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West Anglian Orienteering Club

More about WAOCadditional info about the club

Last Updated: Sun 28 May 2023

Where is West Anglia?

West Anglia is the western part of East Anglia! Most of WAOC's members come from an area which stretches from Bedford in the west to the Suffolk border in the east, and from Peterborough in the north to Stevenage in the south. WAOC is responsible for mapping and running Orienteering events in the Thetford Chase and other woodland, as well as parks in Ampthill, Bedford, Peterborough, Huntingdon, Cambridge, Royston, Baldock and Stevenage, and urban events in towns such as Huntingdon, Ely, and Cambridge. You can get an idea of the terrain we cover from the map on our Mapped Areas page.

Our activities

We hold a weekly training night on Wednesday evenings during university term time, except when there is a MapRun league event. These offer an introduction to the sport for novices as well as catering for experienced orienteers wanting to refine their skills. The MapRun Leagues 'mini evening events' are held one a month for the majority of the year and fortnightly in the summer. MapRun events are less technically complex and highly suitable for novices.

Families should look out for the junior training programme.

We also provide Virtual Orienteering courses, and in conjunction with the landowner we set up and maintain Permanent Orienteering Courses.

Our Events

From Autumn to Spring, we lay on full scale events at weekends in areas including Thetford forest; Ampthill Park, Rowney Warren and other woodland south of Bedford; country parks in and around Cambridge, and also in urban settings - "city races". In Summer, we offer lower key events. Every event offers a range of courses to suit different ages and abilities, and are open to all.

Most orienteers travel to events laid on by other clubs and we are part of the East Anglian Orienteering Association. Many of us also compete (or at least take part!) in national events such as the annual JK festival, the British Orienteering Championships, and multi-day events held in Scotland, Wales, and the Lake District.

Members can compete as individuals, and we have our own club league (the WAGAL) as well as a regional East Anglian League. We issue nationally recognised awards for individual levels of achievement.

We also compete as a club in events such as the CompassSport Cup and Trophy, the junior Yvette Baker Trophy competition, and various relay competitions, where the result is based on a team performance. In 2018 WAOC were runners up in the CompassSport Trophy competition.

Our affiliations

WAOC is a member club of the East Anglian Orienteering Association (EAOA). We are affiliated to the British Orienteering Federation, nowadays known as British Orienteering.

Join us

Details of how to join WAOC, and the benefits of being a member, can be found on our Membership page.

We issue a monthly newsletter by email summarising upcoming events and recent news. Club members receive this automatically, but non-members can subscribe by sending us an email message with "subscribe" in the title. You can unsubscribe at any time.

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