World Orienteering Day: A continued success

On Wednesday May 24th 2017, the second World Orienteering Day took place all over the world. It has proved an even greater success than last year, with over 288 000 participants all around the world taking part in an orienteering event. This is new record, with 35 000 more participants than last year.

In the end, 288 007 participants at 2265 locations in 79 countries have been part of something bigger, World Orienteering Day. Turkey is showing a fantastic result and has increased the number of participants with more than 75% compared to last year. As a final result, Turkey registered 86 436 WOD participants. Amazing!

From Antarctica to Greenland, from Singapore to Cameroun, from Ecuador to Kosovo, from Indonesia to Cyprus, hundreds of thousands of youngsters participated in World Orienteering Day. Following the idea “Be part of something bigger-Colour the World”, people all over the world took part in locally organised orienteering events, and celebrated the biggest world-wide orienteering event ever. World Orienteering Day is a very important tool to attract young people to the sport of orienteering, and it has been a success even in many countries where orienteering is not so well-known.

Hard work paid off

-Trying to repeat and surpass a successful first event is always daunting, as was the prospect of World Orienteering Day 2017. A lot of hard work has gone into building on last year’s achievement, and I am very happy to see that it has paid off. World Orienteering Day would not be possible without the initiative and dedication that can be found in the orienteering community, so I want to say a great thank you to everyone who organised a WOD event, as well as to our generous sponsors who helped make the event possible for many of us. I hope you all had a great day of celebration of our sport and congratulations on beating the World Record together! says Leho Haldna, the President of International Orienteering Federation (IOF).

There are many great examples from a lot of countries with increasing participants compared to last year. Amongst them were Serbia and the young IOF member Egypt, who did fantastic work with WOD this year and increased their number of participants by 103% and 43% respectively. This is a remarkable improvement! The largest WOD event was implemented at Hunan University in the city of Changsha in China with 3160 participants and the smallest one was carried out in an apartment in USA. This is orienteering; you can do it everywhere and anytime!

Reaching new territories

We also have to welcome new countries and territories as Cambodia, Lebanon, Philippines, Kosovo, Isle of Man, Malaysia, Costa Rica, Kyrgyzstan, Macedonia, Mauritius, Luxembourg and Antarctica. Without World Orienteering Day it has been quite difficult to get all these countries involved in orienteering.

- The global reach of the World Orienteering Day project made it clear already last year that it is an important way to spread orienteering, especially to young people. This is particularly important as it is in line with the key objective of the IOC Olympic Agenda 2020: engaging youth through sport. It has been inspiring to follow the many events on the WOD website and to see the wide spread of events. I am already looking forward to next year’s event, Leho Haldna concludes.

[Press release from the International Orienteering Federation 2017-06-14]

Leho Haldna: "Every small orienteering event contributes on 24th May 2017!"

World Orienteering Day 2016 was a great success, achieving and surpassing our goals and expectations. The fact did not go unnoticed and many eyes have been opened to orienteering as a truly global sport for lifelong participation.

However, this does not mean at all that World Orienteering Day 2017 will be a success again. Together, we have set an ambitious target – 500 000 participants. The target is very high and looking at the pre-registrations on worldorienteeringday.com we still have some work to do to make 2017 a similar success.

World Orienteering Day is an important event for all of us. WOD has really gotten media attention plus the support of the IOC and a growing number of sponsors. It is a unique opportunity to market orienteering to new participants and partners and to show the strength of our global community of orienteers.

On behalf of the IOF I’m asking for your personal support for World Orienteering Day 2017. We know there are a lot of enthusiasts developing our sport in schools, clubs, regions and federations. Please participate, and ask and motivate others, in organising events especially in schools but also local orienteering events on May 24th!

It’s not too late to start preparing an event. Every small orienteering event contributes on 24th May 2017!

Leho Haldna
IOF President

[http://orienteering.org/world-orienteering-day-2017-a-letter-from-the-iof-president/]

Kadir Yildiz and the 2017 World Orienteering Day: "I think that we will set a new record of participants in Turkey”

With the 2017 World Orienteering Day on the horizon, it's time to look back on WOD's last edition, meeting Turkey and the amazing movement around the initiative. Coordinating the whole project in that country, Kadir Yildiz remembers the strongest moments of an exciting day.

“Think globally – Act locally”. On 11th May 2016, the first ever World Orienteering Day took place all over the world. It proved to be a great success, with 252.927 participants at 2013 locations in 81 countries and territories taking part in an orienteering event. Somewhat surprisingly, the biggest contribution for this outstanding number came from Turkey with 49.408 participants, just ahead of Sweden (35.754) and Norway (20.368).

When finalizing the official event calendar for the Turkish Orienteering Federation back in August 2015, WOD was set as one of the officially recognised orienteering activities. Then, the chair of the committee devoted to developing orienteering in schools, Kadir Yildiz, was appointed as the person in charge of the project. He remembers the first steps: “I was assigned for this project by the Turkish Orienteering Federation and every arrangement we did was based on the International Orienteering Federation and its documents/promotion kits for WOD. Then, we formed a group trying to reach all the sports clubs, athletes, coaches and teachers. We also took a good advantage of the internet, specially the social networking sites.”

A secret called team spirit

To overcome the language barrier, guidelines on how to register were developed in Turkish and distributed along with other material. Letters were written to all other Federations to raise awareness and ask for their involvement, as well as to the Ministry of Sports to ask not only for their support, but also their help in getting the Ministry of Education involved. The WOD website was closely monitored and any activity was advertised on the Federation’s Facebook page, thus creating an atmosphere of excitement throughout the country. Along the process, Kadir recognizes “the lack of financial resources and the accessibilities” as major difficulties. But, “if you know a thing or two about Event Management and Organization in Sport management, you are able to solve problems like planning, organization, coordination, communication, control and, most importantly, how to induce the right spirit in the team. Thus, we had a good, cooperating and hardworking team. Without it, the project would have failed”, he says.

- How did you manage the whole process?

“We managed it through the Turkish Orienteering Federation. The Federation gave us all all the means we needed, such as printed documents, flags, punchers, IT systems and so on. I think our strength lied on the fact that we were all volunteers and orienteering fans. This was really important to the whole process. All people worked voluntarily.”

“An exciting and colourful day”

The results of this hard and well-coordinated preparative process were a beautiful surprise, representing a good example of what one can manage while getting the support from the Federation, the government bodies and the local communities. Even Kadir recognizes that final numbers were not expected. “Clearly, I didn't expect such high participation level, but I believe that Orienteering is a sport that's easy to join”, he says.

- How was your 11th May? What did you feel?

“My 11th May was exciting and vivacious. We organized an event with our university students, attended by nearly 250 participants. It was an exciting and colourful day for us because, you know, Orienteering is fun and orienteers are enthusiastic.”

“2017 will be an Orienteering year in Turkey”

Nuri Dağdelen will coordinate the WOD 2017, but Kadir Yildiz will remain connected to the project. “We completed the WOD's organization successfully last year and this year I will only be participating with my university students.” But he leaves the door open to a more effective participation: “If the International Orienteering Federation or the Turkish Orienteering Federation asked for my collaboration, I would think about it”, Kadir says.

Kadir's expectations for the 2017 World Orienteering Day are even higher: “I believe that we can do well again. If people get involved and support the project, I think that we will set a new record of participants in Turkey”, he says. Kadir's last words stress the same point: “2017 will be an Orienteering year in Turkey and I believe that, with the collaboration of every person involved, we'll achieve something great.”

Photo courtesy of Kadir Yildiz.

Joaquim Margarido

World Orienteering Day - A record breaking event

On Wednesday May 11th 2016, the first ever World Orienteering Day took place all over the world. It proved to be a great success, with more than 250 000 participants taking part in a global orienteering event.

After having finalised the results, the total of participation in the first ever World Orienteering Day stands at 252 927 participants at 2013 locations in 81 countries and territories.

What was once only an idea, has come to be a reality beyond what anyone could have hoped. Schools, clubs and enthusiasts in every global region made a fantastic contribution, and together managed to beat the world record.

From South Africa to Hong Kong, from Greenland to New Caledonia, from Ecuador to Ukraine, hundreds of thousands of youngsters participated in World Orienteering Day. Following the idea “Think globally, act locally”, people took part in locally organised orienteering events, and together celebrated the biggest world-wide orienteering event ever.

- World Orienteering Day has demonstrated that we are truly a global sport, and I just want to thank the thousands of people who organised over 2000 competitions for 250,000 people on all continents except Antarctica. – Well done the world orienteering family, says Brian Porteous, president of the International Orienteering Federation.

World Orienteering Day is an International Orienteering Federation project that aims to increase the visibility and accessibility of orienteering to young people, to spread orienteering to new countries and places, and to help teachers to implement orienteering in schools in a fun and educational way.

http://worldorienteeringday.com

[Press release from the International Orienteering Federation 2016-05-26]

World Orienteering Day: Raising the Orienteering's flag everywhere

The World Orientation Day was of celebration and feast a bit everywhere. More than two thousand five hundred locations spread over 79 countries on the five continents hosted thousands of people of all ages joining hands and highly raising the Orienteering flag.

Throughout yesterday, took place the first ever World Orienteering Day, an initiative from the International Orienteering Federation. The project joined thousands of people from all over the world with the same goal: to benefit both education at school and development of the sport. Maps and compasses in hands, this amazing sport was celebrated in the world's four corners, from Turkey to New Caledonia, from Uruguay to Oman.

Since its launch, one could realize that this was an initiative aimed for success. The way that clubs, schools, public institutions and civil society shown their interest in this cause, adding their names to a list continuously growing, was certainly a huge incentive for the IOF and, above all, to the project's mentor, Göran Andersson. And when Łukasz Maletz posted a picture with the bib numbers of the events in Poland and the indication “start soon”, in Canberra, Australia, the Bushflyers added: “The controls are out, the rain is finishing, and tomorrow morning will be the first ever WOD event. Don't be late! (there's a mass start)”, the WOD had already started.

More than 90,000 participants so far

The number of preregistered locations was of 2.423 and it's time, now, for counting the participants worldwide, which is close to 100.000 so far. Surely still away from the 250,000 participants, the sum desired by Andersson that will place the event in the Guinness Book of Records. But who care? Just go through the event page on Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/events/145745899143580/ -, to quickly realize that it was worth all this movement.

Hundreds of images were arriving during the day, confirming the power of the initiative and the wave of enthusiasm. “Wen Ya elementary school in Taiwan joins this fantastic activity”, “event starting in Hobart Tasmania on a windy evening as the sun disappears”, “a great time was had in sunny Coffs Harbour, Australia”, “a really great Orienteering Day in Sundsvall, Sweden”, “Canoe Orienteering in Parys South Africa to celebrate World Orienteering Day”, “celebrating World Orienteering Day in Cyprus” and “Cameroon on the map”, are just some of the many sentences that witness hundreds and hundreds of events. Adding to this, there are also maps from different places such as Ceylanpinar, on the Turkey – Syria border, Faneromeni Square in Nicosia (Chypre), Noumea (New Caledonian) or Parco Iris, Padova (Italy).

Grand opening in Karlstad

For the IOF Office, it has also been a momentous day, in the form of the grand opening of the new office in Karlstad. The day of celebrations was of course started off with a visit to a local school to participate in a World Orienteering Day event. Guests included IOF President Brian Porteous, IOF Senior Vice President Leho Haldna, local politicians and World Champion in Long Distance Ida Bobach, as well as representatives from the Swedish Sports Confederation, Swedish Orienteering Federation, the Latvian orienteering Federation

It's time now to congratulate all those who made possible this fantastic day and say that we'll have another World Orienteering Day next year, on May 24th. To know everything about the WOD, please visit the event's webpage at http://worldorienteeringday.com/.

Joaquim Margarido

World Orienteering Day: Seven days to go!

The first ever World Orienteering Day will be held on Wednesday, May 11th, 2016. All schools, all O-clubs and all countries all over the world are encouraged to participate in the initiative and the number of preregistered locations is of 1512 so far. From Norway, Colômbia or Hong Kong, to Cameroun, New Caledonia or Greeland, the World Orienteering Day is already an overwhelming success!

The 11th May is fast approaching and the enthusiasm increases. By organising this ambitious project, the IOF hopes to increase the visibility and accessibility of orienteering, increase the number of participants both in the schools’ activities as well and in the clubs’ activities in all countries of National Federations, get more new countries to take part in orienteering and help teachers to implement orienteering in a fun and educational way by providing schools with materials such as maps, orienteering exercises and equipment.

In connection with the World Orienteering Day 2016, the IOF has a vision to set a new Guinness World Record. The current record is from the WOC 2003 in Switzerland, when 207,979 young people at 1381 locations ran an orienteering course. On Wednesday May 11th, 2016, the IOF hopes to see lots of young people participating in the World Orienteering Day, in order to beat the old record together. Having so far 1512 preregistered locations from 63 countries, the challenging target is 250,000 people participating in orienteering events simultaneously all over the world, which promises to be an exciting and inspiring experience.

Nine locations in Portugal

The World Orienteering Day will be marked by the world governing body opening their new headquarters in Karlstad in Sweden. Among the dignitaries due to attend the opening are Brian Porteous, President of the IOF, and Denmark’s Ida Bobach, winner of two gold medals at the last year’s World Championships in Inverness. Porteous will lead a special seminar at the Värmlands Museum entitled “Orienteering Today”, while Boach will talk about “The everyday life of an elite Orienteer”.

In Portugal, nine locations have entered so far to celebrate the World Orienteering Day. Águeda, Braga, Leiria, Marinha Grande, Ourém, Porto, S. Brás de Alportel, Sesimbra and Funchal, in Madeira Island, are ready to join the World on this unique occasion. Porto, the second biggest city in the country, is preparing the Opening of the S. Roque's Park Permanent Orienteering Course, in the oriental part of the city. This will be the third Permanent Orienteering Course in the city, after City Park and Covêlo's Park. The initiative belongs to the Municipality of Porto, with the technical support of Grupo Desportivo dos Quatro Caminhos. During the whole day, people will have the opportunity of testing the Permanent Course and, at the same time, there will be an Adapted Orienteering Course, very suitable for people who are differently abled and children aged from 4 to 6. The Municipality is inviting all kindergarten children to participate in the initiative and some hundreds of children are expected in S. Roque Park.

For further information, please visit the WOD's webpage at http://worldorienteeringday.com/.

[Photo: Ulf Palm / worldorienteeringday.com]

Joaquim Margarido

Overwhelming success for World Orienteering Day

Orienteering will be in every corner of the world on 11th of May. World Orienteering Day is an event to unite the whole world of orienteering. The project has gathered huge interest from all over the world, and right now there are now 873 locations, in 60 countries, already registered.

Notable among the registered locations, which are spread over all continents, are events in exciting places such as Greenland and New Caledonia. The events will take place in cities, parks, forests and in school yards. Most of the participants will be youths and school children, but people of all ages are encouraged to take part.

There are many ways to practice orienteering, as indicated by the four main disciplines governed by the IOF, namely Foot Orienteering, Ski Orienteering, Mountain Bike Orienteering and Trail Orienteering. Creative ways of organising such events include night orienteering, using headlamps or flashlights, and indoor orienteering, using artificial landscapes of obstacles.

Support from the IOC

It is not only schoolchildren who have seen the potential of this event. The IOF recently received a letter from the IOC President Thomas Bach himself, in support of the first ever World Orienteering Day. In it, he highlights the importance of inspiring young people with the values of sport, and also notes that the activities of World Orienteering Day are well aligned with the key objective of Olympic Agenda 2020: engaging youth through sport.

- Not only is this important considering the Olympic ambitions of orienteering, but it also underlines the importance of the sport in inspiring a younger generation to embrace the values of sport that orienteering represents, says Brian Porteous, president of the International Orienteering Federation.

More locations and countries are being registered every day on the digital map, you will find it here: www.worldorienteeringday.com.

For more information and press photos, please contact malin.bjorkqvist@orienteering.org.

[Press release from the International Orienteering Federation 2016-04-20]

World Orienteering Day: Letter from the IOC President

The next 11th May promises to become historic for Orienteering. The President of the International Olympic Committee, Thomas Bach, underlines the importance of the initiative and doesn't hesitate to say: “Your ambitious program will put orienteering on the map.”

In three weeks, we'll celebrate the first World Orienteering Day and the number of adherents to the initiative increases every hour. There are more than 800 preregistered locations yet and the number of countries where the day will be signed is close to sixty. The aim is simple: Overcoming the current record from WOC 2003 in Switzerland - when 207.979 young people at 1381 locations ran an orienteering course - and set the target to 250.000 young people.

In a message of congratulations and support to the initiative, Thomas Bach, President of the International Olympic Committee, is keen to see in the World Orienteering Day an opportunity to inculcate in young people around the world, the values of sport and healthy lifestyles. Bach goes further: “The activities that the International Orienteering Federation is organising on this occasion are well aligned with a key objective of Olympic Agenda 2020: engaging youth through sport. The strong focus on involving schools and teachers around World Orienteering Day is an innovative way to combine sport and education.”

Wishing “much success in your quest to establish a new record in participant numbers on World Orienteering Day”, Thomas Bach couldn't be more optimistic: “It is thanks to such efforts and using the power of sport to bring people together that orienteering will have a bright future.” Thomas Bach's last words assure the importance of working together looking forward the same goal: “To promote the practice of sport and make it available to everyone, everywhere.”

The letter can be read at http://orienteering.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/IOC-letter-07-04-2016.pdf.

Joaquim Margarido

Two or three things I know about it...

1. By these days, Göreme is hosting the Cappadocia MTBO Cup, an event that attracts to that region of Turkey more than 100 athletes from 10 different nationalities. The competition started yesterday with the Mixed Sprint Relay, which follows, in a few hours, the Long Distance. In the second half of the event we'll have the Middle Distance and the Sprint, respectively next Saturday and Sunday. With the last two stages scoring for the IOF World Ranking, the event registers 61 athletes in the Elite classes, among which we can see renowned names such as the Austrian Kevin Haselsberger, Andreas Waldmann, Sonja Zinkl or Michaela Gigon and the Swiss Beat Schaffner , Beat Oklé, Maja Rothweiler or Christine Schaffner. This event is also included in the World Masters Series, with the Middle Distance and the Long Distance stages scoring for the respective ranking. More details at http://www.orienteering.org.tr/.

2. Are we on the road to the Winter Olympics? Yes, definitely! For the first time ever, Ski Orienteering will be included in the program of the Winter Universiade. As a pre-competition to the Universiade, the World Ski Orienteering Championships will be held in Krasnoyarsk March 5-13, 2017, the same where, two years later, will take place, the Winter Universiade 2019. Two weeks ago, the IOF Event Adviser team - Event Director Alexander Bliznevsky, Assistant Event Director Sergey Khudik, Assistant Event Adviser Markku Vauhkonen (FIN), Event Secretary Anna Khudik, Senior Event Adviser Sild Sixten (EST), TV-producer Karel Jonak (CZE) and National Controller Arkadiy Vedin – visited Krasnoyarsk and several working meetings were held with representatives from the Russian Orienteering Federation, the Winter Universiades Directorate, the WSOC 2017 Organizing Committee and TV-production team. As a result of the visit a WSOC 2017 TV production plan was elaborated, the final program of the WSOC 2017 was confirmed and Bulletin 2 prepared. Ski Orienteering aims for inclusion to the Winter Olympic Games and the Winter Universiade 2019 corresponds to a giant step towards such big goal. Ski Orienteering is already in the permanent program of the World Military Winter Games and is now joining the FISU Winter Universiade sports, two of the largest winter sports events in the world besides the Winter Olympics.

3. It is less than 50 days until World Orienteering Day, and there is a lot of activity going on around the world, with many schools and clubs in the process of planning their activities for World Orienteering Day. The brand new World Orienteering Day Website is now live and can be seen at http://worldorienteeringday.com/. It will be the central hub for the project, where participants can register their activities, upload maps, download promotional material and material for their events, and much more. The latest WOD Newsletter is just being published and it’s full of information and inspiration. Read it [HERE] to find out more about how to use the website and what materials are available, and to see what other people are getting up to on May 11th. In the meanwhile, the Portuguese Orienteering Federation has been encouraging the clubs in order to join the initiative, but only the Clube Orientação Viseu - Natura has made public its intention to organize an event on World Orientation Day so far. Along with the Centro de Deficientes de Santo Estevão, the COV - Natura will organize an Adapted Orienteering course, a discipline particularly directed to a population with mental intellectual disability.

4. After the major international events of January and February, Abrantes hosted the Orienteering's come back. Organized by the Clube de Orientação e Aventura, the Ribatejo Interior Trophy called to Abrantes, right in the center of the country, a set of 324 athletes for two Middle Distance courses, both scoring for the Portuguese Orienteering Cup Vitalis 2016, and also a Night Sprint course and a TempO event. In the Men Elite class, victories divided up by Tiago Romão (GafanhOri), Manuel Horta (GafanhOri) and Marco Póvoa (ADFA), the last one in the Sprint. As for the Women Elite class, triumphs for Mariana Moreira (CPOC), Carolina Delgado (GD4C) and, in the Sprint, Liliana Oliveira (GD4C). Overall, the victory would belong to Manuel Horta and Liliana Oliveira. As for the TempO event, the victory fell to Edgar Domingues (COC). Everything to check at http://www.orioasis.pt/oasis/homepages.php?action=ev&eventid=1511.

Joaquim Margarido