Fordham and De Campo winners as Cross Country Skiing ANC series begins

Seve de Campo and Rosie Fordham took out top honours in the opening round of the 2025 Australian Open Cross Country Ski Championships, held over the weekend at Perisher.

Part of the 2025 Australia New Zealand Continental Cup series (ANC), the event attracted a host of Australia’s top World Cup competitors fresh from the 2024/25 season, setting the stage for high-calibre racing across sprint and distance formats. 

Returning from the University of Alaska Fairbanks, where she trains and competes, Fordham relished the rare opportunity to race at home in front of family… and she didn’t disappoint. In the 15km classic, Fordham stormed to gold ahead of Satara Moon and Maddie Hooker, backed by a dominant win in Friday’s sprint, beating Isabella Moon into second, with Hooker who was third.

Women's 15km Classic Podium

Speaking after Friday's Sprint, Fordham complimented Moon on the close competition. 

"We played a bit of cat and mouse at the top of the hill trying not to lead because you get a nice draft but I'm happy to have been able to sprint away with it because I know Izzy's really quick and I definitely don't have as much sprinting in me so, very happy to be able to pull through just on the finish stretch," Fordham said.  

“If you win the ANC and the Continental Cup you get a start at every World Cup and obviously in an Olympic year it's important to be racing World Cup just for experience and also for qualification so it really helps to be able to have a solid position knowing that hopefully at the end of this series I'll be able to rest every World Cup next season,” she said.

De Campo showed similar grit in the men’s 15km classic, charging through the Perisher course to secure the win over seasoned contender Phil Bellingham, while Bentley Walker-Broose claimed third. The men’s sprint saw Jayden Spring step up with a decisive performance, finishing ahead of Bellingham who was second and a third placed Vincent De Souza.

Spring said the result was 'unexpected'.

"I have been focusing a bit more on my distant skiing the past six months and yeah no it was really really nice to come away with the sprint victory after having not worked on it so much recently but the distance helps you know it meant I could recover, recover and recover and so by the final everything was still relatively intact so it was really nice," Spring said. 

Men's 15km Classic Podium

Click here to view the full results.