The SYO Saturday Series is designed to introduce newcomers of all ages to the sport of orienteering. There are courses to suit all abilities and anyone can come along - just turn up between 12.20 and 3pm and have a go. The series also incorporates the Sheffield Federation of School Sports schools' league. There are 9 league events over the year followed by a fun event and prize giving. The league is open to Y3 and above and there is even now an adults' league; won this year by SYO's Paul Norman!

The new series kicks off on Saturday 21st September at Endcliffe Park. More details here.The other dates are:

Sat 5th Oct - EIS, Olympic Legacy Park
Sat 23rd Nov - Shirebrook Valley
Sat 11th Nov - Whirlowbrook Hall
Sat 8th Feb - Botanical Gardens
Sat 14th Mar - Norfolk Park
Sat 18th Apr - Parkwood Springs
Sat 16th May - Millhouses Park
Sat 6th June - Graves Park
Sat 11th July - Prize giving

We have hundreds of printed flyers if you would like some to give out at a community group or your child's school or you can download a copy here.

The series culminates with a fun event and prize giving. Prizes are awarded to 1st 3 in each age class and there are also team prizes and school prizes. We even reward attendance with a prize for those who attend all 9 events. We celebrated the end of the 2018/19 league with a score event and prize giving at Millhouses Park at the end of July. Well done to all the prize winners - the overall winners are listed below, full list of results here. Thanks to Richard Baxter for the photos.

Primary School - Nether Green
Secondary School - High Storrs

G4 Team - Dobcroft
B4 Team - Nether Green
G5 Team - Hunters Bar
B5 Team - Nether Green
G6 Team - Dobcroft
B6 Team - Hunters Bar
G7 Team - High Storrs
B7 Team - High Storrs
G8/9 Team - Tapton
B8/9 Team - High Storrs
G10/11 Team - High Storrs
B10/11 Team - Penistone

G4 - Imogen, Ecclesall
B4 - Lawrence, High Storrs
G5 - Ella, Hunters Bar
B5 - Oli, Nether Green
G6 - Anna, Dobcroft
B6 - Robbie, Nether Green
G7 - Freya, High Storrs
B7- James, High Storrs
G8 - Imogen, High School
B8 - Conrad, High Storrs
G9 - Carys, Notre Dame
B9 - Euan, High Storrs
G10 - Naomi, Home Schooled
B10 - Max, Tapton
G11 - Alex, High Storrs
G12 - Isabelle, Notre Dame

After 5 hours of minibus madness, music and MacDonald’s we arrived at the home of Winnie The Pooh for a quick stretch of the legs in the ‘Enchanted Forest’ before heading across to Michael Hall School the venue for this year’s Peter Palmer Relays.  The evening consisted of volleyball, basketball, burgers, a quick look at the arena, a football match against Cumbria and Sweden, and then a few hours’ trying to sleep on the gym floor before the 5.00am start of the race.

West Cumberland were the pre-race favourites having won for the last 3 years and despite losing all but one of last year’s team they still had strength throughout including three W18s on the Yellow course!  Octavian Droobers also had an experienced team as did local club Southdown Orienteers and this year two Swedish clubs sent strong teams as part of an exchange with their Tio Mila relay.  With lots of keen youngsters, SYO opted to spread experience more widely managing to field three teams in the main 6 person overnight race and 2 teams in the DayBreak relay. 

The Killer Bees had the slower of the two gaffles on the first leg and lost touch with the pack in the bracken filled forest section coming home 9 minutes down in 10^th place but ahead of the Swedish team OK Linne. Dom ran an excellent race to bring the team back into contention in 3^rd place but still 10 minutes down on West Cumberland and Southdown who suspiciously had been given the same gaffle throughout! The last leg proved decisive for West Cumberland pulling away to take the win while Southdown just managed to hold on to 2^nd place in a sprint finish with OK Linne. The Killer Bees slipped back behind the Swedes but with strong runs from Freya, Anna and Euan managed to hold on to 4^th overall and crucially 1st place in the Joan George handicap class for the 4^th year in a row! 

Matthew coped brilliantly with the challenge of the first leg bringing the Bumble Bees back in 11^th place and Sam T, Oscar and Jamie all picked up places to bring the team back in 5^th place and 2^nd in the Joan George class beating all the other second teams. The Wanna Bees finished a very creditable 10^th place out of 18 teams with Conrad and James having particularly good runs. In the DayBreak Relay the Bees Knees and Worker Bees teams battled it out in the middle of the pack until the last leg when Robbie put in the 2nd fastest time to move from 6^th to 3^rd place and sneak a podium position. 

Saxons Orienteering Club delivered a great event including a proper DJ with dry ice, and a magnificent setting bathed in early morning sunshine with medals, trophies and chocolate on board we piled into the minibuses for the long but not quite as loud trip home to Sheffield.

Many thanks to Jacky for managing the teams, Nick for commentating and writing the race report above and Jacky, Dave, Nick and Rob for driving the mini-buses. Next year’s Peter Palmer Junior Relays take place during the weekend 12 - 13 September in the Lake District on WCOC home terrain! 

Results on the SAXON's website

This weekend saw 2 highly successful days of competition with 30 medals for SYO members!

LEI hosted the British Sprint Champs at Loughborough Uni on Saturday in glorious sunshine. As usual our juniors excelled with wins for Lawrence (M10), James (M12), Ella (W10) and Alex C (W14). Robbie (M12), Anna (W12) and Charlotte (W10) picked up silvers while Imogen (W14) took a bronze. In the men's senior and vet classes Nick B took the win in M35 while Bill E topped the podium in M50. Meanwhile it was silver all round for the women with Laura (W35), Kim (W40) and Amanda (W45) all taking silver.

Sunday saw the action move to Chinley Churn for the British Middle Champs hosted by DVO. Despite the mist, SYO were even more successful here with 17 podium positions! It was a 1, 2, 3 in W10 for Ella, Charlotte and Alice; while the M10 boys managed 1st (Lawrence) and 3rd (Maxwell)! Robbie (M12) and Alex C (W14) both took gold, with Anna (W12) and Imogen (W14) taking well deserved silvers. It was another strong performance from SYO's women with a win for Amanda on W45, silvers for Laura (W35), Lucy (W50) and Judy (W65) and a bronze for Rachel on W35. In the men's classes Nick B took gold in M35 while Andy (M40) and Martin (M50) took bronze.

Check out our new Junior Champions in our Champions section of the Hall of Fame...

To try and forget about how grim the weather's become recently, we've put together some brief reports from all the tours over summer - many thanks to everyone for their contributions. Click the links below to jump to the tour to find out more about how our Juniors got on! To find out more about the tours, and how to get selected, check out the tabs on the right hand side of the JROS Website.

Lagganlia

Imogen P

"Lagganlia was an amazing experience and I learnt so much not to mention all the life long friends I made! The orienteering was technical but the terrain was beautiful and great to run in. We swam in Loch Morlich just beneath the Cairngorms! The food was amazing cooked by the great team of cooks and thank you to all the coaches and junior coaches who made it the best week possible!"

Jamie L

"Lagganlia was a brilliant chance to combine making new friends from all around Britain and a week of orienteering in fantastic Scottish terrain. We trained every day but also had lots of time to just hang out and socialise. We swam in the loch and played football. My favourite area was Rosile because of the intricate contours and beautiful terrain. Overall it was a great week and I have made friends for life."

Alex C

"Lagganlia was such a great opportunity to not only improve my orienteering skills but also to get to know people from all over the UK. The areas we ran on were both lovely and technical Scottish terrain and the site we were staying on (Lagganlia) was amazing. We also did lots of activities outside of trainin like swimming, playing football and lots of other fun things. Thank you to everyone who made it a week to remember, coaches who changed my orienteering for the better and cooks who fed me with brilliant meals and toast all week."

Deeside

Alex E

"The Deeside tour was definitely a highlight of my summer - a chance to orienteer on high quality areas with great people, whilst being able to practice different techniques both with and without the pressure of a race situation. One of my favourite areas was Balmedie (we don’t get many sand dunes in Sheffield!) which has lots of intricate contour detail. At the end of each day we could then relax with some post-training swimming in the sunshine."

Max M

"Deeside was a great tour full of nice areas but it also had plenty of time to just relax and have fun with all the other athletes. We went swimming every day (helped by the beautiful weather) and usually had at least one competitive race a day to win a yellow jersey. The food was also really good with a BBQ and homemade pizzas etc."

Badaguish

Euan T

"Badaguish was great. We learnt a lot in the classroom and orienteered in some great terrain. It was also a good opportunity to get to know the year above. Thanks to the chef's, could recommend getting selected just for the food. And also thanks to the coaches for giving up there time as well."

Gothenburg

Ryan E

"In August I was selected for the JROS Gothenburg training camp for a second year. This year we had 4 athletes from Yorkshire: Me, Dom, Laura H and Alasdair P. It was a great camp in quality terrain. In our free time we did lots of swimming and on Saturday we went to the Liseberg theme park! At the end of the week we raced at the Gothenburg 3 days giving a great opportunity to practice racing abroad."

Dom D

"This was my first year on the Gothenburg camp, along with a lot of the athletes, but the relaxed feel of the camp was great, meaning we had to do a lot more of the organisation ourselves - such as planning trainings, putting out controls, and cooking. The terrain is a little different to that of Stockholn where I'd been before in Sweden, so was a great challenge orienteering there! Of course Mark and Alice did a brilliant job keeping a gentle eye on what we were doing, so thank you very much to them for such an enjoyable week!"

Yorkshire Junior Squad Tour

Conrad R

"I really enjoyed the squad tour for all sorts of reasons. It was great to socialise and get to know people better, go through amazing experiences with everyone, and as for the orienteering, it’s like nothing I’ve ever been to in England. The coaching was great and i think my orienteering skills and confidence has improved drastically. Whether it’s beautiful forests or swimming lakes Sweden has it all."

Isabelle H

"Squad Tour was a real eye opener to Swedish terrain (even when I was lost), it was a great week of swimming, training and roller coasters!"

Will G

"The orienteering was really hard but great fun and I learnt loads. The rest day on Friday was also amazing especially Grona Lund and the Skansen Museum."

Ryan E

"This year on the Yorkshire Squad tour we stayed in the OK Hellas hut in the south of Stockholm. We had the amazing area of Paradiset right on our doorstep which was big enough to give us areas to train on all of the days we had for training. There was lots of racing too with a double day on the Wednesday and the Stockholm Middle and Long Champs on the last weekend which was on a stellar area north of Stockholm. We had tremendous fun with plenty of down time including swimming and a rest day in Stockholm where we went to the Swedish heritage park Skansen and the Grona Lund theme park. It truly was a week to remember!"

Matthew M

"I really enjoyed the squad tour, the orienteering was very technically challenging and fun. The lake swimmig was great. I also enjoyed the rest day at Skansen and Grona Lund."

Claudine H

"I got a bit lost and it was as a quite stressful when the terrain was hard but I enjoyed it lots. Spending time with the squad, swimming in the lakes, gronalund and the races that went alright were fun. Swedish forests are very pretty as well. "

Forty seven SYO juniors travelled to Heaton Park in Manchester on Saturday 12^th October to compete in the British Schools Score Championships. The sun shone, which was lovely for spectators and competitors alike and made a decent change to many recent events! Competitors had 45 minutes to find as many of the 30 controls had they could. Four juniors, including SYO’s Euan and Dom, managed to score the maximum 300 points in the time allowed. The SYO juniors all excelled themselves with 19 individual medal wins! Congratulations to:

Y5 Boys - Will P 3^rd
Y6 Girls – Charlotte 1^st, , Ellen 2^nd
Y6 Boys- 1^st Oscar, 2^nd Jake
Y7 Girls – 1^st Anna
Y7 Boys – 1^st Robbie, 2^nd Joseph, 3^rd Ben A
Y8 Girls – 1^st Freya, 2^nd Ciara
Y8 Boys – 3^rd Isaac
Y9 Girls - 2^nd  Millie
Y9 Boys – Sam T 1^st, Ben T 2^nd
Y10/11 Boys – 1^st Euan, 3^rd Olmo
Y12/13 Girls – 2^nd Alex E
B12/13 Boys – 3^rd Dom

There were also excellent results in the team competitions. In the primary competition Nether Green won the primary boys while Hunters Bar took 2^nd in the primary boys and 3^rd in the primary girls. In the secondary competition, High Storrs won the lower secondary girls and lower secondary boys competitions. Visit the SYO Facebook page for more photos of the event.

Next up is the British Schools Champs on Sunday 17^th November in Black Park near Slough!

SYO Juniors have had a very impressive medal haul this weekend!

Saturday saw the British Schools Score over in Manchester, where 47 SYO Juniors competed for their school in a challenging 30-control score at Heaton Park. Out of a possible 42 individual medals, our juniors took home 19 of them - almost half! Read more about the event in Junior News...

Meanwhile, over in Northern Ireland, Jamie L was representing England at the Junior Home Internationals. Saturday was the individual race, where he put in a fab performance for 2nd place in the M14 category. In a similar format to JIRCs, Sunday was the Relays, where he put in an even stronger performance to get 1st on his leg! Well done to Jamie - see the results and photos on the Lagan Valley website...

Back in South Yorkshire, it was time for the Yorkshire and Humberside Orienteering Championships 2019, held by SYO in Wombwell on Sunday. Many of our juniors attended, and lots of them enjoyed the edible prizes they won on the podiums! There are too many to list here (podium positions can be seen on the results) but SYO Juniors took the win in all the W/M10-16 age classes.

A fab weekend of winning - well done to all who competed this weekend!

Next up in the Junior Events? CompassSport Cup down south this weekend, followed by British Schools Orienteering Champs on Sunday 17th November!

At the end of September eachyear the country's best juniors gather for a weekend of fierce competition at the Junior Inter-Regional Championships, which this year was hosted by SYO. An amazing eighteen SYO juniors (out of a possible 24) were called up to run for Yorkshire.

The individual day was held on Cowm's Rocks - a brand new orienteering area behind the Snake Pass Inn. This was always going to be a physical and technical challenge but even more so in the brutal conditions experienced on the day! True Yorkshire grit showed through though with some excellent results by SYO juniors. Congratulations to Imogen for winning W14 and for Jamie taking 3rd on M14. There were also very well-deserved top 10 positions for Euan (4th M16), Alex C (4th running up on W16), Freya (5th running up on W14), Alex E (8th W16) and Dom (10th M18). Well done to Dylan, Ciara, Sam T and Claudine for making their Yorkshire debuts and to Max, Sam C, Isabelle H, Conrad, Sam D and Will G for also performing well for the team - you all made a difference and helped Yorkshire to a tie on 2nd place with North West after day 1.

Following the individual competition the teams transferred to an overnight stay at Kingswood Outdoor Centre near Doncaster. Warm showers and food were followed by the prize giving for the individual and then a ceilidh just to ensure everyone was thoroughly worn out!

Relay day dawned and it was still raining torrentially, although spirits seemed to be high as the teams arrived at Tankersley. There were some excellent relay performances, particularly Imogen, Alex C and Evie (from AIRE) taking the win in the girls relay! There were other notable performances from Dom and Sam T who brought their teams up 5 places and Freya who took her team up 4 places; although all our juniors performed well to help Yorkshire to 3rd place in the relay competition. Overall, over the 2 days competition, Yorkshire finished in 3rd (just six points) behind the North West in 2nd and Scotland in 1st.

A massive thank you to all the volunteers who completed some very long shifts in cold, wet conditions over the 2 days but particular thanks to Jacky for organsing the overnight accommodation, Pete for managing all the SI, Charlie and Dave P for planning, Amanda and Mark C for organising, John (DVO) and Tony (AIRE) for controlling and Pauline for her role as weekend co-ordinator. 

Check out the photo album for the weekend on the SYO Facebook Page.

Forty members of SYO braved the long drive to Pippingford Park (and the appropriately named Windy Ridge) in Sussex yesterday to take part in the CSC Final against 9 other clubs from across the country. 

Pippingford Park is a Mole Valley major event favourite having been previously used for the British Night Champs in 2014 and the JK relays in 2017. The area offers varied terrain comprising of wooded valleys and well contoured heathland. Early starters were hampered by bracken and heather but the courses soon sped up with some very quick times posted as the event progressed. Courses were enjoyable and although not particularly technically challenging, plenty made mistakes. A late surge of good results saw us race up the leaderboard into a surprise second place behind Forth Valley Orienteers and ahead of Southdown Orienteers. 

Well done to everyone that competed - you all made a difference - but particular congratulations to our 25 scorers! 7 of our counters (out of a possible 8) were Juniors: Alex C, Dom, Conrad, Charlotte, Freya, Imogen, Alex E, Sam C.

Next year the final is at Sutton Park on 18th October - put the date in your diary; we need to win that trophy back from Scotland!

The photos have been out for a while now, but this fab video has just been released! It gives a great insight into what goes on at Lagganlia - an annual JROS summer training camp for M/W14s held in Scotland.

Thanks very much to Johnny Hooton for putting this together!

Wow – what a day! More than 60 Sheffield School pupils travelled to Black Park near Slough on Sunday 17^th November and took 26 podium positions across the whole school, age class team and individual competitions at the British Schools Champs!

In the whole school competitions High Storrs lifted the trophy in the large secondary schools competition for the first time while in the primay competition there was a reversal of last year's positions with Hunters Bar taking the top spot with Nether Green in 2nd place.

In the primary age team competitions Hunters Bar won the year 6 girls' trophy while Hallam took 2nd place in the year 5 boys competition. In the secondary team categories, High Storrs took the national title in the year 8, 9 and 10 boys classes and girls' year 12, while the girls in Y8 took 3rd. 

In the Individual categories there was plenty of success for SYO members; well done to:

G6 1^st Ella, 3^rd Alice
B5 2^nd Will P, 3rd Lawrence
B6 3rd Oscar
B7 1^st Robbie
G8 1st  Freya, 2^nd Ciara
B8 3rd James
B9 2nd Jamie, 3rd Leni
G11 2nd Naomi
B10 2nd Matthew M
B11 2nd Max
G12 2nd Alex E
G13 1st Isabelle H

Check out the SYO Facebook Page for photos of the day. Next year’s British Schools Champs will be held on Sunday 15^th November at Wormley Woods near Enfield.