It was a short but sweet Aussie winter for Alpine Snowboard and Snowboard Cross riders, with record numbers flocking to key events across the domestic season.

New South Wales Institute of Sport (NSWIS) athletes – Olympic gold medallist Josie Baff and Junior World Champion Cameron Turner – continued their 2025-26 successes in the Southern Hemisphere winter, as rising stars and Olympians came together on the slopes.

Mt Hotham was the centre of some of the biggest action this winter when it came to snowboard events, hosting the Australia New Zealand Cup (ANC) in August.

Olympic champion Baff swept the field at the ANC Snowboard Cross competition, topping all three women’s races.

Abbey Wilson (NSWIS) finished second in all of the women’s races, while Maya Billingham (NSWIS) and Mia Clift (NSWIS) completed the podium twice and once, respectively.

Junior Snowboard Cross world champion Turner took out all three men’s races, James Johnstone (NSWIS) claimed two runner-up finishes, while Adam Lambert (NSWIS) came in third twice and Angus Young (NSWIS) once.

Young and Marcelle Davis-Cook took out the junior male and female races at Mt Hotham, part of the FIS Snowboard Cross Junior series, after the first two events in Thredbo were cancelled.

The ANC and FIS Juniors came off the back of another huge week at Mt Hotham, which hosted the Snowboard Cross FUTURES camp.

That event brought together 91 athletes across Snowboard Cross and Ski Cross, giving developing talent the chance to train alongside high-performance athletes and coaches.

Rising stars were then able to test themselves in race mode, competing alongside leading Snowboard Cross riders.

In the Alpine Snowboard realm, Thredbo hosted the largest-ever FUTURES event in that discipline in August.

Aimed at introducing athletes to snowboard alpine racing, the program exposed riders to a day of high-performance training alongside National Team athletes on a Parallel Giant Slalom (PGS) course.

National Team members Millie Bongiorno and Harvey Edmannson also participated in a panel discussion as part of the event, along with former Portugal World Cup Alpine Snowboard rider Christian de Oliveira.

The camp was followed by a PGS race, attracting more than 70 snowboarders across youth, open and masters age groups, and giving riders a chance to test themselves against international level competitors including Lambert and Germany’s Jana Fischer.

More of Australia’s next generation riders were on display in the Interschools snowsport championships at Thredbo.

Snowy Mountains Grammar School swept the female Giant Slalom and Snowboard Cross Division 1, with Gracie Byron topping the individual female events and Byron, Abbie Matterson and Tahlia Frost winning the team event.

The Scots College took top honours in the male races, Thomas Beck taking out the individual and the school winning the team event, along with Angus Folsom and Robert Beck.

Alexander Frost from Snowy Mountains Grammar School won the individual GS, while Thomas Beck, Robert Beck and Folsom won the team event.

Australia’s snowboarders will now turn their focus to the Northern Hemisphere season, kicking off in November.