News

April 2026 News

Published Sat 18 Apr 2026

President’s Introduction

Kia ora all.

It has been great to reconnect with many of you so far this season and it is exciting to meet new members who have recently discovered orienteering or returned from last season wanting to take the additional step of joining a club. We welcome you all and look forward to engaging you in club activities.

NWOC ran a successful forest event in March and I'd like to acknowledge Daniel Porteous, Geoff Mead, Mark Lawson and Lisa Mead for leading, and all the helpers on the day for making it possible. We also ran a coaching session in Woodhill Forest, thanks Cameron Bonar for leading that.

Newsletter Contents

Auckland Calendar of Events
Club Nights
Key events coming up around New Zealand in 2026
- Tūāraki North Regional Champs - April
- NZ Mountain Bike Orienteering Champs
- Auckland Triple Crown 2026
Schools Orienteering
- North Island Secondary Schools Champs
- New Zealand Secondary Schools Champs
- AIMS
North West's Bivouac Outdoor Rogaine Series 2026
Winter Orienteering
Reviewing Your Results
Member News
- Member Results
  - AKSS Sprint Series Finals
  - Katoa Po
  - NZ Champs
  - NWOC Members to Represent NZ
- Membership Fees due now
- NWOC Club Shirts
- New Members

Auckland Events

All upcoming events in the wider Auckland area for 2026 will be added to our NWOC website here New Zealand wide events are on Orienteering New Zealand’s website here

Club Nights

Gene Beveridge leads a Club Night every second Wednesday from 6:30pm to 8:30pm in Epsom. These are open to all members and non members. We expect these to be well attended by AOC, CMOC and NWOC members. Each night will include coaching discussions using courses and maps from recent and upcoming events. More info, including dates for 2026 here

Key events coming up around NZ

Tūāraki North Regional Champs, 25-27 April 2026

Not long to go now! Don't miss the opportunity to experience some of the best terrain in Woodhill. Think lots of variety, most of which has never been used before. Enter before Sunday 19 April here

Course Lengths are available now on the event website here
Enter for 1, 2 or 3 days - you choose!
There will be chasing starts for most grades on the final day - you can opt out of this if you want.
Camping is available close to the event centres in a beautiful deer farm, ideal for those picking up a small camper van or who are willing to stay in a tent. It is 20 minutes drive to the Parakai hot pools and food places.
Carpooling is encouraged - see here if you would like a ride or have spare seats
Event info here

New members, this event is 'close to home' and a fantastic opportunity to experience a multi-day orienteering event.

Help Please - Trailer Towing Opprtunity!

As event hosts, NWOC will need a team of helpers over the three days. A number of members have already been assigned to roles. There are a few special roles required, one of which is towing portaloo trailers to Event Centres. If you have a vehicle capable of towing portaloos and are willing to help, please contact Tūāraki Event Director Jenny Cade at jjcadenz@gmail.com or 0211882468.

NZ Mountain Bike Orienteering Champs

Orienteering Bay of Plenty (OBOP), with support from Taupo Orienteering club, will host the 2026 NZMTBO Championships over the weekend of 16 & 17 May. Events will be held close to Rotorua. This promises to be a fantastic weekend of competition, challenge, and fun for Mountain Bikers, Orienteers, and Adventure Racers of all abilities.

Early bird entries close: midnight, 12 April 2026
Standard entries close: midnight, 10 May 2026

We expect competitive fields that will suit experienced and competitive athletes. However there will also be recreational courses for people newer to the sport, and young juniors. Rotorua is the mecca for mountain biking in NZ, and there are also fantastic adventure rides in easy reach as well, so people may choose to enjoy world class riding outside of the competition programme. Head to the NZMTBO Champs website for more info Enter here

Auckland Triple Crown 2026

Auckland Orienteering Club is hosting Auckland Triple Crown 2026 (ATC) over King’s Birthday weekend. The weekend includes

Three World Ranking Events (WRE)
Trials for the Southern Cross Challenge team
Trans-Tasman Test Match (Pinestars vs Bushrangers)

Details here Enter here

Schools Orienteering

North Island Secondary Schools Champs 2026

Al the best to all our North West Juniors who are heading to Taranaki for the North Island Secondary Schools Champs from 17-19 April. Entries have closed for this event.

New Zealand Secondary Schools Orienteering Champs

Christchurch is the place to be from Thursday 16 to Sunday 19 July for the New Zealand Secondary Schools Champs. Entries will open very soon; sports coordinators will enter students from each school. Public race entries will open at a later stage for support members. Checkout the programme on the website

Zespri AIMS Games - Saturday 5 to Friday 11 September 2026

AIMS (The Association of Intermediate and Middle Schools) Games is an annual multi-sport event held in Tauranga, the largest annual sporting event in Australasia. It provides Year 7 and 8 students the opportunity to compete as individuals or in teams against the best of their age across a range of sports, with the aim of encouraging competition, fair play, and enjoyment. In 2025, a record 14,000 intermediate-aged athletes from 431 schools competed across 27 sporting codes. Orienteering is now a regular sport code - this year's events are on Monday 7 & Tuesday 8 September. Registrations for 2026 registrations are officially open, enter via your school sport coordinator.

For more info about the orienteering events see here

Aims Games | 5 – 11 September | Entries now open

Bivouac Outdoor Rogaine Series 2026

Our annual Bivouac Outdoor Rogaine Series is back for 2026. Three 90-minute Foot Rogaine Events will be held on:

Sunday 10 May, Barlow Road, Riverhead Forest
Sunday 24 May, Leighton's Farm, Woodhill Forest
Sunday 14 June, Grass Track Road, Woodhill Forest

All event info is on the Rogaine Series section of our North West website here

Enter now here enterO - be one of the first 50 people to enter all 3 events and go in the draw to win an Osprey pack donated by Bivouac Outdoor.

Thanks to a new sponsorship deal with Bivouac Outdoor we will have more prizes than ever before!

Winter Orienteering & What to Wear

As we head into winter, let's think about what to wear when orienteering! In Auckland we can be lulled into false safety with our temperate climate however, elsewhere in NZ (and here), weather conditions can change quickly and can impact orienteers - hypothermia is a possibility! Parents, please discuss with your teenagers as shorts and a singlet top may not be optimal dress at winter events! Read more here.

Reviewing your Results

Event Results are published on Winsplits and then tools such as Livelox and Otrax can be used to analyse your results - compare your route with others, note alternate route choices etc. See below for links to these tools for two recent events. Upload your GPS tracking from these events and see how you fared!

Member News

Member Results

AKSS Sprint Series Finals Results

Congratulations to North West Juniors who placed in the top 3 for the Sprint Series Finals as below

Senior Boys, Isaac Stewart -1st
Year 10/11 Boys, Aidan Barrett-Hamilton - 3rd
Year 9 Boys, Alexander Finn - 1st
Year 9 Girls, Arietty Smith-Godoy - 2nd
Year 7 Girls, Jordan Hefer - 2nd

Katoa Po - North West wins again!

Katoa Po Night Relay is an annual event held in March hosted by the Taupo Orienteering Club. The race involves 5-person teams from different clubs navigating courses ranging from white level to red, in the dark! Teams camp beside the event centre, and there is always a very social buzz about as people reconnect with friends, support their teams, and run and debrief their races.

The 2026 event was based on the Ōpepe map most recently used for 2025 Tūāraki Northern Champs. The terrain is classic Taupo negative features on diverse terrain with a mix of prominent rock features, native forested gullies and open running.

The North West team of Gene Beveridge with Lauren, Quinn, Tahi and Nick Harris took first place - in a total time of 3hr 44min 46sec to make it back to back wins for NWOC!

The relay begins at dusk with Leg 1 (White). Each leg is graded for difficulty and has corresponding age/grade restrictions to ensure teams are a cross-section of club members. Lauren ran the leg without difficulty in 18min 08sec, handing over to Quinn in 3rd place and full darkness.

Quinn crushed Leg 2 (Yellow) in 18min 37sec, fastest on the leg and moving into 2nd place. Turns out he was too quick for his Dad, who was still wrapped in his warm clothes when Quinn hit the finish chute. The crowd enjoyed the scene of Nick struggling to strip off layers of coats and pants, tag Quinn, tie shoelaces, and grab the map... Plenty of chat was directed at Nick during this debacle, and fair enough - he was losing time on the leaders and at least one team ran out while he was getting sorted.

Finally heading out on Leg 3 (Orange) Nick was now in 3rd place about 4min behind the leading team from Taranaki OC. He attacked the early legs by going straight - counting off the deep gullies and gauging height against trees and prominent contour shapes - by control 4 he found he was waking controls (SI boxes go to 'sleep' when not in use, and take an extra second to register a punch when waking up), a sign that noone else had been through before him. Concluding that he had slipped ahead of other teams, he took a calm approach to the rest of course finishing in 52min 30sec, handing over in 1st place.

Tahi had to handle Leg 4 (Red) without errors to maintain the NWOC lead over Taranaki and Hawkes Bay. Some tricky legs required extra care but Tahi negotiated the course smoothly with the fastest time on Leg 4 of 1hr 2min 51sec.

Gene had a comfortable lead of 27min over Taranaki going out on Leg 5 (Red) and no other teams were able to challenge him. The NW anchor-man produced the quickest run on the 7.2km leg of 1hr 12min 40sec thereby sealing a convincing win.

One other NWOC member present - Owen Means - raced Leg 4 in a composite team with OBOP, returning in 1h 55min 44sec.

NWOC will be back next year to defend our title - and other clubs are sure to be gunning for us! With Auckland, Bay of Plenty, Hawkes Bay and Taranaki all able to offer strong teams across the grades it won't be easy to win.

We strongly encourage you to consider entering Katoa Po next year and making the pilgrimage to NZs pinnacle night orienteering pin event. In parallel with the relay, the hosts also offer a fun warm up event, the “Explorer Rogaine”, and a Sunday morning rogaine reusing the controls from the night before. Its a weekend packed full of orienteering suitable for all levels, and is always well run by Taupo OC. The excitement of night orienteering is truly special - if spiking controls in the daylight gives you a thrill of satisfaction, there is an extra kick when you do it in the dark!

Congratulations to from L to R below, Tahi Harris, Gene Beveridge, Lauren, Quinn & Nick Harris.

National Champs, April 2026 Results

There were some impressive results from North West members at Nationals. Several of our Juniors appeared on the podium multiple times. Special congratulations to Daniel Porteous & Alexander Finn who took out the win for their age groups in each of the Sprint, Middle and Long.

Sprint

M14A, Alexander Finn - 1st; Joseph Porteous - 2nd
M16A, Daniel Porteous -1st; Aidan Barrett-Hamilton - 2nd
M18A, Callum Hill - 2nd
M50A, Nick Harris - 1st
M80A, Dave Middleton - 3rd
W12A, Lauren Harris - 3rd
W40A, Sian Finn - 3rd

Middle

W12A, Lauren Harris - 3rd
M16A, Daniel Porteous - 2nd
M14A, Alexander Finn - 1st
M50A, Nick Harris - 1st
M65A, Owen Means - 1st
M80A, Dave Middleton - 2nd

Long

M14A, Alexander Finn - 1st
M16A, Daniel Porteous - 1st
M35A, Gene Beveridge -1st
M50A, Alexander Hood - 1st
M80A, Dave Middleton - 1st

North West Members to Represent New Zealand in 2026

Congratulations to Cameron Bonar who has been selected in the team to represent New Zealand at the World University Orienteering Championships (WUOC) in Vila Real, Portugal from 28 July – 1 August 2026.

Three North West Juniors have been selected in the M16 team to represent New Zealand at the European Youth Orienteering Championships (EYOC) in Nova Gorica, Slovenia from 25-27 June 2026. Congratulations to Jamie Appleton, Aidan Barrett-Hamilton and Daniel Porteous.

ONZ's Administrator of the Year goes to Gene Beveridge

Gene Beveridge, President and now General Manager of North West, was named Orienteering New Zealand's Administrator of the Year at the recent National Champs. Congratulations Gene. Read the citation for the award here.

North West Membership Fees for 2026 are due now please

If you haven't already, please renew your fees before Tūāraki and/or the Bivouac Outdoor Rogaine Series to be eligible for member's rates.

NWOC membership fees remain unchanged for 2026 and are due NOW please. Thanks to those who have paid already.

Category	Membership Fee 2026
Senior	$40
Junior (20 and under) / Student / Unemployed	$20
Family - 2 Seniors + Juniors	$90

Existing members can simply credit NWOC's club bank account (WESTPAC Account 03-0243-0247251-000 and include your name in the reference field.) No need to log in or re-register.

North West Club shirts

We have new stock of short sleeved Bryzos brand club shirts. The shirts have short sleeves, mesh side panels and a short neck zip in North West's distinctive colours. Cost $45 per shirt - go to Shop on our website.

Get in now and purchase yours while stocks last. To order, contact Lisa Mead mead10b@gmail.com.