Trail Kids Run & Orienteering

The Run & Orienteering program is part of the Loppet Foundation’s Trail Kids year-round programming. Participants ages 7-13 will enjoy trail running on the single track and ski trails around Theodore Wirth Park as they are coached in the basics of orienteering skills. The program will also incorporate ultimate frisbee, slackline skills, and other running games as warm up activities for the main session which is focused on trail running and orienteering. 

Practices include the following activities:

• Agility and strength exercises to develop age appropriate motor skills
• Balance work with the slack line
• Orienteering skills using orienteering maps to find hidden controls in the woods like a treasure hunt
• Adventure Trail Race offers a trail race in the woods of Theodore Wirth Park and surrounding areas
• Games, relays, ultimate frisbee, and soccer mixed in throughout the sessions

Gear: Participants will need a good pair of running shoes and water bottle for each session.

Ability Levels: When you register you can indicate the appropriate orienteering ability levels listed below.

• White Level: Beginner with no experience in orienteering
• Green Level: Beginner to intermediate orienteering skills: Participant has participated in at least one or two 6-week sessions of the Trail Kids orienteering program.
• Blue Level: Intermediate to advanced orienteering skills. Participant has participated in at least three to four 6-week orienteering sessions.
• Black Level: Advanced orienteering skills with two plus years of orienteering experience and a desire to be challenged and compete at local MNOC meet events.

Swag: Trail Kids T-shirt and water bottle for all participants available at no additional cost. In an effort to reduce waste, TK Swag is now listed as an optional “add-on” during your registration. If you’d like your participant to receive this swag please ensure it is selected.

Friend Requests: For safety and equity reasons, Trail Kids does not offer friend requests as part of registration. The mass quantity of friend requests made it impossible to accommodate them all and greatly impacted safety and group dynamics. We would love to allow everyone to practice with their friends, but if we cannot accommodate all friend requests, we cannot offer them to everyone. We encourage riders to embrace the opportunity to form new friendships through our programs!

Adventure Trail Race: Participants will get a chance to partake in one of the adventure trail races that are offered as part of our Trail Kids program. There will be one race scheduled for each of the three sessions scheduled during a normally scheduled practice. Participants will race with their teams at different start times throughout the evening and continue practicing with their team before and after their race wave.

Weather Cancellations: While Trail Kids embraces the belief that the outdoors can be enjoyed in any weather, there are some weather circumstances, including high temperatures, thunderstorms, etc. that can create unsafe or wildly unpleasant experiences for our coaches and participants. We will occasionally cancel or shorten practices due to extreme weather. We make weather calls the day of, 90 minutes before the start of practice. We will contact you via email and/or Team App about adjustments to practices; please do not ask in advance. Assume practice is always running unless you have received an email or a Team App notification otherwise (be sure that you can receive Team App notifications and do not unsubscribe from RunSignUp). Due to the lack of adequate indoor space and additional programs utilizing it already, Trail Kids is unable to shift practices inside the Trailhead on days where we have inclement weather. In instances where practice is canceled due to inclement weather, we do not offer refunds or make up practices.