PREVIEW: Australia’s Para Cross Country Team Commit To ‘Go Hard Or Go Home’

Courtesy Australian Paralympic Team

A new chapter in Australian Winter Paralympic history will unfold in the Italian Alps from Saturday when the first of six individual biathlon and cross-country events take place at the Tesero Sports Stadium.

Never has Australia been able to field five athletes in the two Nordic disciplines.

The team of three sit-skiers Dave Miln, Matt Brumby, Lauren Parker, and vision impaired athlete Taryn Dickens and her sighted guide Lynn Maree Cullen follow 20 years on from the footsteps of James Millar at the Torino 2006 Winter Games – Australia’s first Para Nordic competitor.

Millar was joined by Dominic Monypenny in 2010 at Vancouver but there have been none since.

All five in 2026 are Winter Paralympic debutants although Parker is a veteran of two Summer Paralympics (Tokyo 2020 and Paris 2024) which netted her two gold and two silver medals in triathlon and road cycling.

But Parker arrives in Italy having only been on snow since July last year and having just two World Cup events under her belt (one in biathlon, one in cross-country) in Canada last December.

“For Summer Games I’m so confident going into the races but here I’m not so confident because I’m new and I’m still learning,” she said.

“Yes, I’m progressing and adapting quickly but it’s still the scariest thing I’ve done. I’m just jumping at the opportunity, making the most of it, and seeing what I can do.”

The Australians have entered all six Para Nordic events: sprint, individual and sprint pursuit in biathlon and sprint, 10km and 20km in cross-country skiing.

There are three categories in the Paralympics – sitting (for wheelchair and lower limb impairments), standing (for amputees, or lower and upper limb impairments) and vision impaired athletes.

In Para biathlon, the targets are set 10 metres back with standing and sitting athletes shooting air-rifle pellets at five targets. Vision impaired athletes wear headphones to find the targets by sound.

Joining Parker with a relatively short winter history is fellow wheelchair athlete Dave Miln, who suffered serious injuries in a snow plough collision in 2022 on a family ski holiday.

“It’s been a long road. My accident was just over three years ago, so I’m pretty excited to get out there and see what I can do,” he said.

“I’ve come from lying in a hospital bed fighting for my life to being on snow in the Italian Alps representing the green and gold.

“So there’s a sense of pride and wanting to achieve as much as I can.”

British-born Miln served in the UK Royal Marines before moving to the British Clearance Divers and then across to the Royal Australian Navy. He currently works at the Navy’s clearance diving school at HMAS Penguin in Sydney.

Another with military training is Brumby, who acquired a spinal fluid condition while working in the Royal Australian Navy, which affected his lower limbs.

He became an Ironman triathlete competing at two Para World Championships and coming desperately close to winning selection on the 2016 Rio Summer Paralympics. He represented and co-captained the Australian team at the 2018 Invictus Games.

But three years ago, he turned from triathlon to the snow and now has qualified for his first Paralympics.

“When you wear your nation’s crest on your chest it’s big,” Brumby said.

“I had a little moment the other night in the Village when I was looking around the room thinking, ‘I’m actually here’. Any negatives you’ve got or some bad times you’ve had, you just put that all aside.

“You make sure you’re in the best place mentally to go out and give it everything you’ve got because you may only get one Paralympics so make the most of it.”

A third military personnel member is Taryn Dickens, who has a degenerative eye disease which started in 2019, but four years ago found her place in Para Nordic skiing.

“It’s really exciting to be here – all the hard work to get here has been so worth it,” she said.

“A bit colder weather and better snow would be nice, but I’ve got a simple plan: go hard or go home.

“Actually having fun is another goal. I want to do well here and set the example so hopefully we can attract some new athletes to the sport.”

Cullen is her guide after coming close to being a triple Olympian. She was on the shadow team for the 1992, 1994 and 1998 Winter Olympics.

“My goal is to make sure Taryn stays upright and we get around the track without falling or getting tangled up with other people,” Cullen said.

“Simply, we want to do the best we possibly can despite the tough conditions out there because the snow in places is like porridge.

“So it will be tough but we have had these conditions in Australia – now it’s everyone else’s turn.”

Australia’s Para Nordic head coach Kaspar Wirz, who has guided Canada, South Korea and China to Winter Paralympics, said the weather would add another layer of toughness for all athletes.

“The quality of the snow is questionable because it’s been warm even before the Olympics finished because it is Spring here in Europe – that is why,” Wirz said.

“The downhills will have some slush and even at the Olympics you saw world-class skiers tumble. This can happen here again and it’s not the fault of the athletes.”

Wirz knows he has some ‘newbies’ to snow sport in his crew. But he’s also seen how quickly they have improved.

“Making the top half of the field would be a success; top 10 in a (classification) category would be awesome; and anything beyond that would be excellent,” he said.

“That would be especially good for the (Para Nordic) program in the future as you can actually build on that. But it’s not a given. Our athletes are going to have to stretch themselves.”