Twenty-year-old Mia Clift finished an impressive breakthrough season with a bronze medal at the Snowboard Cross World Cup Final in Mont-Sainte-Anne, Canada. Following on from World Cup silver one day earlier, also in Canada, and silver at the World Championships mixed team event in Switzerland.
A fortnight ago she had yet to win a medal at the international level, now she has three-in-a-row.
It was a strong finish from the Australian team which had three other athletes join Mia in the top 10; Adam Lambert fifth, Josie Baff sixth and Cameron Bolton ninth.
All four riders also finished the season ranked in the top 10 on the World Cup standings.
Mia won her opening round of 32 heat and was second in the quarter-final to advance to the semi-final which also included Josie.
In a close semi-final Mia crossed the line in second, one place ahead of Josie, to advance to the big-final and relegated Josie to the consolation small-final.
Mia was joined in the big-final by Sina Siegenthaler of Switzerland and French riders Lea Casta and Julia Pereira de Sousa. Casta, who secured the World Cup Crystal Globe the previous day, led from start to finish to make it back-to-back victories. Siegenthaler passed Mia just before the finish line to finish second and Mia was third.
Photo credit: Miha Matavz
In the men’s event Adam won the men’s small-final to finish fifth and Josie was second in her small-final to finish sixth overall.
“The big final was a lot of fun with all the girls,” Mia from Melbourne said.
“A lot of training, a lot of hard work and snowboarding at home in Australia coming up.”
Other Australian results included Cameron Bolton in ninth, James Johnstone 40th and Declan Dent 42nd.
Josie was the highest ranked Australian in fourth at season’s end, while Mia landed eighth. In the men’s final rankings Adam finished a career-best sixth and Cameron was ninth.
