Juniors
ESOC offers various opportunities for juniors, including coaching, competitions, and trips away.
Regular junior coaching sessions are run by the East of Scotland Orienteering Association (ESOA), usually on a Saturday. The sessions are run by qualified coaches, and are designed to help juniors develop their skills and meet other young orienteers. Juniors from the other orienteering clubs in the East of Scotland also attend. Details of upcoming sessions are emailed to club members.
Each year, ESOC juniors take part in the Jamie Stevenson Trophy event, a Scottish inter-club competition for juniors, named after orienteering world champion and former ESOC junior Jamie Stevenson. Juniors compete on their own or in a junior pair.
Juniors can also compete in ESOC teams in the annual Scottish Relay Championships in the late spring.
As well as the inter-club competitions mentioned above, there is a Scottish Inter-Area competition, where ESOC juniors, together with juniors from the other East area clubs (ELO, INT, KFO, RR and TAY) compete against the West and North areas. The competition includes both individual and relay races. These are held over a weekend and it is a great social occasion.
Many of our juniors compete as individuals or as part of a school team at the Scottish Schools Orienteering Festival (SSOF), which is held in early June each year.
For juniors who are keen, and successful at a club level, there are lots of opportunities to take your orienteering further. Each year juniors from across Scotland are selected for the Scottish Junior Orienteering Squad (ScotJOS), which includes age classes M/W14-18.
Various training days, weekend and summer training camps are available, plus the opportunity to be selected to run for Scotland in the UK Junior-Inter Regional Championships (JIRCs) and the Junior Home Internationals (JHIs) against England, Wales and Ireland.