We are the university orienteering club of Trinity College Dublin.
Orienteering is an adventure sport combining running and navigation.
We welcome all students, staff and alumni of Trinity College Dublin whether they be beginners or experienced orienteers.
Last week to welcome all our new Fresher's to Trinity we ran a small training
around Trinity Campus. We were thrilled with the turnout of new and old members
and were delighted to see plenty of familiar faces at our joint social with UCD
Orienteering Club!
New beginners Ciara, Gemma and Fiona get help from
committee members Eoin and Conor
Our socials sec(s) Lizzie and Laoise show them a thing or two!
The world's first piggyback-O.
New club member Julien enjoys his map while Lizzie
prepares to take new member Corey out for a lesson
It was a tough race but eventually the girls sprinted to victory.
Last June, an eleven-strong group from DUO,
Queen's University and (even) 1 from UCD travelled to Finland to take part in
the world's biggest orienteering race: Jukola, followed by a week of training
in Sweden.
Eoin,Rosalind, Henrik and Kyle
For
those who aren't familiar with Jukola: Jukola is a 7-leg relay that goes
through the night in Finland every year, with the Venla (The women's
competition, which has 4 legs) run in the afternoon before Jukola. It is the
single largest orienteering competition in the world with over 1,600 teams in
the men's race and over 1,200 in the women's. All in all there are about 16,000
competitors (And no, I didn't add an extra zero). Jukola is an incredible
experience and one that should be on every orienteer's bucket list.
We
had all arrived at our luxurious accommodation by the morning of Jukola in time
for the start of the Venla. DUO were represented in this by Rosalind, Stina,
Regina and Eibhlin from Queen's. The girls had solid runs in the technically
and physically demanding terrain to finish just inside the top 500, in 499th
place.
After the finish of the Venla relay, it was time to wait
until the start of the Jukola relay at sunset (ie. 11pm). Even then, when
you're in the north of Finland, it never really gets dark. (It's more like dusk
before getting bright again.) So, on the strike of 11pm, for over 1,600 teams
the start of the Jukola relay was signalled with a flyover of a F-15 fighter
jet and a blast from a heavy artillery gun and with that, a stream of
headtorches flooded into the Finnish forest.
We
did well with a team of James on first leg, Kyle, Henrik, me and Rosalind. I
know what you're thinking, “That's not seven!” James was going to run leg
seven, while Colm from UCD was to run leg six after running leg 2 for his Swedish
club, OK Tisaren. Unfortunately, both James and Colm injured themselves on
their first leg and so were unable to run two legs. Nonetheless, at the end of
the 5th leg, we were sitting in a very respectable 386th
place.
After
Jukola, it was time to begin the second part of the trip and get the boat to
Sweden to take part in an annual Jukola tradition: The Jukola boat party! This
is exactly what it says on the tin: a big party on a boat where everyone gets
some well-deserved R&R after the tough race the night before. ;)
Arriving
in Stockholm early the next morning we travelled across the city to our
lodgings for the next 2 nights with Nick Barrable. Over our 2 days with Nick he
treated us with training on some fantastic areas around Stockholm and showed us
great hospitality.
It was time then to move onto Hallsberg in the centre of
Sweden to spend a night with OK Tisaren via a sprint race in Örebro university.
The sprint was fast and not too technical. Conor was the best of the men
finishing in 3rd place, 21 secs off the winner, while Rosalind was
the best girl finishing 4th, 48 secs behind the winner. After
sleeping in the Tisaren club hut that night, we ran a middle distance race in
Hallsberg before a long drive up to Leksand with long distance training in Falun along the
way.
The
following three days were spent in the Leksand club hut training in the sandy,
runnable forest behind the hut and culminating in Midsummer. Midsummer is a
huge Swedish festival celebrated on the weekend of the longest day of the year,
June 21, and is one of Sweden's most important holidays. Midsummer in Sweden is
a pretty special experience, but Midsummer in Leksand is one of the biggest
celebrations in all of Sweden and is the place to be over the Midsummer
weekend. The festival centres around the raising of the maypole, followed by
doing some funny dances around it and singing traditional Swedish songs. It was
a strange experience, particularly when we found ourselves jumping like frogs
around the maypole with thousands of others, but it was fantastic and one of
the highlights of the trip.
As
well as all the excitement of Midsummer in Leksand, we ended up on an
unexpected evening excursion the night before Midsummer when we were asked to
take part in a search for a little boy who had gone missing earlier in the day
in a nearby town. We spent several hours combing the forest and, thankfully, at
around 2am the boy was found. It was a strange experience, taking part in a
search like this, in Sweden, when we were the only non-Swedes there, but one we
were happy to take part in to help find the little boy.
The day after Midsummer, it was back to Örebro for a sprint
double-header with an individual sprint followed by a mixed sprint relay. Ros
finished 4th, which was good enough for her to secure the overall
victory in the 3-race series in Örebro, having run the first race
before Jukola. After the individual, it was time for the mixed sprint relay.
This is a 4-leg relay with 2 men on the team and 2 women. Having started to
lose people from the group in Stockholm, our merry group was down to five by
this stage, so the team was Rosalind, Yours Truly, Henrik and Eibhlin. Colm,
who was the odd one out, decided to make his own last-minute team and run all 4
legs himself. Although the sprint was not very demanding navigationally, we all
enjoyed it and we finished 2nd in the Elite class, while Colm
unofficially finished 2nd but as he was non-competitive, we took
home the silver.
This
brought an end to an incredible trip, with one final orienteering session in
the forest next to Alistair Landels' house, who kindly took us into his home
the night before our flight from Arlanda the next morning. By this stage, we
were all well and truly exhausted, but by no means sick of orienteering. In
fact, I don't think my enthusiasm for orienteering has been so high as after
these 10 days because I enjoyed it so much and I think I'm safe in saying
everyone else had a great time on this incredible trip. Big thanks to everyone
who let us sleep on floors, in club huts etc; Nick Barrable, Alistair Landels,
OK Tisaren and Leksands OK. Also to our drivers Henrik and Rosalind. Another
thank you to the Trinity Alumni Fund who kindly helped subsidise part of the
cost, which was a big bonus. And last, but not least, a massive thanks to the
outgoing DUO captain Kyle, who organised everything and who without, this trip
could not have happened.
A few DUO members enjoyed a lovely scatter event in Newbridge House Demense organised by Fingal Orienteers. (fingal.orienteering.ie) last Sunday Congratulations to DUO member Laura Cox who won the medium category, Rebecca Ní Chonchubhair and Julien Beuken enjoyed their first scatter event ever too!
We hit some really big competitions with both our beginner orienteers and our experienced orienteers and everything in the middle.
Conor shows off the DUO Maze-O in Front Square, Trinity College Dublin.
Leinster League Events
We went to lots of league events with our beginners to get a feel of orienteering all over Leinster:
Rebecca's (left) first orienteering event mentored by Laoise
Experienced orienteer James Haynes running through the Leinster Mountains
DUO member Laura on Bull Island
Getting wet and soggy on Bull Island
Déise Days
Then in October we attended an Inter Varsity Training Weekend down in Waterford (hosted by Waterford Orienteers waterfordorienteers.blogspot.com ) where we had some training, some organised events and of course lots of socials and fun!
Committee members Conor and Henrik preparing for their run
First timer Amy gets help from experienced Regina
"Ooooh maps" - Rebecca
Fun up the Comeragh Mountains
Running across the bogs in Waterford (Amy, Rebecca and Andrew)
DUO Captain Kyle takes on UCCO Committee Member Roy in a sprint race!
Running around the brand new WIT sports campus
Tired but happy!
UCDO, UCCO, DUO and QUOC discuss their maps and pose for a photo!
The JK
Several club members travelled to Wales to compete in the JK an international competition for orienteers of all ages.
Rosalind representing DUO! (left)
2013 PRO hands over to 2014 PRO (right)
New DUO captain for 2014
New DUO president Ruth Lynam
DUO ladies at their relay handovers
Exploring the mines in Wales after our runs!
Intervarsities
DUO dominated the Intervarsities this year with both our male and female teams winning the competition held in Clarabeg Co. Wicklow
with Conor Short being overall men's champion and Mirjam Allik winning the women's title!
Map of the challenging area where the Intervarsities were held
Jukola
See the blog post by our new Captain Eoin McCollough about his experience at Jukola, a trip to Sweden with DUO.
Next year, we're going on even more amazing trips, with a return trip to Waterford with the other Irish Universities and of course our DUO Anniversary weekend with our club turning 40 years old! Excited for another year of fun with the returning faces and of course all the new ones, Peace and love, Your outgoing 2013 DUO Committee