Latest news:

• Seb Represents England at Interland Cup!
  A huge congratulations to Seb, who recently represented England for the first time at the 2025 Interland Cup! Competing in the M14 category, he had a fantastic race, finishing in 3rd place and securing the best result for England in his age group. The event took place in the Netherlands, with a warm and sunny training day followed by a foggy, cold race morning that cleared up as the competition went on. After a strong start, Seb kept up the…

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• Junior coaching opportunites
  Ex-HOC member Rosie Taylor is running a series of short coaching sessions, mostly at NGOC league events. HOC juniors are very welcome to join in.
• Seb’s going to Interland!
  Massive congratulations to Seb Blackmore who has been selected to represent England at next year’s Interland. This is doubly impressive as Seb only ran his first orienteering race in April last year – a truly meteoric rise! (And even better – the competition is hosted by HOC’s Belgian close namesake, HOC’93 or Hune Oriënterings Club 1993)

One of the many strengths of orienteering is that young and old compete alongside each other on the same courses and compare notes afterwards.  The Run for Your Club and New to Orienteering? pages have lots of information that applies to runners of all ages and levels of competitiveness.

Safeguarding:

We are committed to the principles of Safeguarding Children and Vulnerable Adults and our Safeguarding page explains our policies and practice.

Orienteering in England has a structure of Regional and National level squads for youngsters who want to compete at these levels, with the potential for progression to International competitions.  Harlequins juniors who are a second year M/W12 or older, and are able to confidently and independently complete an Orange course (or above) can join the West Midlands Junior Squad.

The CompassSport Cup/Trophy competition includes juniors within the ‘whole club’ team, and indeed they are frequently key to the overall result.  The assorted West Midlands competitions all have Junior categories.

One way for Juniors to measure progress within the sport is to work towards the different badges for colour-coded courses.

There are two inter-club competitions organised solely for juniors:

The Yvette Baker Trophy/Shield is the premier Junior Inter-Club competitions for English and Welsh clubs. It is named after Britain’s first World Orienteering Champion.  Usually the heats are held in Spring with the final in July.  Harlequins qualified for the 2022 final in the Shield.

The Peter Palmer Junior Team Relays are held yearly, often in September, with the first two legs usually run in the dark.

Juniors who attend schools in the West Midlands Region can take part in the West Midlands Schools Championships.  The British Schools Orienteering Association has a very comprehensive website and coordinates two National Championships each year.