Australia’s Inaugural SkiMo Event a Success

World Cup athletes Phillip Bellingham and Ava McCann have won the first ever Ski Mountaineering event to be held in Australia, the Falls Creek SkiMo Challenge on Sunday August 24. 

Ski Mountaineering, or SkiMo, is set to make its Olympic debut at Milan-Cortina 2026. The race at Falls Creek took place in the Sun Valley area above the Dicky Knees cafe.

Though the field size was small, the SkiMo Challenge included three of Australia's World Cup athletes from last season - Bellingham, McCann and Daniel Trevena who finished 2nd overall and first in the Masters category (over 40).

Bellingham made it back-to-back wins for the weekend, having claimed victory in the 42km Kangaroo Hoppet the previous day, and was all smiles after his first SkiMo event on home snow.

"Pretty exciting stuff, happy to have a race today and see the event unfold. I was a little bit dusty [after the Hoppet the day before], my legs weren't feeling super fresh, but I got them going again and felt alright in the end".

The weekend event combination was fitting for Bellingham, as he aims to represent Australia in both sports at the 2026 OWG in Milano-Cortina.

McCann also had weary legs after a hard-fought 7th place in the Hoppet, but was particularly impressive in the transitions and managed to take third place overall behind Trevena. 

“I think it was really special to be part of it, I have been telling lots of my friends in Cross Country and Biathlon to give SkiMo a go, but I think it’s definitely a growing sport and I’m excited for people to give it a go in Australia.” 

“Especially because I am the only youth athlete from Australia in the SkiMo youth World Cup at the moment, so it would be really good to see so many people trying it out because I think it’s a super cool sport.”

Snow Australia SkiMo Chair Brian Lichi was Chief of Race for the event, and together with the Falls Creek Events team designed what was described by the leading athletes as a "world class course".

"The course ended up being a bit of a hybrid between a Sprint and a Mixed Relay," said Lichi, who has raced World Cup in Europe the past two seasons. "The event had all the features of a Sprint event, including three transitions and a boot pack on each lap, but with an extended uphill and giant slalom so that it was around 6-7 minutes per loop for the leading skiers." Sprint and Mixed Relay are the two SkiMo events to be contested at the Winter Olympics.

Competitors completed the course twice, with Bellingham's winning time of 11 minutes and 46 seconds a lot quicker than the organisers anticipated. McCann completed the course in 13:20. The field was rounded out by a number of "citizen" competitors competing in a SkiMo event for the first time.

"I'm super proud of this first ever event, it was great to have elite athletes and first-timers competing together on the same course." said Lichi.  "Our challenge now is to grow the sport. The Olympic exposure in 2026 will hopefully inspire future generations to take up the sport."

Bellingham is in prime position to be selected in the SkiMo event for Milano-Cortina after being the dominant male athlete from the Oceania region on World Cup last season. McCann, Australia's only athlete on SkiMo Youth World Cup last season, is currently in third place in the Oceania women's rankings, with one more selection World Cup to be held in Solitude in the USA in December.

The next Australian SkiMo races are scheduled for Perisher on September 20-21. More information is available in the SkiMo section of the Snow Australia website. https://www.snow.org.au/disciplines/skimo-events/