Our Events Calendar

One of the club’s primary goals for 2025 is to continue to offer quality local events for our members, other club orienteers and newcomers who might enjoy orienteering, whatever their age.  This is an important aspect of our club development work to raise wider awareness of orienteering across Edinburgh and the Lothians and encourage participation through providing a range of course options of differing length and challenge.  In particular, we’ll continue to offer longer less-technical Red courses that regular runners can try as a good introduction to orienteering without compromising on distance.  All our events will have options for juniors and we welcome participation from groups (e.g., schools, youth groups etc).

Building on the success of last year’s programme, our first open-to-all ‘Come and Try It’ event will be on Saturday 1st March at Craigmillar Castle Park. This will be particularly exciting as it’ll see the first outing of the new map (made for us by Alastair Pedley).

Further events organised by Interlopers include:

• Sunday 6 April - Calderwood SoSOL (South of Scotland Orienteering League, regional)
• Saturday 3rd May - Scottish Long Distance Championships at Barrybuddon (near Dundee)
• Sunday 7 June - venue TBC (Local Come-And-Try-It)
• Various Sprintelopes around Edinburgh on Wednesday evenings over the spring and summer
• Sunday 21 September – Gullane (National Scottish Orienteering League (SOL) #4)
• Saturday 4 October – Braidburn Valley Park, South Edinburgh (Local Come-And-Try-It)
• Sunday 9 November – Livingston (Scottish Urban Orienteering League)
• Saturday 6 December - local Come-And-Try-It, venue TBC

National Competitions and Club Relay Events

For waving the Club banner at competitions, a key date is Sunday 23 February, which will see the Scottish qualifying round for the Compass Sport Cup / Trophy 2025.  Will this be the year we can reclaim the trophy??  The club will need a strong turn-out so all hands on deck and please do mark this and the autumn final (Sunday 14th September) in your diaries for a fun weekend away!

As usual, we’ll all be looking forward to the JK (Jan Kellstrom Orienteering Festival) at Easter with a lot of club members heading down to Sheffield for the weekend. Club Captain Rob will be in touch about Relay teams for this, and of course for the Scottish Championships at Barrybudden in Fife at the start of May with Interlopers organising the Individual Champs on the Saturday – Lorna will be looking for lots of volunteers to help). 

Then there’s the Scottish Six Days to look forward to for an amazing orienteering holiday week on Royal Deeside – register ASAP to take advantage of early-bird entry fees.  If you’ve not been to a multi-day orienteering event before, this really is a must, for the quality forest orienteering, the international level competition and the amazing festival vibe.  Our club is organising Day 5, Friday 1 August (Glen Dye) and it’ll be all-hands-on-deck for making sure that goes smoothly, with plenty of club socialising during the week too.

There’s a handy summary of key competition dates on the SOA website and of course keep an eye on the events calendar there too.

Training and Social Programme

This year will once again feature a social programme of informal club gatherings for things like Halloween and Christmas as well as meet-ups at the JK and Six Days. Keep an eye out for details in due course via the email list and the club WhatsApp group (to be added to these contact John Barrow, Club Secretary). We’re also looking at running some fun training activities and talks by members on topics of wider interest (get in touch if you’d like to offer anything). The Thursday evening training runs will continue with some pub meets or meals after some of these (the first will be after the Holyrood Park run on Thursday 16 January, at the Salisbury Arms). Also continuing are our Wednesday evening Strength and Conditioning sessions – contact Lorna for details. Some of our local Saturday events will also feature Juniors’ coaching sessions as part of the East of Scotland Junior Development programme. Our AGM and club meal will be held in the autumn.

Club Development

Work will be continuing to reach out to new audiences and widen interest in orienteering, building on the experience of the past six months of club development work funded by the Orienteering Foundation and Scottish Orienteering Association. A particular focus will be Craigmillar Castle Park, with the reinvigoration of the Permanent Orienteering Course into a valuable resource for introducing newcomers to our sport.  We’re also planning to do further Parkrun volunteer takeovers and taster sessions for runners (and anyone else). More details to follow, and get in touch with Katherine (email to Club Development Officer) if you could get involved in work to encourage newcomers as well as develop our club more generally. For example, we’re keen to keep improving our social media presence, and improve the club website so ideas and  skills would be very welcome but most importantly energy!

Get Involved

Whether you’re a seasoned competitor or new to the sport, 2025 offers countless opportunities to contribute to the club and wider orienteering community.  From competing in events to volunteering behind the scenes, your participation is what helps make Interlopers a vibrant and welcoming club.  All sorts of skills are useful (writing, photography, social media, organisational, mapping, coaching, mapping, first aid…) and all energy is highly valued!  Do get in touch, with club chair Max (email Club Chair) or Katherine (email Club Development Officer).

Stay connected by following us on Facebook, via the Whatsapp group, and by reading William’s regular INTeresting email bulletins. Here’s to another fantastic year of exploration, camaraderie, and achievement with the Interlopers Orienteering Club!

Forthcoming Events