Collie, WA

The 2025 Australian Mountain Bike Orienteering Championships took place in and around the town of Collie. Four exciting events were held from Friday 5th September to Sunday 7th September amidst changing and wet weather.

A massive thank you to all course setters, organisers, and admin teams who had put in countless hours behind the scenes to make the Championships run smoothly.

All results can be found on Eventor. Video footage can also be found on Orienteering WA Facebook page. Below are event reports for the Middle Distance, Sprint and Long Distance events.

Event Report 1: Middle Distance Australian MTBO Championships

The 2025 Australian MTBO Championships Middle Distance event was held on a new map by Duncan Sullivan featuring some compact but complex areas with many tracks, a gravel pit and an old railway formation on the outskirts of Collie, some narrow and flat single track networks next to the Collie River at Minningup Pool, and in between a grid of sandy tracks in rolling terrain that was very pleasant riding, but not navigationally challenging.  We ended up using the middle area for some long route choice legs with several options to get to a control on top of the largest hill. There was quite a bit of back and forth in the complex areas to make the most of them, which unfortunately caught a few people out. It was important to check the sequence numbers and not just follow the line.

The sandy terrain is a bit unusual for WA events and the recent rain firmed up the tracks making for very pleasant riding.  A few sections of the course had disturbing numbers of ducks on them when putting out controls, but it was mostly possible to avoid the deeper puddles and only one had a control right on it.

Most participants I spoke to said they really enjoyed the event especially the firm sandy tracks and there was much discussion of the route choice on the long legs.

Many thanks to everyone who helped make the event and the carnival happen, notably Duncan for the map and course setting assistance, Mark Lommers and others for the arena setup, dealing with a nice shire renovation of our chosen finish arena, which had nice new terraces picnic benches, freshly laid turf, and a fence keeping us off it. Ken and Carol Brownlie for managing the start. Melinda Richards for the computer and scoring, the Braid/Pass family, Simon Windsor, Joseph and Susan Colement, and Hadrien Devillepoix and Ellie Sansom collecting controls. Brian Dunning for assistance putting controls out and spotting me putting the wrong bricks on the last 2 controls in time to fix it. 

Report by Course Setter Michael Dufty.

Results are available on Eventor and route choices on Livelox.

Photos: Anthea and Kate (left), Ian (right). Taken by Rohan Braid.

Event Report 2: Sprint Distance Australian MTBO Championships

The Sprint event was held on Saturday afternoon, with some blustery winds and clouds in the sky but thankfully not much in the way of rain.  The event, starting and finishing at the Collie High School ovals, was held on a map drawn by Duncan Sullivan, covering the fringes of the Collie River as it passes through Collie.  The map includes river-side bush and forest areas with a complex single track network, and a variety of park and urban terrain sections.

The shorter courses stayed mainly in the bush and forest areas and needed close attention to navigation and fast decision making.  The longer courses added in the park and the show-ground areas which required competitors to quickly adapt to the different demands of these areas before heading back into the forest area.

The challenging courses were well received and produced worthy winners across all the categories.  The Men’s Elite was taken out by Ricky Thackray and the Women’s Elite by Marquita Gelderman.

Many thanks to the teams that made the start and finish mechanics all work smoothly and to the many volunteers who contributed to a successful event.  Special thanks to those who made short work of the control collection at the end of the day.

Report by setter Ben Coetzer.

Results are available on Eventor and route choices on Livelox. 

Photos: Left, Ellie you're being followed; Right Katie and Volker starting. Taken by Sasha Eves, from Orienteering WA Facebook page.

Event Report 3: Long Distance Australian MTBO Championships 

The Arklow Forest was identified as an area of great potential for MTBO several years ago, and was the inspiration for staging the carnival in and around Collie. The potential map area extends further west and north of what was used for the event, so it could easily accommodate a 2-day event in future.

There is a good mix of XC style sanctioned MTB trails, well used forest tracks, and some disused less distinct forestry  tracks and old rail formations to add some more navigational challenge. The disused tracks were in relatively better condition when mapping commenced in July 2024 due to recent controlled burns, but accumulated leaf litter and undergrowth made them a bit trickier, especially for those not used to WA Jarrah/Marri forest. As mapper and course setter I even resorted to taping some sections to reduce the risk of competitors riding into no-mans-land like I did on occasions.

Some track clearing was required to aid fairness and challenging route choices. The map and courses were well received, with plenty of route choice. It was nice to see that competitors chose various different routes, even some that I thought would be avoided. Overall courses were a little longer than target winning times, contributed to by the wet
weather, indistinct tracks, and me running out of time to do enough test riding.

The preferred arena at Harris River Winery was beyond our budget, but Jeff Riley from Collie Trails Retreat was very helpful in getting an area ready in and just outside his property, and getting his new cabins ready in time for a few key officials to stay at. This meant I was able to challenge weary minds and legs with a few controls in the intricate Ray’s Trail area towards the end of the courses.

Whilst I had all the flags out by Friday morning, the SI units needed to be activated on Saturday when I also felt I should be showing my Carnival Director face at the Middle Distance and Sprint. I am very grateful for the help from Brian Dunnage (blast from the past), and Sprint course setter Ben Coetzer for assisting with this process of turning on 47 controls.

Thanks to the Start team Ken and Carol Brownlie with help from Anna Napier, the IT crew Melinda and Jack, Ian and Jan for toilet towing and parking marshalling, Peter Gillon for the towing the trailer and set-up and packing up, and the Lommers and others for Arena set-up. Thanks also to control collectors Ben, Hadrien, Rob Beattie, Anthea, Peter Gillon, Volker, Deb and Richard, Ceri and Graham and family.

Congratulations to the W21A winner Marquita Gelderman from NZ, and to our own Ricky Thackray in M21A. The closest battle was in M50A, with Craig Steffens taking an early lead after a better route choice to control 2, but losing the lead at control 16 after missing an indistinct junction, in the end going down by 18sec to Michael Ridley-Smith.

Report by setter Duncan Sullivan.

Check out all the virtual battles on Livelox
Full results are here.

Photos: Competitors on gravelly tracks on the Long Distance Event, taken by Graham Braid.