Bellingham and Jezersek take out titles

Matt Bartolo
olympics.com.au

PyeongChang 2018 hopefuls Phil Bellingham and Barbara Jezersek have claimed the overall Australian-New Zealand Cup titles after the final events over the weekend. 

Bellingham finished 6th in the 15km Classic Mass Start as Benjamin Lustgarten of the USA beat compatriot Adam Martin and Japan's Kaichi Naruse.

Fellow Australians Callum Watson and Paul Kovacs finished 8th and 9th.

Bellingham won three events in the Cup having taken out the Sprint at Perisher before winning the Sprint and 15km Freestyle at Falls Creek in August. His final places of fourth, 14th and sixth at the Snow Farm against strong fields from  the USA and Japan put him 160 points clear of runner-up Callum Watson. 

"I felt strong in the final race, unfortunately I didn't have enough to stay with the front bunch after the first lap but was happy with how it ended up," Bellingham said. 

"It's hard to keep good form at this time of the year when also putting in a big training block, but my distance skiing has really taken a strong step forward and I'm really happy to take the overall win in the continental cup again."

Jezersek did not finish the final event, the 10km Classic Mass Start, which was won by Jessica Diggins as the USA claimed the top five spots in the race with Caitlin Patterson and Ida Sargent rounding out the podium. However, Jezersek had already wrapped up the overall title with four wins in Australia and the silver medal in the Winter Games 5km Freestyle behind Diggins on Thursday.

Aimee Watson was Australia's best in the 10km, claiming 9th while Sarah Slattery was in 13th. Kat Paul did not race the final event, but had enough points from the other seven events to be runner-up in the series ahead of Watson.

"Already in the morning I felt totally flat, I started the race but after first lap I just couldn't do more," Jezersek said. 

"I've had two to three hard weeks now with really good training and racing and my body was ready for a break.

"I was happy to fulfil my season goal of winning the series, and I think I was racing at a really high level and that my shape is getting better each month."

The Australian Team has already returned across the Tasman where the winter is booming and good training conditions will likely hold well into October. The next major events for the team will be World Cup competitions in Switzerland and Italy in December.

2017 FIS Aus-NZ Cup final standings
Women
1) Barbara Jezersek (AUS) - 516
2) Katerina Paul (AUS) - 394
3) Aimee Watson (AUS) - 379
4) Sarah Slattery (AUS) - 294
5) Jessie Diggins (USA) - 218
6) Caitlin Patterson (USA) - 190

Men
1) Phil Bellingham (AUS) - 568
2) Callum Watson (AUS) - 408
3) Paul Kovacs (AUS) - 341
4) Ben Lustgarten (USA) - 280
5) Miles Havlick (USA) - 220
6) Kaichi Naruse (JPN) - 20