Renee Beveridge

Elite orienteer and a NWOC member practically since birth, Renee Beveridge holidayed in the South Island at the end of 2020, and could not resist competing in a Southland Orienteering Club (SOC) event in December. SOC took the opportunity to talk to Renee and profile her in their January 2021 newsletter.

Years Orienteering and how I started: Since I was born! My dad started Orienteering in his 30s as he loved long distance running. My mum started after meeting my dad, and then my brother and I were indoctrinated into it. We belong to the North West Orienteering Club which has maps in North West of Auckland, most notably the famous Woodhill Forest.

What do I love about Orienteering: How varied the sport is. You run in so many different areas and types of terrains, from complex building and town settings to sand dunes, marshy forests, and open rocky areas. Every course is different, instead of running around a track 10 times. Because you can have thousands of competitors competing on the same day in the same area, you have young and old, and non-elites and elites all at the same event. You mingle with 100s of people at each event rather than just your team or who you are competing against. You can travel to Orienteering competitions all over Europe all year round with elites competing at the same time as non-elites, which you cannot do in many other sports that only hold events for the top athletes.

International experience: I first competed outside NZ in 2011 as part of the NZ Schools Team that competes in Aussie every year. The competition is usually held over two weeks, with schools competitions, public races, and Australian and State Championship competitions. Sometimes this is held in conjunction with Oceania that adds a number of other races to the mix as well. Competing in Aussie definitely motivated me to commit to Orienteering more seriously. I was at a point where I needed to start training a lot more if I was to get close to being competitive in NZ junior and senior elite races. Australia has some really challenging types of terrain, including beautiful open Eucalyptus forest with massive boulders and cliffs to mining terrain with a labyrinth of trenches and gullies. Many of their forest terrains have broad hills, with not a lot of detail but rocks, and this showed me that my compass technique was rubbish.

My next overseas experience was the 2013 Junior World Champs (JWOC) in Hradec Kralove, Czech Republic. This was the first time I had been to Europe and it was a really great trip. Czech Republic is beautiful and also cheap. Again, this competition taught me the level you needed to be at to be competitive in foreign terrain against people who were a lot fitter than me and used to competing in terrain that had everything from rocks, marshes, vegetation changes, complex contour detail, stone walls, open rock etc. You are also hanging out with people from lots of different countries. I was feeling a lot more motivated now, and realised I still needed to train a lot more. In 2014 I was in the NZ team for the World Uni Champs (WUOC). It was in Czech Republic again but in Olomouc, which had different terrain compared to JWOC. Because it was so cheap a lot of gelatos were consumed…which wasn’t great for my body but how could I say no to a 4 scoop gelato in European summer? World Unis was very cool, with many of the competitors also competing at World Champs. I also went to Fin5 in Finland and O-Ringen in Sweden. My brother also competed at WUOC and O-Ringen with me (map shown below is typical of an O-Ringen event).

European competitions are always bigger than NZ ones, but O-Ringen takes the cake. O-Ringen is an Orienteering competition that has been going for over 75 years and has an average 15,000-20,000 competitors over the six days. A huge area is booked out for accommodation, where people tent or stay in campervans in the host town. There is a banquet hall and heaps of shops at the accommodation. Pretty much an Orienteering city. O-Ringen is definitely an event you need to go to if you are wanting to orienteer in Europe. It’s massive and well planned, with 8 finishing lanes with young kids through to people in their 90s running down them the whole day. In 2015 my brother and I competed in Scotland at the World Orienteering Champs. That was pretty scary and also a bit different from JWOC and WUOC in that the teams stayed in separate places. But still very cool to be competing against the world’s best, and alongside the best NZ orienteers. I then took a bit of a break from going overseas due to Uni, but still went to the Australian Champs and Oceania a number of times.

In 2019 I couldn’t resist going back to Europe again. I did a bunch of travelling and then went to watch JWOC and do the spectator races in Denmark, then to Sweden for O-Ringen again, and then to Slovakia for the Slovak O-week. Since it had been a few years since my last European trip it was really cool to see the new JWOC team in action and be travelling alongside many Kiwis that had only just starting Orienteering when I was first competing internationally; now they were experiencing international competition for the first time and loving it.

Favourite discipline and terrain: The middle distance is my favourite discipline. Middle distances are often held in technically challenging terrain (lots of rocks and land or water features/complex contours) and isn’t overly physical and nasty. I enjoy the fast pace of middle distances and the challenge of technical navigation a bit more than big route choices through steep grunty terrain. But maybe I would like long distances if I did more hill training!

Weakest trait in Orienteering: My weakness is probably uphill running. I also need to improve my navigation and confidence when running through terrain where vegetation hides the contours as I tend to doubt my compass bearings. I also lose my concentration a bit sometimes, particularly in big competitions when stress levels are high.

Renee's orienteering tip: One of main things I see with new orienteers, particularly adults, is moving onto the next navigational level too quickly. Often new adult orienteers feel pressured to run their normal age grade; which is red navigation. Unfortunately, they really struggle at this level as they haven’t gone through all the different levels like a young newcomer would have, and have missed out on crucial navigation skills such as contour recognition. Red courses require a strong understanding of contours. When people can’t get around the course using contours they tend to fall back on other techniques, such as compass bearings. They continue relying on their compass to get from control to control for quite a long time, but because this isn’t an efficient way of doing red courses they don’t improve their results or advance their contour understanding, even after years of Orienteering.

Moral of the story is, Orienteering is more about map reading than compass. If you are struggling, drop down a level. There is no shame in this and will help you in the long run.

For more information about Renee, visit her wordofo profile.

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Profiled May 2017

Renee has represented NZ in Schools Challenges, JWOC WUOC and WOC. We are fortunate to have her as an active club member (schools events, course setting etc) and such a popular, positive mentor and coach to club  junior. Renee won the Oceania Middle Distance title in the recent Oceania Championships, gaining automatic entry to WOC, but unfortunately is unable to attend WOC this year.

Number of years orienteering?
Since I can remember. Started as a baby on mum's back when she went orienteering!

How were you introduced to orienteering?
My parents :) 

Key orienteering achievements to date?
WOC middle and relay 2015. World Cup in Tasmania 2015, WUOC 2014 and JWOC 2013. Winning automatic qualification for WOC middle 2017 because of win in Oceania Middle Champs.

Current orienteering project or goal?
Training for Queens Birthday, Aussie and Nationals

Favourite map and why?
Whites lines....haha jokes.
Any maps from Oringen in Sweden and some Aussie maps because they challenge you in every way. Unfortunately many of our maps have either very good visibility or are open farmland. I'm not saying I don't make mistakes in NZ, but most European and Aussie maps force you to use all your skills.

Map you have yet to experience but aspire to orienteer on?
Some intensely detailed maps in France, Slovenia or Croatia

Orienteering hero?
Ida Bobach

Day job?
Mike Beveridge's PA (course setter)

Other interests?
Karate, Art, Science

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