The European TrailO Championships (ETOC), based in Szczecin in northern Poland, ended on Monday with fantastic results for the British Team. At the concluding event, the Relays, our Open GBR Team 1 were only 6 seconds behind the winners Finland and finished in second place with the silver medals. The new British Junior team just missed out on a podium place by coming in 7th.
The Open team result was the best ever relay result for a British team at any ETOC. The Open team had Tom Dobra (TVOC) going off first, Charles Bromley Gardner (BAOC) second and Ben Kyd (MDOC) was on the final leg.
The Junior team, competing in the first ETOC Relay Junior class, had James Curtis (M18, SO) first leg, Jack Knight (M20, KERNO) second and brother Tom Knight (M18, KERNO) third.
In the ETOC TempO competition on scrubland with scattered vegetation, both Ben Kyd and Tom Dobra qualified for the final. This had 9 stations but, with two errors on the 8th station, Ben saw his winning chance disappear and he finished in 15th place with Tom in 26th.
The 2-day PreO competition used the mature beech forest to the south of Szczecin. Our best results came in the Junior class with Tom Knight being in 6th place both days. Unfortunately, when the two day’s results were combined, he was pushed into 7th place just missing a podium position. Colin Duckworth (HALO), our only competitor in the P class, did well to finish in 17th place overall.
The relays took place in very different terrain – a golf course on a gently sloping hillside allowing the planner to set some very long-distance controls. Each competitor had 13 PreO controls to consider followed by 2 TempO stations. These all proved very challenging and, with some complaints and one protest, the results were not finalised until some time after the final competitors had completed their legs. Ultimately, when these were concluded, the Finnish team had a combined time of 457 seconds with Great Britain having 463. Croatia was over a minute behind in third with 535 seconds.
Finally, a special mention of two of the team participating for their first time in the Open class. Peter Dobra (SAX), Tom’s brother, and River Edis-Smith (SYO) had some excellent results with Peter’s 8th place, and the leading British competitor, in the preETOC PreO being really outstanding and encouraging for his future participation.
Further details of the various events at ETOC 2026 can be seen at the website: ETOC 2026.
Overall a very successful Championships with many positive elements for the British participants
The silver medallists: Charles Bromley Gardner (BAOC), Ben Kyd (MDOC) and Tom Dobra (TVOC)
With the European TrailO Championships (ETOC) taking place in Poland later this week, the British team has today assembled in Szczecin. The main ETOC events are TempO on Friday, a two-day PreO on Saturday and Sunday, and they conclude with a relay on Monday. Each Championship event has, for the first time, separate classes for P class (for physically challenged competitors) and Juniors as well as the standard Open class.
After arriving mid-afternoon, many of the team headed out to a local area of forest used for a 2025 PreO event. This provided an excellent opportunity to discuss terrain interpretation including the use of contours and form lines as well as the use of the forest canopy to determine the boundary between open and wood, particularly important when identifying clearings. The training was intended, in particular, to give those new to the team and new to the Polish terrain an awareness of the issues that may be important in the Championships.
In advance of the main ETOC events there are two pre-ETOC events being staged by the local Polish club to give additional training and experience for all ETOC competitors. Tomorrow there is a PreO event and on Wednesday a TempO event.
Good luck to those on the team:
Team members assessing potential control challenges based on a recent PreO event.
It has been a busy few months for European TrailO with numerous World Ranking Events. Many of these have reports in the new June Newsletter which is now available on this website. Each report is illustrated with map extracts and discussion of some of the controls and the techniques used by GBR competitors to attempt to reach the correct answer. As well as some thoughts from the JK weekend planner there are reports from events as far apart as Lithuania, Spain, Finland and Italy. This is in addition to the usual full updates on the GBR performance in the World Rankings, ECTO and On-line TempO.
Those who have signed up to receive a pdf copy direct to their inbox should have received an email with it as an attachment. Alternatively, download a copy from the Newsletter page of this website: Newsletter page.
The full Trail Orienteering Team Selection 2026 Policy has now been published and is available on the main British Orienteering Selection page - see: Selection for the GB Orienteering Teams. Interested athletes should note in particular the deadline for submitting their expressions of interest to the selectors - 11 May 2026.
As the end of 2025 is near, there is news of the results of the British TrailO League 2025 (BriTOL) and the plans for the BriTOL 2026.
With 5 events in the year, the 2025 League was based on a competitor’s best 3 events. Although both Tom Dobra (TVOC) and Ben Kyd (MDOC) each had one win (scoring 100 points), Tom also had a 2nd (96 pts) and 3rd (93 pts) compared to Ben’s 3rd and 4th(91 pts). Ben was the 2024 winner but this year, with Tom finishing slightly ahead, Ben finished in second place. There was also a close finish for the 3rd and 4th place with David Jukes (BKO) just gaining slightly betters scores than Iain Phillips (LEI). The table below shows the top 10 places – for full results, see: British TrailO League 2025
Some changes are being introduced for 2026. With the adoption of electronic results for most TrailO events, a decision has been taken to move the League results from the current website (as used by the various UK urban leagues) to the European ‘TOP’ website - see: BriTOL 2026 | TOP Project. This should enable a simplified and speedier publishing of updated BriTOL scores after a League event. One key change is that only the premier course (usually called ‘Elite’) will qualify for League points at a designated BriTOL event. A new scoring system is also being adopted using the scheme used by the European ‘CHIS’ League. Tom Dobra, the League co-ordinator hopes to provide a summary of the changes in the next few weeks.
The first event for the 2026 BriTOL will be on the 28th February at Craig-y-nos Country Park in South Wales. News of additional events is awaited.
The Humber Bridge TrailO Weekend has provided TrailO enthusiasts with two days of competitions. On a rather wet Saturday, competitors tackled a 12 control PreO Sprint and a 3 station TempO in Baysgarth Park, Barton-upon-Humber - to the south of the Humber Bridge. On a much brighter Sunday, there was a 22 control PreO in the Humber Bridge Country Park - this time to the north of the bridge.
The weekend was the idea of Peter Roberts (EBOR) who identified the potential for the weekend and then developed the concept which included providing the maps of the two areas.
Results for the two days can be found on the TOP site - see: TOP - Humber Bridge Results. Congratulations to Tom Dobra (TVOC) who won both the Saturday events and to Helena Crutchley (HALO) for winning the Sunday PreO.
Some additional files are also available:
Competitors enjoyed the sun at Sunday's PreO event.
Today, at the World TrailO Championships (WTOC) in Hungary, it was the second day of the 2-day PreO Competition. Yesterday’s event had competitors mainly on top of cliffs looking down into a former quarry. Today by contrast, for the first set of controls, competitors were looking up at cliffs which formed the hill on which Sumeg Castle is built. The second half was back to closer controls in similar grassy areas to Day 1 but with significantly more vegetation.
At today’s event, there were 13 Open Class competitors with all 33 controls correct with Charles Bromley Gardner (BAOC) and Ben Kyd in the chasing group with 32 correct. With a better performance at the Time Controls, Charles finished in 22nd position with Ben in 24th.
Over the two days there were 6 competitors gaining the maximum score of 69. The top performer and World Champion, based on the total times at the four Time Controls, was Anders Höije from Sweden who beat Tommi Hakuli of Finland by just 12 seconds. Top performer for GBR was Ben Kyd in 16th with 68 correct. 3 other GBR team members all finished with 64 correct with Charles Bromley Gardner (51st) just beating Tom Dobra (TVOC) (53rd) by 11 seconds. John Kewley (MDOC) finished in 61st position.
With teams being invited to include up to two extra Junior team members, James Curtis (SO) had been selected for the GBR team this year. James has been performing well in the UK but this was his first international event. Being faced with some very technical terrain at a World Championship was a challenge but James, who finished in 93rd position overall, successfully identified 58 controls correctly. A very encouraging result showing significant future potential.
The GBR Team had a single competitor in the P Class – Colin Duckworth (HALO). Although faced with the same controls, the more limited mobility of P Class competitors made the events harder and, on Day 1, no competitor got all the controls correct. Colin finished Day 1 in 20th position but improved to 12th position today. Overall he finished in 16th position.
Tomorrow brings a rapid change of scenery for competitors, as the teams head off on the 2.5 hours’ drive into Slovakia, for the TempO Model event, followed directly by the Relay on Saturday and TempO on Sunday.
Colin Dickson (l) and Charles Bromley Gardner (r) on the WTOC PreO Day 2 course
As part of the Jan Kjellstrom (JK) weekend festival of orienteering held in Yorkshire over Easter, two TrailO competitions have been held.
On Good Friday (18th April), Day 1 was held in urban parkland as well as part of a university campus near the centre of Sheffield. The day saw competitors tackle a ‘Combined TrailO’ consisting of a 4 station TempO section followed by an AZ PreO section. Based on time penalties for incorrect controls allocated to the PreO section, a combined overall result was determined. Congratulations to the Day 1 Elite winners: Open – Ben Kyd (MDOC), P Class – Colin Duckworth (HALO), Junior – James Curtis (SO). Overall winner in the Standard Class was Matthias Mahr.
Yesterday, for the Day 2 competition, competitors tackled a PreO course on very different terrain. Complex contours from former mining activity in woodland gave the opportunity to provide challenging controls. Congratulations to the Day 2 Elite winners: Open – Anne Straube (OD), P Class – Colin Duckworth (HALO), Junior – James Curtis (SO). Winner in the Standard Class was Erik Biernacki-Jablonski (WAOC).
For more details and to download results, map files and to see links for photos, see the main JK page on this site: JK TrailO Page
View of the second Timed Control station on Day 2 of JK2025
The 2025 TrailO World Ranking Event (WRE) season has started with the Hungarian TrailO Weekend. Based in the town of Kecskemet there were 3 events: a WRE TempO and a PreO Sprint on Saturday and a WRE PreO on Sunday.
In contrast to the rugged and rocky terrain often found in TrailO, these events used largely flat areas: the Saturday events used a landscaped golf course and the Sunday was in an arboretum with complex vegetation. Despite this unusual terrain, the courses were challenging and the planning made full use of each areas’ potential. Five former members of the GBR team competed in the events. An opportunity to get some early experience prior to the selection of the team members to represent GBR at this year’s World TrailO Championships being held in Hungary and Slovakia in August.
Top performer in the TempO was Ben Kyd (MDOC) who finished in 9th place. Perhaps due to it being the first time competitors had seen the map, the first station was particularly challenging with the 2nd and 3rd tasks getting only 26% and 28% correct responses. The second GBR member was John Kewley (MDOC).
With 19 correct answers out of the 20 controls, Ben also led the GBR competitors in the PreO Sprint. Although he had the fastest time in the Sprint (using less than 9 minutes of the 29 minutes permitted), unfortunately that one error left him in 8th place. Our second GBR member was Tom Dobra in 25th place – he also had 19 correct but took 24 minutes to complete the course.
In much colder conditions, Sunday’s WRE PreO had 36 controls to consider in 135 minutes followed by three time controls, each with 3 tasks. Following the voiding of two controls, 9 competitors achieved the full score of 34. Both Tom Dobra (TVOC) and Ben Kyd achieved scores of 33 but it was Tom with no errors at the time controls who finished in 17th place to Ben’s 21st. John Kewley (with 32 correct) was just behind in 25th place.
The next opportunity to experience TrailO and enhance competition skills is when the JK Orienteering Festival takes place over the Easter weekend. TrailO features on both Good Friday and Easter Saturday.
Tom Dobra at the Hungarian PreO event [Image from Trailo.cz Facebook]
Two items of interest to Trail Orienteers can be found in the minutes of the IOF Council meeting which took place recently on the 21st March.
Of particular interest to British TrailO people was the announcement that Ben Kyd has been appointed as a member of the IOF Trail Orienteering Commission (TOC) for 2025-2026. As stated on the IOF website, the Commission ‘is the interface between the International Orienteering Federation (IOF) Council and the Trail Orienteering community regarding the development and implementation of the Trail Orienteering sport (TrailO) worldwide.’ The current Chairperson of TOC is Anne Straube (GER) who is well known to many GBR competitors as she is based here in the UK. Congratulations to Ben on his appointment.
The second item was the appointment of USA as the organiser of the World Trail Orienteering Championships (WTOC) 2027 with the preliminary dates 9-14 November 2027.
All the minutes of the IOF Council can be found on the IOF website at: IOF Council.
Ben Kyd at the World Championships (WTOC) in 2023.
