Zak Vinter continued his extremely impressive run of form in his early season race results at the Australian National Junior Championship Giant Slalom in Thredbo in finishing a creditable 18th overall. More importantly, the Glasgow Ski Racing racer scored a career best to date result of ... 71 FIS points. The race was won by Luke Laidlow from Australia who managed to overhaul the first run leader Ross Peraudo and took the win by the narrowest of margins, 0.01 seconds to score a 19 point result.
Vinter used the perfect conditions to great benefit as he took on board the advice given to him by his coach in the start. Edwards explained after the race that "Zak took advantage of great conditions, pushing all the way on a course that had greater turns than yesterday. With nothing to lose and the advice I gave him, he just went for it. Skied solid and smart."
While Vinter produced a promising result, third place in the race went to a young Austrian, another 1998 year of birth: Thomas Dorner, who scored a 35 point result in only his fourth FIS race.Â
Frazer Middleton hip checked on both runs and had to be content with a 118 point result, better things will come for the youngster from Glasgow in the future. Ben Fluck also competed in the race finishing one place behind Middleton in 29th.
The Australian Championships move to Perisher for the Slalom races. The Slalom hill in Perisher is where the EDEP training group have their training base and Edwards is hoping for big things for his group that include the number one Australian Slalom skier, Ross Peraudo.
No British women took part in the Women's race.
Full results
Men
Women
Picture: Zak Vinter competing at the Anglo Scottish / BSA Grand Prix in January 2014. Picture Racer Ready - all rights reserved