2022 VIC Junior XC Championships
Published Mon 18 Jul 2022
The racing season has well and truly kicked off with the Victorian Junior XC Championships held over the July 16-17 weekend at Falls Creek. The predicted adverse weather luckily did not hinder the racing and organisers were able to hold a successful event despite the considerable snowfall.
The skate sprint was the first event and took place on the Saturday. Maddie Hooker took the victory in the open junior women's final, and Rosie Franzke won the U16 women final. In the men’s finals the Spring brothers dominated the day with Jayden Spring taking the victory in the open class and Isaac Spring taking the win in the U16 category. In U12 finals the winners were Carmen Cullen-Croke and Hamish Retchford.
Carmen Cullen-Croke about to start the Sprint Time-Trial. Photo by Andrew Croke.
Day two saw a 7km classic mass start for the open junior men and 5km classic mass start for the open junior women, and shorter distances for the younger categories. With heavy snowfall overnight and strong winds forecast the courses were brought in to the sheltered inner trails and held on shorter loops. The open junior men's event saw a long battle between U20 athletes John Mordes and Tommi Silvester, and U18 skiers Jayden Spring and Boris Stanish. In the end Jayden Spring managed to break away to claim a 6 second win over John Mordes. In the women's 5km Maddie Hooker made it back to back wins ahead of runner-up Olivia Schubert.
In the younger classes Rosie Franzke and Isaac Spring won the women's and men's U16 events, Eli Spring won the U14 men (there were no U14 women), and Bethany Franzke and Hamish Retchford won in the U12.
It was a great weekend of racing despite the considerable snow fall, with the Falls Creek groomers and race organisers putting together two fantastic courses for the juniors to race on. Next race on the calendar at Falls Ceek is the Australian Open XC Championships on the weekend of the 30th-31st of July.
