New Junior Representative
Please welcome the new Director of Junior Representative Orienteering (a mouthful, normally abbreviated to the “Junior Rep”) to the Irish Orienteering Association. David Masterson has decided to take up the role after many years of being coaxed into doing so, but mainly because he firmly believes in giving Junior Orienteering Athletes every possible opportunity to learn, improve and display their talents, both at home and internationally.
Dave has been an orienteer since his first event in Sept 1991, where himself and a young Shane Lynch argued for 72 mins about which path to run up on Ticknock. He spent many happy years orienteering as a junior within the Irish Junior Squad and ran at several JHIs (to no great success). He went to UCD, but decided to spend his elite years underground in caves instead of in a forest. However, he returned several years later having seen the error of his ways.
Nowadays, he lives on the Curragh and runs with CNOC (to moderate success), and can be seen at most orienteering events (with his family) around the country – generally lending a hand where he can. He hopes that he can give the current Juniors the same great memories of junior orienteering that he himself has.
To get in touch with Dave, the best way is to send an email to juniorrep@orienteering.ie
Junior Training Talk Registration Form
This is a workshop to detail what a winter physical (running) training should be and what the technical training can be for an Irish junior living in Ireland and who is interested in competing at the Junior World Orienteering Championships next year or at some stage in the future. Presenters are Josh O’Sullivan Hourihan and David Healy respectively per topic area.
The workshop will take place over two evenings on the 30th and 31st of October at 8pm both nights and it is intended for the MW16-20s juniors. However MW14s are invited to sit in if they are interested. Or young seniors who feel this is of interest.
See you soon!
Junior Home Internationals Success
A surprisingly strong squad emerged from the enforced hibernation of lock down and a team of 21 young athletes were selected to travel to the Junior Home Internationals in Surrey. The event was excellently organised by South London Orienteers. Luxurious accommodation was provided by PGL outdoor activity centre and the Individual event at the Devil’s Punchbowl was planned to have a fiendishly steep finish up to the Centre’s woodland. It was great to have a full complement of W14s and a particularly strong performance from Great Easter Navigator’s (GEN) Fionnuala Rowe who finished in 6th place, her older sister Emily also performing well finishing 8th in the W16 race. Lagan Valley’s Meadow McCauley led the Irish field at W18 in her last performance at JHI.
The terrain was very tough, and not your typical southern forest. There was hard running through thick undergrowth and several very steep climbs so our M18s had a tough outing, but again performed well with a 6th and 8th place for Eoghan Whelan (South East Viking Orienteers) and Liam Cotter (Bishopstown Orienteering Club), and a respectable time in 11th place for Lagan Valley’s Dan Earnshaw. This is also the last JHI for all these young men. At M16, the Irish boys finished in consecutive places with Josh Hoare (Bishopstown Orienteering Club) leading the pack and Oliver, Dan and Ben (LVO), in succession all showing how physical the terrain was.
Highlight of the weekend had to be Gerry Browne’s performance winning 3rd place in the M14 race. He followed this with such a blistering relay leg that his 3rd leg runner (nameless) wasn’t quite ready for the handover. There was no question about who should be awarded the shield for Best Irish Performance. Well done Gerry!
The relay on Bramshott Common provided some fast running and unfortunately a confusing control with a mis- number. Despite this all our teams finished error-free giving us a comfortable lead over a diminished Welsh team and we took home the Judith Wingham Trophy again.
Many thanks go to the parents who travelled with the team and especially to Eoin Browne who lent his O-shoes to Ben whose bag stayed in Gatwick for the weekend. Special thanks to Stephanie Pruzina for coordinating and organising the Irish team in the absence of a Junior Affairs Coordinator for the IOA. Made especially difficult under the current covid restrictions, differing North/ South Ireland and UK! Of course enormous thanks to SLOW for putting on a great event and particularly Mathias and Abi who co-ordinated the weekend.
One final learning point…we might need to recruit some musical talent for next year. If we can’t beat the Scots at O maybe we can out-sing them!
Links to Full Results can be found at SLOW’s website here.
More thanks to Stephanie Pruzina for providing the basis of this article. 🙂
Munster & Connaught Champs – UPDATE
Munster Championships – Sunday November 7th 2021.
ENTRIES NOW OPEN
Entries for MOC 2021 are now open using the IOA entry system. Relevant course information also included. Also note the email address for any specific requests for early/middle/late start blocks. BOC look forward to you joining us for MOC 2021 November 7th.
More details and entry are at
Connaught Orienteering Championships – 24 October 2021
Venue: Woodlawn, New Inn, Co. Galway M687 326 GPS 53.341824 -8.473520
Start Times: Start times will be from 11am to 12.30pm.
Map: The map scale is 1:10,000 with 2.5 metre contours. Surveyed and drawn by Padraig Higgins 2021
Terrain: Mixed runnable undulating forest with a good network of roads, tracks and paths. Lots of small hills and re-entrants. Not all recent mountain tracks have been mapped
Orienteering in Ireland » Official website of the Irish Orienteering Association » Woodlawn
Junior Home Internationals 2021
This weekend a team of juniors and their supporters and mentors are heading for Haslemere in Surrey in the South of England for the Junior Home Internationals. South London Orienteers, affectionately known as ‘SLOW’ are hosting the event. The event is, for many, the first time they will don the Irish jersey and orienteer for an all Ireland team in the JHI.
The JHI is the ‘Home Nations’ of Junior orienteering where teams aged M/W14 to M/W18 from each of England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland compete. The event consists of an individual long distance competition on Saturday, followed by mixed aged teams in a Relay on the Sunday. Results from the two days are calculated using a points based system.
Saturdays long distance race will be in the aptly named Devil’s Punch Bowl and Hindhead Common, a tough area with plenty of gradient which will test both the mental and physical strength of these youngsters.
The Relay race will be held on a newly mapped area at Bramshott Common, the area is very runnable with a mixture of lightly wooded sections and open grassy areas interspersed with trees.
The full list of the team can be found here, members represent a range of clubs from across the country including :
- Ajax
- Bishopstown Orienteering Club
- Cork Orienteering Club
- Curragh Naas Orienteering Club
- Great Eastern Navigators
- Lagan Valley Orienteers
- North West Orienteering Club
- South Eastern Vikings Orienteering Club
- Three Rock Orienteering Club
- Leicestershire Orienteering Club
We wish the young orienteers a great weekend of orienteering, making new friends and memories.
Subject to photographic restrictions, we hope to bring you pictures and news of the event as it happens via social media channels , facebook, instagram and twitter.
Instructor Training Course October 29th & 30th 2021
The course takes place over 2 days, Friday and Saturday, the course will be completely outdoors. It will run from 9am until 5pm. It is ideal for orienteers who want to instruct others in the sport and for those working in Outdoor Education. Scout Leaders may also find this useful.
More Details and a booking link is at Instructor Training
Cost: €140 per person
Candidates must have a basic knowledge of the sport, including some event experience, ideally this should consist of a minimum of three public events on Orange or Red courses. The award is aimed at club orienteers, teachers, youth leaders and outdoor pursuits instructors that are interested in introducing people to the sport of orienteering.
During the course trainee instructors will:
- Explore a range of activities suitable for the introduction of orienteering in the classroom, school grounds and in local parks and woods.
- Plan and deliver sessions that develop basic understanding of orienteering skills & navigation techniques.
- Be introduced to the IOA Orienteering Ability Awards as a progressive scheme for the advancement of skills in novice and beginner participants.
- Become familiar with equipment and skills necessary to organise orienteering activities.
- Learn to carry out risk assessments and use these in conjunction with the orienteering venue terrain guide.
- Use course planning tools to organise simple orienteering activities in private grounds, parks and small woods.
After completing their training, candidates will be required to log teaching hours and complete a practical teaching assessment to qualify as an IOA Orienteering Instructor.
Northern Ireland Orienteering Championships, Oct 16th in Cavan
Entries will close tomorrow (Tues Oct 5th) for the NIOC 2021 at the Cavan Burren on Saturday 16th October.
https://www.sientries.co.uk/event.php?event_id=7413
If you’ve already entered you don’t need to do anything unless your Age Class has changed. If this is the case you can amend your entry by Tuesday October 5th at –
https://www.sientries.co.uk/edit_entry.php?event_id=7413.
Two new Orienteering Co-ordinators
Please welcome two new Orienteering Co-ordinators to the Irish Orienteering Association. They are Deirdre Ni Challanain and Mark Stephens. Both Mark and Deirdre are experienced orienteers and know our sport well. They will work with Aine Joyce to continue the task of promoting Orienteering and supporting clubs.
Deirdre has been involved in the promotion of sports and orienteering in particular in Cork. She has worked with Local Sports Partnerships, schools and local community groups. Mark has worked in Tollymore National Outdoor Centre and he has been working with the NI Sporting Clubs Coordinator and the Outdoor Partnership during the summer period. They can be contacted at markstephens@orienteering.ie and deirdrenc@orienteering.ie
