Simone Niggli Luder began competing in orienteering early on, joining the Swiss club OLV Hindelbank; at the age of ten, she participated in her first competition. Since then, her palmarès has been impressive: she won a gold medal at the junior world championships in 1997, has been 20 times Swiss champion, won the Finnish championships once and the Swedish championships nine times, has won the world cup five times, and won seven gold medals at European championships and a total of 23 gold medals at world championships.