Trudging through the outdoors on foot or by push-bike and deciphering maps sounds like a weekend of bliss for Lexie Tait McCosh, who loves filling her time with orienteering.

“I wish I had got into it sooner,” the bubbly 76-year-old said.

She’s now excited to open up her 500-acre Pongawaka farm to host the new Team Rogaine course for this year’s Zespri AIMS Games.

McCosh fell in love with the sport years ago after catching a glimpse of what it was like when she competed with her daughters in a 2013 adventure race.

She gradually learned more about orienteering and navigational skills, which are needed to help with the adventure races, and joined Orienteering Bay of Plenty a few years ago.

“I wish I’d known about it at school; I love it.”

Although she can’t run through the course at the same pace as she sees the “young ones”, she doesn’t think it matters. It’s about completing it.

“I enjoy it, it’s like a treasure hunt,” she said excitedly.

She gets “a buzz” from discovering the controls, knowing she’s going the right way, the puzzle, using her brain, going to “neat places” and moving her body.

“You’re so busy thinking about where you’re going that you forget about the ache in your knee,” she said with a laugh.

It’s become a family affair, with her grandchildren, their parents and herself sometimes running the same course.

“It’s great to have the family involved.

Lexie Tait McCosh with her husband Roger and his daughter Kyla. Photo / Jamie Troughton, Dscribe Media Services

This year’s Team Rogaine course will be on Panea Farm, which McCosh and husband Roger have owned since 1985. The land is a run-off for their dairy farm for weaned young stock before going back to the dairy farm.

It’s got a bit of everything to make an exciting course, McCosh explained: it’s hilly, has lots of gulleys, rough and scrubby in some parts, pine trees on steep hill sides and flat and grassy in others.

They’ve previously offered their farm to Orienteering Bay of Plenty and a few courses have been held on it, but not in the past couple of years.

It was a no-brainer when they were asked if Panea Farm could be used for AIMS Games 2025.

“We’re more than happy to see a bunch of kids running around, being happy and doing what they like doing. It’ll be fun … we’re so excited.”

AIMS Orienteering event controller Dennis De Monchy said they were blown away by the participation in orienteering’s first year last year, expecting 150 kids but getting 280 each day.

This year, they planned for around 300 entries across the sprints at Toi Ohomai and the Team Rogaine at Panea Farm, about 40 minutes away in Pongakawa.

“We’re loving seeing the growth in the sport,” De Monchy said, with the quality of junior Kiwi orienteering now putting the country’s youngsters on the world stage.

–The Aims Gamer