By Liz Bourne
More than 160 orienteers will be travelling to the Granite Belt next weekend, September 20 and 21, to compete in the two day Queensland Orienteering Championships which are being held outside Dalveen.
The competitors come mainly from throughout Queensland and will be joined by orienteers from Tasmania, Victoria, South Australia, New South Wales and the ACT. The Championships will take on an international flavour with some orienteers from New Zealand, Canada and Britain and a junior from Sweden also participating.
The Championships are being organised jointly by the local Bullecourt Boulder Bounders and Toowoomba’s Range Runners Clubs.
“We've got 25 classes at the Championships, ranging in age from the under 10's to the over 75's, so people of all ages and ability are catered for,” Ms Bourne said. “We are expecting some top competition over the weekend with our men’s and women’s elite fields particularly strong.”
She said that special orienteering maps had been produced for the Championships with competitors having to navigate their way through the bush to specified control sites on their course using their map and compass. Course lengths will vary from 14km for the elite men down to 1.5km for the under 10 age class.
The region's detailed granite terrain provides for some of the most challenging navigation in Australia with many orienteers have competed here many times before, she said.
“The Championships will be held on grazing land north of Dalveen with open paddocks and forested hills with areas of scattered granite, providing a range of navigational challenges."
Ms Bourne gratefully acknowledged the support of the Southern Downs Regional Council who provided funding for the Championships and the Department of Tourism, Innovation and Sport who funded the production of the two new maps being used for the event.
Many of the competitors will be heading to Armidale the following weekend to participate in the week long Australian Orienteering Championships Carnival so the local championships will provide a good opportunity to hone their skills in similar granite terrain.
For further information, please contact Liz Bourne on 4683 6374 or bbb@oq.qsn.au
