Coaching Support
British Orienteering encourages qualified coaches to keep up to date with the latest developments in sports science, nutrition and coaching principles and practices. Use the links below to search for information related to your areas of interest.
Details of the Coaching Committee can be found in the About British Orienteering section - Council and Committees.
Coaching Support is categorised in the following way:
Coaching Safety
Safety is a key aspect of your training and
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Registering a Coaching Session
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Coaching Logbook
The Coaching Log Book is used to keep records of your coaching.
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Coach Newsletters
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Coaching Kit
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Coaching - Useful Documents
Included is a collection of documents that have been presented at workshops, conferences or clinics and are a useful resource to help you improve your coaching or your personal orienteering skills. They are aimed at everyone from the complete novice, through the regular orienteer looking to brush up their skills, up to the top elites in search of new training ideas and inspiration.
If you feel able to help providing content for any of the pages, please don't hesitate to email
General Coaching Information:
Useful Documents from past Coaching Conferences
2008 Conference:
2007 Conference:
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People to Offer Support
When you want support you have a variety of people to turn to:
- If your query is related to information about the awards or about the administration of your Coach Award or License to Coach please contact Vicky Thornton, British Orienteering Coaching Manager
- If your query is about orienteering courses, First Aid courses, local support or regional matters please contact your regional coaching representative at:
 Also of interest to you might be Sports coach UK. They deliver 2 series of workshops; the 5 'Coaching Essential' workshops are targeted at those with little or no coaching experience whilst the 20 'Develop your Coaching' workshops cater for coaches who want to further improve their coaching skills. An introduction to the workshops and a list of them can be found here.
Other specialist support may be available from the links provided elsewhere on this page.
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Sports Medicine
Sports medicine is a multidisciplinary approach to treat injuries, to help prevent them and to instruct and prepare athletes for competition. Sports medicine is not a single speciality, but an area of work that involves health care professionals, researchers and educators from a wide variety of disciplines.
Orienteering is a sport where athletes do become injured and sports medicine has a significant role to play in curing and rehabilitating athletes. Interestingly, recent developments in sports medicine are now also focusing on helping athletes and coaches understand how injuries can often be prevented or at least minimised by effective training regimes. The importance of core stability is one such example where improving core stability is believed to reduce the rate of injury to runners particularly over rough terrain. Articles related to core stability are:
The Home Countries Institutes of Sport are the first place you should look for support as they have medical teams that understand sport and athletes. If they are unable to assist the British Association of Sports and Exercise Medicine (BASEM) have lists of contacts that should be able to meet your needs
Other sources of information about sports medicine can be found at:
Acclimatisation Advice - The British Olympic Association works with National Governing Bodies to ensure that each athlete has an optimal environmental preparation strategy for competing at the Olympic Games, taking into account the pertinent issues relating to each venue.
The advice provided for previous Games is shown below; please note that the strategy was specific to the timing and circumstances of each event and should not be seen as generic advice although much of it will be of use to orienteers.
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Sport Science
Many coaches recognise the benefits of having support science support for both their coaching and the individual athlete’s they work with. This page will help you find sport science support for you and your athletes.
What is sport science?
 "Sport and Exercise Science is the application of scientific principles to the promotion, maintenance and enhancement of sport and exercise related behaviours" (BASES, 2005). There are three branches of science that study sport; these are biomechanics, physiology and psychology. All are of interest to orienteering coaches although physiology and psychology are arguably seen as having more interest to orienteering than biomechanics.
The British Association of Sport and Exercise Sciences (BASES) is the UK professional body for all those with an interest in the science of sport and exercise.
British Orienteering recommends that coaches seek sport science support  from BASES Accredited Sport and Exercise Scientists. Accredited scientists work to a strict code of conduct to provide a range of sport science services. The BASES website describes what you can expect while receiving support from an accredited scientist. You can search for accredited scientists using the BASES website.
BASES also provide a programme of workshops designed to provide sport and exercise scientists with current information, views, skills and the sharing of experiences, which relate to improving practice in specific disciplines.
Finding a sports nutritionist
You can search for registered nutritionists on the Nutrition Society Website. The Nutrition Society is developing a new specialist category of the register in sport and exercise nutrition.
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Other Coaching Links
Below are a link to Orienteering Club websites that have useful coaching tips. If you manage a club or personal website that contains similar material, and would like to get a link to it added to this page, email us
- CLOK - An introduction to the basic skills required on an orienteering course
- HH - A series of five skills sheets practising different techniques
- SARUM - Useful hints and tips to improve your orienteering
- SOLWAY - A detailed description of many orienteering techniques
- SWOC - A description of many intermediate and advanced navigational techniques
- WAOC - More descriptions of different techniques
- ULOC - A short reminder of orienteering techniques
- WSX - A guide to some more interesting aspects of navigation
.The following links are web sites that may provide you with information about a wide variety of coaching related issues:
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