The depth of Australian Snowboard Cross continued to shine on the weekend as Adam Lambert won his first World Cup medal of the season, and Australian firsts were set at the Cross-Country Skiing World Championships.
Snowboard Cross: Silver for Lambert and fourth for Bolton in Georgia
Adam Lambert has achieved his first podium performance of the season in Georgia, finishing second on the first day of competition, giving the 27-year-old from Jindabyne in the NSW Snowy Mountains the fourth World Cup podium of his career.
Adam qualified 15th for finals on the Gudauri course and went on to have a sensational day of head-to-head racing, winning his round of 32, quarter-final and semi-final to advance through to the top four big final medal round.
In the big-final, Adam was moving between second and third place for much of the race and was fortunately ahead of a crash on the final feature involving Eliot Grondin of Canada and Elias Leitner of Austria, leaving him in second place behind winner Jakob Dusek of Austria.
Photo Credit: FIS Snowboard
“The men’s big final is always really competitive, I have had a few in my time, I would like to have more, but it’s always fun to race all day and not go out in the early rounds, so I am stoked,” Adam said.
In the women’s event, French riders took out the top two places, with Julia Pereira de Sousa in first, Lea Casta second and Italian Michela Moioli in third.
Three-time Olympian Belle Brockhoff was in strong form qualifying in third place and made it through to the small-final. Unfortunately, Belle suffered a crash and was taken away by the medical services team on course, ultimately finishing in eighth place.
World number three Josie Baff also crashed in the first round of finals finishing ninth and suffering some bruising. NSWIS teammates Mia Clift were 10th and Amber Essex 26th.
On day two triple-Olympian Cameron Bolton was unlucky not to claim a podium spot, finishing fourth in a closely contested men’s big final.
The NSWIS rider advanced through the rounds of 64, 32 and quarter-finals to reach the semi-final round, where he had an impressive race to advance in first to the big final medal round against Julien Tomas of France, Austrian Lukas Pachner and another Frenchman Loan Bozzolo.
In the big final, Cameron had the early lead but was passed by Pachner and then Tomas, and then with the pack close, Cameron and Bozzolo both went down near the end of the course. Tomas went on to win, Pachner was second and Bozzolo recovered from the crash to cross the line in third leaving Bolton in fourth and uninjured.
In the women’s event, NSWIS World Championship medallist Josie Baff did not compete on day two, choosing to recover after her crash on the previous day, Mia Clift made it back-to-back top-10’s and Amber Essex was 19th.
The next World Cup is a double event in Montafon, Austria, on the 21st and 22nd of March.
Cross-Country Skiing: Best-ever individual and team event results for Australia in Norway
It’s been a highly successful World Championships for the Australian Cross-Country Skiing Team in Trondheim, Norway, where they skied to best-ever individual and team result performances at the World Championship level.
Competing in front of fanatical Norwegian crowds of up to 100,000 spectators, Rosie Fordham claimed a 20th place finish in the women’s 50km mass start free, the best-ever finish in an individual distance.
Rosie was also a member of the women’s team sprint alongside Ellen Soehol Lie finishing 15th, the first time an Australian team has made a championship final.
The women’s 4x7.5km relay team featuring Rosie, Ellen, Tuva Bygrave and Phoebe Cridland placed 12th, the best World Championship relay result for an Australian team.
In the men’s event, the individual highlight was Lars Young Vik finishing 33rd in the men’s sprint, just missing the finals (top 30) by 0.21 of a second. No Australian has ever made the sprint finals at the World Championships.
The men's relay team also finished 20th in team sprint and the 4x7.5km relay.
Monobob: Top-10 for Walker at World Championships
Beijing 2022 Olympian Bree Walker battled illness to finish top-10 at the Monobob World Championships in Lake Placid, NY, USA.
Competing in the four-run combined time major championship format over two days, the QAS bobsleigh pilot was 11th fastest in run one, seventh in run two, 10th in run three and ninth in the final run to finish in a total time of 3:59.58.
“Certainly not the race I had prepared or planned for all season," Bree said.
“I got extremely sick with a viral infection a day or so out from the race. I thought I would be able to still challenge for what I worked so hard for, but my starts were unfortunately so weak which left me on the back foot from the get-go!
“I gave it everything I had and that’s all I could do with the cards I was dealt! Heartbroken but it is what it is.”
Walker still holds the track record for Lake Placid set 12 months ago, with no athletes able to improve on the time which saw changing weather conditions throughout the two days of competition.
She will now focus on the two-woman Bobsleigh World Championship event in Lake Placid alongside brakewoman Kiara Reddingius on the 15th and 16th of March.
Others in action in Lake Placid competing for Australia included Olympian Nick Timmings 20th in the men’s skeleton event. In the two-man bobsleigh, Rhys Peters and Benjamin Frost were 27th & Cam Scott and Patrick Castelli 28th.
