The government has issued new guidance for the national lockdown in England, which comes into force on Tuesday 5 January.

The guidance states that:

• Outdoor exercise is still permitted but should be limited to once per day.
• You can exercise in a public outdoor place:
  • by yourself.
  • with the people you live with.
  • with your support bubble (if you are legally permitted to form one).
  • in a childcare bubble where providing childcare.
  • or, when on your own, with one person from another household.
• Outdoor exercise should be done locally wherever possible, but you can travel a short distance within your area to do so if necessary (for example, to access an open space). If you need to travel you should stay local – meaning avoiding travelling outside of your village, town or the part of a city where you live – and look to reduce the number of journeys you make overall.
• All outdoor sports clubs, centres, venues and facilities will close, alongside indoor facilities.
• Organised outdoor sport for disabled people is allowed to continue, and we will provide further detail on this once we have information from the Government.

All organised orienteering activities, including events, competitions, leagues and coaching, are therefore suspended with immediate effect (except for orienteering for disabled people, on which we will provide further information in due course).

POCs and VOCS

POCs and VOCs can still be used for individual exercise. Courses should be registered with British Orienteering as activities to provide insurance cover for the club and planner. They must not be used for competitions or leagues.

We would recommend that you add any courses on to the British Orienteering POC portal via your club POC Manager or contact nweir@britishorienteering.org.uk

The full national lockdown: stay at home guidelines are available on the UK government website.

Guidance for orienteering clubs

Up to date support and guidance for UK orienteering clubs is available via our COVID page.

The First Minister has today announced that Tier 4 restrictions have been brought forward to the 20 December 2020.

However, the guidance that the Welsh Executive has published is clear that people who live in Tier 4 areas must not travel out of their Tier 4 area other than for legally permitted reasons, and that people who live in Tier 4 areas must not leave or be outside of their home except where they have a specific purpose or ‘reasonable excuse’.

For those living in a Tier 4 area, unlimited outdoor exercise is still permitted, including in parks and the countryside. Exercise must be alone, or in a public outdoor place with your household, support bubble, or one other person. Exercise should be done locally wherever possible, but you can travel a short distance within your Tier 4 area to do so if necessary (for example, to access an open space).

Orienteers are obviously required to comply with the new restrictions and with other government guidance.

British Orienteering will the guidance as further details of the new restrictions become available.

The 2021 Virtual Coaching Conference continued this week with three further sessions providing great insights for coaches and clubs across the country. So far, the live viewing figures for the first seven sessions is nearly 500.

Following the success of the conference so far, we are pleased to announce an additional session onto the programme.  

Titled ‘What is a Coach? A look at what modern coaching entails’ Join an expert panel to discuss;

• Who are the athletes?
• What are their needs?
• How can we help them?
• What are the needs of coaches?

The panel for the evening includes:

• Lynne Walker - Coach Education and Development
• Mark Nixon - High Performance Coaching
• Jen McKeown - Coaching Life skills & Reaching Your Potential
• Jon Musgrave - From Poacher to Gamekeeper
• Denise Martin - Expedition Team Building & Individual Goal Posts

The session takes place on Tuesday 2^nd February, 19:30 – 21:00

Register Here The session will be delivered via Zoom

Don’t forget there are two exciting sessions taking place next week with registrations still open.

Tuesday 26^th January @ 19:30 Using Virtual Platforms for Coaching

Register here Delivered through Go To Webinar

Thursday 28^th January @ 19:30 Simulating Sweden

Register here Delivered through Go To Webinar

For further details of all the sessions visit the conference webpage: www.britishorienteering.org.uk/coachingconference2021

British Orienteering wishes to reassure all competitors, volunteers and spectators that safety of all attending our events is a priority. We are aware of the concerns surrounding the current Coronavirus outbreak and are regularly reviewing our processes and procedures and staying up to date on government advice.

At present (5 March 2020), the British Championships (21 – 22 March) and JK events (10 – 13 April) are due to go ahead.

Please note:  For those who are unable to access the document entitled 'Advice for attending public events' from the COVID 19 Advice PDF please find this document below.

Peter Hart
Chief Executive