Hillwalking in Ireland has seen a growth in popularity as an adventure and tourism activity over many decades. In recent years, more and more people have discovered the recreational opportunities available in the Irish upland areas. For many participants, hillwalking is all about exploring Ireland's great outdoors, improving / maintaining physical fitness and mental wellbeing, and meeting up with other like-minded people. More experienced hillwalkers embrace the various challenges on offer. Some participants have long regarded hillwalking as a sport. However, unlike every other sport in Ireland, hillwalking was lacking its own national or All-Ireland competition. The absence of such competition prevented hillwalking from being classed as a true sport.
This changed in 2016 when Sport Hillwalking officially became a true sport through the introduction of the first-ever All-Ireland hillwalking sports competition: the All-Ireland Highpointeering Individuals League. This ground-breaking points-based competition was delivered by High Point Ireland and has been run every year since. In 2017, we introduced the Clubs, Counties and Provinces Highpointeering Leagues. In 2020, we created the All-Ireland Mountain Race for experienced challenge hillwalkers wishing to introduce a time-based person-versus-person competitive element. In 2020, the Highpointeering Leagues and the Mountain Race ran in parallel as two separate competitions between the Spring Equinox and Autumn Equinox each year. At the end of the season, the combined results of these two competitions allowed us to identify the individual and team champions in the first-ever All-Ireland Hillwalking Championships: the ultimate achievement in Irish sport hillwalking.
In 2021, due to a lack of interest, we decided to permanently cancel the Mountain Race as a hillwalking initiative. When we first came up with the idea for a time-based hillwalking competition, we knew there was a strong possibility that it would be unsuccessful. The timed race format is probably more akin to the mountain running community, making it a difficult concept for hillwalkers to get behind. Nonetheless, testing the race format in 2020 was a worthwhile research exercise in finding out what competitive Sport Hillwalkers' goals are and how far they are willing to go to achieve those goals. It also gave us an opportunity to develop a full set of 24 anytime mountain challenges which we will continue to promote as hillwalking initiatives over on The Ireland Walking Guide website. The new single-track competitive format starts on 1st March 2022.
Our All-Ireland Sports Competitions are the first-ever national hillwalking competitions to be hosted anywhere in the world. As such, they provide an evolving template for other countries to replicate. In time, if other countries choose to follow our example, we could even look at the possibility of setting up the first-ever Hillwalking World Championships.
On 10th May 2021, High Point Ireland became the All-Ireland governing body for Sport Hillwalking. As such, High Point Ireland delivers all official hillwalking competitions at national level across the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland. Other matters related to the activity of hillwalking outside of sport hillwalking (the primary one being insurance provision) remain within the remit of Mountaineering Ireland and the Ulster Federation of Rambling Clubs.
Starting from 18th June 2022, Sport Hillwalking will be officially celebrated in Ireland on a dedicated day called Sport Hillwalking Day. This will occur each year on the longest Saturday (i.e. the Saturday closest to the Summer Solstice as part of Mountains & High Points Week).
We invited Mountaineering Ireland to get involved in our All-Ireland sport hillwalking competitions on numerous occasions between 2016 and 2020. Despite introducing the necessary competitive element to justify hillwalking as a true sport, they declined our invitations. As a result of Mountaineering Ireland's clear decision not to develop or promote hillwalking as a competitive sport, High Point Ireland is now leading the development, delivery and promotion of Sport Hillwalking as its official All-Ireland governing body.
This changed in 2016 when Sport Hillwalking officially became a true sport through the introduction of the first-ever All-Ireland hillwalking sports competition: the All-Ireland Highpointeering Individuals League. This ground-breaking points-based competition was delivered by High Point Ireland and has been run every year since. In 2017, we introduced the Clubs, Counties and Provinces Highpointeering Leagues. In 2020, we created the All-Ireland Mountain Race for experienced challenge hillwalkers wishing to introduce a time-based person-versus-person competitive element. In 2020, the Highpointeering Leagues and the Mountain Race ran in parallel as two separate competitions between the Spring Equinox and Autumn Equinox each year. At the end of the season, the combined results of these two competitions allowed us to identify the individual and team champions in the first-ever All-Ireland Hillwalking Championships: the ultimate achievement in Irish sport hillwalking.
In 2021, due to a lack of interest, we decided to permanently cancel the Mountain Race as a hillwalking initiative. When we first came up with the idea for a time-based hillwalking competition, we knew there was a strong possibility that it would be unsuccessful. The timed race format is probably more akin to the mountain running community, making it a difficult concept for hillwalkers to get behind. Nonetheless, testing the race format in 2020 was a worthwhile research exercise in finding out what competitive Sport Hillwalkers' goals are and how far they are willing to go to achieve those goals. It also gave us an opportunity to develop a full set of 24 anytime mountain challenges which we will continue to promote as hillwalking initiatives over on The Ireland Walking Guide website. The new single-track competitive format starts on 1st March 2022.
Our All-Ireland Sports Competitions are the first-ever national hillwalking competitions to be hosted anywhere in the world. As such, they provide an evolving template for other countries to replicate. In time, if other countries choose to follow our example, we could even look at the possibility of setting up the first-ever Hillwalking World Championships.
On 10th May 2021, High Point Ireland became the All-Ireland governing body for Sport Hillwalking. As such, High Point Ireland delivers all official hillwalking competitions at national level across the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland. Other matters related to the activity of hillwalking outside of sport hillwalking (the primary one being insurance provision) remain within the remit of Mountaineering Ireland and the Ulster Federation of Rambling Clubs.
Starting from 18th June 2022, Sport Hillwalking will be officially celebrated in Ireland on a dedicated day called Sport Hillwalking Day. This will occur each year on the longest Saturday (i.e. the Saturday closest to the Summer Solstice as part of Mountains & High Points Week).
We invited Mountaineering Ireland to get involved in our All-Ireland sport hillwalking competitions on numerous occasions between 2016 and 2020. Despite introducing the necessary competitive element to justify hillwalking as a true sport, they declined our invitations. As a result of Mountaineering Ireland's clear decision not to develop or promote hillwalking as a competitive sport, High Point Ireland is now leading the development, delivery and promotion of Sport Hillwalking as its official All-Ireland governing body.
All-Ireland sports competitions
