16-17th March SL1 & 2 Lithgow Area

Welcome to Newcastle Orienteering Club

Orienteering is a competitive or non-competitive recreational activity in which participants use a detailed map, and usually a compass, to navigate between checkpoints on an unfamiliar course in bush terrain, parkland or urban areas.

If you like a physical and mental challenge while exploring the outdoors, orienteering is the sport for you!

NEW TO ORIENTEERING? Click here for more information.

See what's on by clicking on the Club Event Series buttons below or see all orienteering events by going to Eventor, the orienteering event calendar.

Classic "forest" orienteering for all great outdoors. Run or walk, compete against yourself or others, or a fun family outing. (Mar-Sept)

Navigate the suburbs. Run or walk to as many checkpoints as you can within a 45 minute time limit. How many points can you get? (Oct-Feb)

A great introduction to orienteering with fun courses in suburban parks & reserves. Also includes a night event. (Feb-Apr)

Navigate bush tracks & trails on your mountain bike. Bike Orienteering Summer Series offers 75 minute score & line+score events. (Oct-Mar)

Newcastle & Central Coast sprint series. Four exciting sprint events. Fast & furious. (Apr-Jul).

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So the State league for this year has kicked off with 2 events in Ben Bullen State forest near Lithgow. Around 30 Newcastle club members made the journey down (I'm not sure of the final numbers as Eventor does have everyone listed for clubs properly yet). Day 1 was on the Gardiners Gap East Map and was physically and mentally challenging (at least for me but given the finish times I suspect for most) navigating amongst large boulders and rock spires. Have a look at the map and some of the routes taken over on routegadget. Day 2 saw us on the Long Swamp map just over the road from Day 1. This time the terrain was spur gully, similar to quite a few of our maps here in Newcastle. There were some rock formations depending on the course you were running but on the whole a much easier day (at least in my opinion) than the previous one. Check out the map on routegadget. routegad You can check out Eventor for more information and the full set of results but I have done the hard work and picked out our top 5 finishers in the classes that we ran. At least I hope so - apologies if i missed you.

State League 1

M10A
2nd Alec Power

M20A
3rd Angus Roberts

M21A
3rd Andrew Morris

M35AS
2nd Shane Jenkins
3rd David Kitchener

M40A
1st Scott Simson
4th Shane Trotter

M45AS
3rd Peter Orr

M50A
1st Andrew Power
2nd Glenn Burgess

WOpenB
1st Kate Alborough

W12A
3rd Isabella Trotter
4th Claire Burgess

W18A
1st Amylee Robertson

W20A
3rd Nicola Blatchford

W21AS
2nd Margaret Peel

W45A
1st Karen Blatchford

W65A
1st Toy Martin

State League 2

M10A
1st Alec Power

M12A
3rd Oscar Power

M20A
2nd Angus Roberts

M21A
3rd Andrew Morris

M35AS
1st David Kitchener
2nd Shane Jenkins

M40A
2nd Scott Simpson
3rd Shane Trotter

M45AS
3rd Peter Orr

M50A
1st Glenn Burgess
2nd Andrew Power
4th Russell Blatchford

M55A
2nd Geoff Todkill

MW-10N
2nd Sophie Trotter

WOpenB
2nd Kate Alborough

W12A
3rd Isabella Trotter
5th Claire Burgess

W18A
1st Amylee Robertson

W20A
1st Nicola Blatchford

W21AS
4th Margaret Peel

W45A
1st Karen Blatchford

W45AS
3rd Sharon Burgess

W50A
2nd Gayle Quantock

W65A
1st Toy Martin

W70A
3rd Carolyn Chalmers

So why run at a State League event you might ask? Well for me at least the answer is simple - the new maps. There are a lot of terrain types that we just don't have in the Newcastle area and travelling to a State League event is one of the best ways to run on some quality maps. The organisation and planning for a State league event done by the host club far outstrips that of an ordinary club event and is offset by the increased cost of entry.