Greetings North West members

It’s been a busy two months since our last newsletter with NWOC hosting two home events – the urban middle at Kristin School in July and more recently, the New Zealand Secondary School Champs in August(joint co-hosts with Auckland Club). Many thanks to Andrew & Fiona de L’Isle  and Allan Janes for organising the Kristin event – this event takes a different format to forest orienteering and is becoming a regular in our NWOC calendar. And extra special thanks to Annemarie Hogenbirk who masterminded the New Zealand Secondary School Champs. I know from experience that organising an event for 450+ people involves hours and hours of work and the success of the Champs is testament to Annemarie’s attention to detail and her development of processes that make for smooth operations.

The presence of a film crew at the New Zealand Secondary School Champs was a first for orienteering in New Zealand and provided a fantastic opportunity to showcase our sport to a wider audience. Our thanks to North West member Devon Beckman, the man with the microphone, who showed he is a natural presenter with his expert commentary and slick interviewing.

July and August have also been busy months for many of our members who have experienced European orienteering events. There are some great write-ups about these experiences later in this newsletter. Congratulations to all those who had personal best performances. And at our recent North West Exec meeting, we talked about what we can learn from these experiences in planning future home events.

Talking about future planning, as we look ahead to 2020, we are also addressing our resourcing as a Club. Kaye Griffiths, who has been our fantastic newsletter editor for 5 years, is stepping down and we are seeking her replacement. An 'ad' for an editor is later in the newsletter. Please contact me if you are interested in this role. And thank you Kaye for the wonderful newsletters you have brought us.

I am also considering my future as Club President. I have held major roles on the Exec for 5 years; 3 years as Secretary and 2 years as President. With significant changes in my employment situation this year, I want and need to make some changes. I would like to step down as President at the end of this year so if you're a ‘President-in-waiting’, please let me know!

All of us on the Exec are busy people and all of us have been committed to North West for many years (some much longer than I have!) To ensure the continued success of North West we need others to join us in helping run the Club. One idea we have is to expand our Committee and split the current roles into smaller roles, thus spreading the workload. We know that today everyone has less time for volunteering; we are all busy and so I ask you all as members of North West to consider how you could help us. More people doing smaller roles will mean the time commitment is shared. Please contact me to discuss ways you could help.

In making this request, I want to note the fabulous benefits from getting involved in the Club. Volunteering feels good (there’s research to prove this!), I’ve had heaps of fun, learnt new skills, love seeing people of all ages enjoying our sport, better understand orienteering and best of all, I’ve made wonderful friends!

Jenny Cade

President, North West Orienteering Club

presidentnorthwestorienteering@gmail.com    0211882468

In this issue:

1. Upcoming Events
2. Club Relays Details
3. Call for North West Trophies to be Returned
4. Help Needed for AOS 9
5. Junior Camp & U23 Camp Registrations DUE
6. Oringen 2019
7. WOC 2019
8. JWOC 2019
9. MTBO World Championships 2019
10. Club Member Profile
11. Welcome to New Members
12. Carbon Neutral Orienteering
13. Seeking New NWOC Newsletter Editor
14. NZSS Championships
15. Australia and China Events
16. NZ MTBO Championships
17. Sprint Weekend - Lonely Mountain Sprints 24-27 January

1. Upcoming Events

 8   September AOS 8, Totara Park
15 September Auckland Inter-Club Sprint Relay - Murrays Bay School, Clematis Ave (Details below)
22 September AOS 9, Whites Line (request for helpers below)
20 October AOS 10, Tapapakanga Regional Park
26-28 October Auckland Championships
1 December NWOC End of Year Dinner and Prizegiving - more details closer, but save the date!

2. Inter Club Relays Details

Ensure you have signed up on on Enter O here by Sunday 8 September (TOMORROW) so Allan can make up the teams. Remember, it is fun for all members, not just those at the top end of the results!

Date: Sunday 15 September 2019
Venue: Murrays Bay School (Clematis Ave). There is no parking in the school so please park on the road. Follow O signs as you walk in to the school to ensure you do not venture out of bounds! Event Centre will be in the School Hall adjacent to the main entrance.

First start at 11:30. Registration open from 10:00, briefing at 11:00.

Entry fee is covered by North West.

3. Call for NW Trophys to be returned

It's that time of year again, where we ask you to clear out your trophy cabinets and return the trophies you may have won last year. We will have a box available at the Relays and also at AOS 9 - just ask a committee member or someone on registration! 

4. AOS9 - Request for helpers

Call for volunteers to help at AOS9, September 22^nd, Whites Line, Woodhill

Please contact Pip Poole p.poole@xtra.co.nz or text 021682448 if you can help with any of the tasks below. She will confirm with you during the week before the event.

This is North West’s last event for 2019, so it’s your last chance to be part of the great NWOC event team this year. We are really keen to involve new members and will show you the ropes!

These are the jobs we need to cover:

Set up (be at Restall Rd gate at 0800)                      5 pers
Registration                                                                3 pers
Start 0945-1115 ( you can run late)                         2 pers
Start 1115-1230 (you can run early)                        2 pers              
Finish                                                                           2 pers
Take down 1400-                                                       5 pers  
Control collection 1430-                                           4 pers                

5. U23 and Junior Camp Registrations - applications due by 15 September

 We assume all our club juniors and elites saw this notice in a recent email from ONZ but just in case it is reprinted here…

Junior Camp 15-20 December, Pukekohe

Because of demand for the ONZ Junior Camp over the last few years that we have now put some limits on who can attend.  This is so we can focus on the training needs for M/W 14/16 Red (and experienced Orange) orienteers, giving these young orienteers the best training opportunity we can.

2019 Junior Camp Selection Criteria Priorities:

1. M/W 14/16
2. Those that compete at Red or Orange (experienced) course level
3. Those who have represented NZ in a Schools Team or Invitational Team
4. Those who have represented their club at National Championships

The maximum number of athletes for the camp has been set at 80. Applicants must be a member of an ONZ affiliated club.

If you are running just orange courses, then the focus for you is to start challenging yourself to run harder courses with the aim of red courses during 2020 and beyond.

If you do not fit these criteria, i.e. you are now running M/W 18, we are currently assessing the expansion of our youth training opportunities.  We are looking at how we can make training available for those that are too old for the Junior Camp and/or haven’t been selected for the U23 camp.

Costs are still to be confirmed, dependent on funding applications.

Application cut-off date is Sunday 15 September 2019. Apply here 

U23 Camp 7-13 December, Pukekohe

This camp will be focused on high performance with the Under 23 High Performance Squad in attendance and others by invitation, after registrations have been assessed.  Again, there are limited numbers who can attend.

Applications are open to those aged 17 to 22 years old and is targeted at the U23 and regional-squad members (older 17-22 years) to develop their skills and training regime for JWOC/WUOC and National Orienteering League.  Note that membership of the Regional Squads does not guarantee acceptance to the camp.  

Coaches for the Junior Camp will also be encouraged to attend. 

Focused on optimising technical skills for competition and building a structured training plan.

Costs are still to be confirmed, dependent on funding applications. Application cut-off date is Sunday 15 September 2019. Apply here

6. O-Ringen 2019

With over 30 NWOC and AOC orienteers at Oringen this year, there was quite a NZ contingent. We asked Geoff Mead  to write up a few thoughts to share with those of us who were not able to be there:

Every orienteer needs to go to an O-Ringen event at least once in their orienteering career. O-Ringen is the world's largest orienteering adventure - an annual five-day competition in Sweden. About 18,000 competitors, with 10,000 camping at the O-Ringen campsite / event centre.  The 2019 event was held in Norrköping, about 3 hours train travel west of Stockholm. Four long events, one middle and a chasing start on the last day. NWOC was well represented and shared a corner of the giant campsite with AOC and other NZ orienteers. We had a great time both socially and with the orienteering challenges. Clubs are grouped together with similar start times, so you can travel and hike to the start with your club mates.

Takeaways from the event…….

• Challenging O terrain, both physically and technically. The white Swedish forest is what we would often map as light green forest. It is typically rocky under foot with knee high vegetation. Long legs with few track options or catching features. Lots of rock features, marshes, hills all the same size. There are some map snippets below. We all came away better orienteers and the impression that orienteering in NZ is often “soft”. Our NZ carpet-like underfoot conditions in our sand dune forests, track networks in our plantation forests, all too easy. We need to toughen up if we are going to compete in the Scandinavian home of orienteering.
• The phenomenal number of good orienteers and the depth in the grades. We could never ever imagine doing the winners’ times. So many super fit and expert orienteers. I guess a Swedish rugby team would feel the same visiting NZ? A completed course with no DNF / MP was a good outcome for a standard NWOC club member.
• Marquita did however display her excellent bike and orienteering skills by winning the MTBO event in her age group!
• The organisation and logistics, so good. We think 500 people is a big event, well 18,000 is big. Fleets of buses to get people to the events (no need for your own car), many starts, long walks (up to 3km) to the starts, many finish chutes. See the picture below of one of the event centres. You had to go down the finish chute that matched the sponsor of your competition class.
• The O gear shops, the communal showers (segregated by gender) – well, the event is in Sweden. Good salad bars in the supermarket replaced eating in restaurants.
• What a great O experience and holiday.
• Map snippets and event centre photo below.

And some more photos of NW member at O-Ringen

7. WOC - Norway (July)

Many of you will have spent some late nights watching these races - isn’t it fantastic that the technology allows us to share the moment….

NWOC members Gene Beveridge and Cameron de L’Isle were competing in the team.

As Malcolm Ingham recently noted in High Performance news, Gene’s 34th place in the Long (along with Toby Scott’s 30th) were the best men’s results seen for many years.

You can read an analysis of Gene’s run here.     

 

8. JWOC

Here was another series of late nights a few weeks earlier as we supported (in spirit) the NZ team and especially NW juniors Max Griffiths, Daniel Monckton, Tegan Knightbridge (and coach Devon Beckman).

Their best  placings were:
Tegan  Long 109th, Middle 46th (B Final)
Max Sprint 86th, Middle 23rd (B Final)
Daniel Sprint 54th,  Middle 32nd (B Final)

Some of us were fortunate enough to be able to support in person and our Black and White Supporters Crew t-shirts ensured we made a visible statement to go along with our loud cheering!

Max Griffiths, competing in his last JWOC shares some thoughts here:

I again had the opportunity to run at JWOC in my final year in Denmark this year alongside North West members Daniel Monckton and Tegan Knightbridge and the rest of the NZ team. Having run at JWOC in Hungary last year, I had an idea of what to expect but being held in Denmark, I knew the organisation would be a step up from last year and it seriously delivered on that front. The arena’s for all events were amazing with commentary, large screen, run throughs, gps on all athletes, and even an arena start for the middle distance final. All of my maps from the training week and competition week can be found here https://www.numberoneaucklanddoma.com/maps/index.php?user=Max&categoryID=0&year=2019&filter=&displayMode=list.

The team met in Copenhagen a week before the competition started before driving through to Silkeborg where we would train and compete over the following two weeks. The week of training was all about familiarising ourselves with the maps and getting into the zone before JWOC races at simulation trainings. The forest was varied in both steepness and runnability. On some of the broad white forest hills it was beautiful open running and clean underfoot, but some areas also had considerable ground cover, including blueberries which were draining on the energy to run through. The green forest was also varied with the light green usually being still quite runnable with just a few branches between trees and tighter spacing of trees, while the darker green sometimes was thick conifer bushes which hindered runnability and visibility severely.

The following week we moved into competition starting with the opening ceremony in the centre of Silkeborg. This is always a fun atmosphere, and was the point that we realised how large the support group of NZ’ers was that had travelled to Denmark to cheer on the team! Having this level of support for individuals and the team helps fuel the energy in the team and build confidence despite being on the other side of the world in unfamiliar terrain!

The sprint was up first and provided challenge through many tight corners and small buildings and hedges, so while there were no significant route choices in the courses, being able to pick a (near) optimal route quickly and have the acceleration round all the corners was key. One of the legs is shown below with 3 main route choices, but there are other combinations available. The 3 medalists overall ran green while the winner of this leg ran a slight variation on red. Other interesting legs to look at route choice are 5-6, 19-20 and 20-21. The map can be found here.

Next up the long distance provided a healthy dose of hills (somehow they found some in Denmark, with the M20 total climb being more than 3 times the height of the highest point in Denmark). While there were no major long legs with wildly different routechoices, there was still plenty of opportunity for time loss, both in smaller routechoices as well as technical errors, especially in some of the vague green areas. Many legs offered 2 main routechoices of a straighter, more physical, harder running underfoot, or a longer distance track running option. Interestingly looking at the routes of some of the top runners, many opted for less physically demanding but longer distance track based routes on a fair few legs. Leg 14 is shown with 4 of the common routes. Legs 4, 8, 15 are a few other legs with some straight or round routechoices. Take your pick and then compare with the GPS replay!

After a rest day, races continued for the middle distance qualification and finals based around the same arena. With the top 20 from each of 3 heats qualifying for the A-final, mistakes must be kept to a minimum. NZ had 3 qualifiers to the A final after the competition on the southern part of the map, Katie, Joseph and Will, with all NW members qualifying for the B-final. A snippet of my course with my route below from heat 2 of the qualification races is shown. 

Trying to keep hesitations and mistakes to a minimum but unfortunately too many small mistakes added up to too much time loss overall. The technical difficulty of both of these races was easier than we were expecting, especially the final which usually has much more of a focus on technical orienteering than the physical side (while still being important of course). The northern part of the map above the arena had broader more open slopes with a few pockets of green and tighter contour detail. That is, once we got to it after the first yellow-difficulty control!

Part of the Men-B-final, Lots of positive contour                                                 A couple of different routes around the 
control sites (spurs)                                                                                                 swamps and green on the Men-A-final.

The week concluded, as it always does, with the relay in which NZ always seems to struggle for various reasons. The recent change in the format for the NZ National Champs relay at Easter will hopefully improve this in following years as we get used to high pressure relays against top NZ runners, although this unfortunately won’t reach the level of exposure runners in Europe get at these kinds of competitions.

Unfortunately it wasn’t the year for the womens' teams with both teams mispunching in the hectic chaos of tight controls and criss-crossing runners. The terrain consisted of much flatter terrain than the previous days, with a maze of tracks and rides through a mix of fast open white forest and greener (but still very runnable) bush. The forking was set very well, as can be seen from the master map here. Even in the final loop there were a couple of splits, which, when combined with the course crossing on itself in this final loop, caused many runners in many directions to distract you if you weren’t paying enough focus; as well as the added pressure of being able to hear the arena in the background. 

The run-through and final loop, if you can manage to make sense of the forking and crossing course lines!

9. MTBO World Championships

NWOC Members Tegan Knightbridge and Devon Beckman retruned to Denmark at the end of July to compete in the MTBO World Championships in Viborg.  By all accounts it was a fantastic week of racing.

Amidst many punctures, mp's and dnfs for the team, Tegan and Devon ended up as the only team members with results for all races! Tegan's and Devon’s best performances were in the sprint distance finishing 24^th and 28^th respectively. 

In the public races, Rob Garden, Marquita Gelderman, Michael Knightbridge and Kay Knightbridge competed.

Marquita won 4 out of 5 stages in the womens 40 class in the public races the Viborg 6 Day, so dropping down an age class and still out performing everyone else!! She didn’t contest the 6^th day due to competing with Tegan (and Georgia Skelton) in the W21 relay, where they finished 10^th overall!

Michael  competed in all 6 races and finished all with no MPs’ ! He finished 6^th overall in the M50 class.

10.Club Member Profile - Chris and Yett Gelderman

This month we are profiling Chris and Yett Gelderman - known to many club members as "volunteers extraordinaire" - they are always willing helpers at most events! Read on to find out if they got Marquita into the sport or if it was the other way around!

Number of years orienteering?
Around 36 years, from 1983

How were you introduced to orienteering.?
Marquita had already been introduced to orienteering, and she wanted to borrow the car most Sundays. A few months later, Michael Wood ran an event in the Rimutaka Forest Park, next door to where we lived. We decided to go and have a look to see what it was all about. After doing two courses that day we were hooked!

Key orienteering achievements to date?
Three gold medals at the World Masters MTBO champs in Portugal in 2015 for Yett.
No such achievement for Chris, but being able to represent New Zealand overseas in MTBO has been pretty special.

Current orienteering project or goal?
To find all controls within a reasonable time, don't DNF, and in the case of MTBO, don't fall off!

Orienteering hero?
There are two orienteers in our lives who keep us on our toes! Gentle reminders such as "USE YOUR COMPASS" and exclamations like “ OH DAD!!" or "MUM !!" are driven by their unfaltering dedication and enthusiasm.

Day job?
Keeping our macadamia trees strong, healthy and happy.
And growing nuts!

Other interests?
Cycling. Combine it with orienteering and it becomes MTBO. Combine it with a holiday and it becomes an adventure.

11. Welcome to New Members

Sienna Payne
Phaedra Cadness
Nicky Peters, 
Gus McIntosh
Amelia McIntosh
Hannah McIntosh

Plus Devon Beckman - as a second club!

We hope you enjoy being a part of North West and we look forward to getting to know you at events.

12. Carbon Neutral Orienteering?

The NWOC committee at a recent meeting had a discussion on the environmental impact of orienteering. The Zero Carbon bill is being developed by the Government as a response to climate change. What should we do as a sport to support the objectives of a carbon neutral NZ?

Orienteering playgrounds (maps) use the environment as is, whether it is a city park, a school campus, a farm, a forest etc. We do not have to construct or build special facilities for orienteering, like sports fields, swimming pools, chair lifts, etc. We may leave a few muddy foot prints behind and some crushed vegetation but our events do not significantly “damage” the environment. The Government policies that support forest (carbon absorbing) planting may well over time increase the areas available for orienteering.

We do, however, all drive in our CO2 emitting vehicles to orienteering events - sometimes long distances to reach high-quality forest orienteering terrain or a regional championship. Over the coming decade as we transition to hybrid/EV cars this problem will reduce. But in the meantime, we should at least ensure that our vehicles are full of orienteers when travelling to an event, to minimise the vehicle emissions per orienteer. So car pool to events with your friends and club mates. 

Clubs when selecting new areas to map should also consider the driving distance from town. Urban sprint/park orienteering close to competitors’ homes is part of the sport that is more environmentally friendly in terms of minimal vehicle emissions. We can walk/run, cycle, scooter, e-bike, public transport to these events? Well some of us might?

We can also minimise the amount of waste / rubbish produced at events by including in our orienteering kitbags a reusable cup for water after our run and the pre/post event coffee, rather than constantly using disposable cups. Also, by supplying our own and reusing plastic map bags, rather than using a new one for every event. 

Now we come to a challenging topic, air travel to that overseas orienteering carnival holiday or a NZ event beyond a driving distance. From a carbon neutral perspective it is not a good look. Forgo the event, have a long European holiday every few years with many O events to minimise the number of long flights (lucky people who can do this!), or ensure that your travel budget covers the cost of a carbon offset fee (Air NZ has these)?

13. Seeking a new North West Club Newsletter Editor

After five years as Editor of North West’s newsletter, Kaye has decided to stand down.  The newsletter keeps us up-to-date with news of Club events, Club members’ achievements, coaching advice and more.

The facts about the job. The editor’s role is to:

·         Publish a newsletter typically six times each year

·         Keep a note of upcoming events to be promoted

·         Keep track of results of NWOC members from major events  

·         Invite Club members to write a report about major past events e.g. Nationals, Queen’s Birthday weekend, Australian Champs

·         Invite Club members to write a profile page – standard questions exist.

·         Invite special contributions e.g. on coaching or a report of an overseas experience.

Members of NWOC’s Exec support the Editor and assist with suggesting the timing of and content for newsletters.

We’re seeking another Club Member with an interest in writing to take on the role of Editor.  If this is you, please email Club President, Jenny at presidentnorthwestorienteering@gmail.com

14. NZSS Championships

Another fantastic event run by North West was held recently - well done to Event Director, Annemarie Hogenbirk,and her team.

Congratulations to the following NW juniors who made podium over the weekend:

Taiga Kato 1st Junior Boys Sprint
Jessica Sewell 1st Senior Girls Sprint

15. Australia and China Events

China

Congratulations to Devon Beckman and Alice Tilley who have been selected to compete at the World Cup Event in China in October - World Cup Round 4 will be held in Foshan City, Guangdong, China from 25-29 October 2019.

Australia

All the best to all members who are heading across the ditch to compete at Australian Champs and Oceania later this month.

In particular good luck to:

• the following who are in NZ secondary school teams to compete in the Southern Cross Challenge against Australian State Schools Teams:
  • Liam Stolberger, Luke Farrand, Cameron Bonar, Jessica Sewell, Cara Bradding
• our Elite runners who will be hoping to gain placings guaranteeing entry to WOC Sprint 2020
• members competing as part of the Pinestars team against Australia
  • Tegan Knightbridge, Jessica Sewell, Liam Stolberger, Gene Beveridge, Cameron de L'Isle, Matt ogden
• members competing as part of the ANZ challenge.
  • Cara Bradding,  Rob Murphy, Marquita Gelderman, Kay Knighbridge, Pip Poole, GEoff Mead, Rob Garden, Dave Middleton

16. NZ MTBO Championships, Rotorua, 9-10 November

Want to experience a fantastic weekend of top level mountain bike orienteering?  The 2019 NZ MTB Orienteering Champs will be hosted in Rotorua, NZ's MTBing mecca, on 9th and 10th November.  The Long Distance, Middle Distance and Sprint events will have categories for all ages and experience.  This will include an E-Bike Category and a Children's Category.  Don't be put off by the fact it s a NZ Champs.   This will be a fantastic weekend of competition, challenge, and fun for Mountain Bikers, Orienteers, and Adventure Racers of all abilities. 

To find out all the details and to enter go to mtbochamps.nz.  You must pre-enter online and online entries close 3 November.  Note if you enter before the end of September you will be eligible to go into the draw to win a new AutoPilot mapboard.

17. Sprint Weekend - Lonely Mountain Sprints, Taranaki, 24-27 January

Entries are now open for the Lonely Mountain Sprints 

Originally Malcolm Ingham asked us to run a WOC sprint trial, but we decided to make it a larger festival and so “The Lonely Mountain Sprints” were born. The WOC trials will be in a knockout QF/SF/Final format and will be great spectating while the Open events will have the normal 8 or so age graded courses.

 As many of you will be aware, the following weekend is Sprint the Bays, so get ready for a festival of Sprint Orienteering.

You can enter on  www.lonelymountainsprints.weebly.com