please

We've got a busy start to 2024 with two significant events coming up in March & April followed closely by our Auckland Bivouac Rogaine Series starting in May.  First up, on Sunday 17 March is the Long event of the JWOC trials followed in April (Thursday 25 - Saturday 27) by the 2024 North Island Secondary School Champs. In May & June, we host our Rogaine Series. North West Club members also provide support for Auckland Secondary Schools events especially for Finals Day to be held on Sunday 7 April.

We need and value help from all Club members - thanks to those who have already responded postively to the call for help in our last newsletter or to direct requests. To everyone else, if you're happy to help please contact us at northwestorienteering@gmail.com There's a variety of jobs to do; some pre-event activities that might involve admin work from home as well as on-the-day assistance with everything from running the sport ident technology that ensures we have results for events to control collection at the end of an event. All those who help are awarded a voucher for discounted or free entry to another NWOC-organised event. 

North West Membership Fees for 2024 are due now

NWOC membership fees remain unchanged for 2024 and are due NOW please. Thanks to those who have paid already. Note - to enter the National Champs in Rotorua you must have paid your Club membership fees.

And as in the last couple of years, we are again offering a combined deal of club membership/rogaine entry fee that offers good savings for those who love our rogaine series. (We have 3 rogaines planned for 2024.) The new combo deal means you effectively get free entry to one rogaine – plus all the benefits of club membership.

To ensure you get members’ rates at all orienteering events, please pay your fee as soon as possible.

Existing members can simply credit NWOC's club bank account (WESTPAC Account 03-0243-0247251-000 and include your name in the reference field.) No need to log in or re-register. Those selecting the membership/rogaine combo deal will receive a credit voucher before the start of the rogaine series.

We hope to see lots of members at an event soon.