LAPPE – A year ago, Thunder Bay’s Max Hollmann earned a spot on Canada’s U23 Nordic Team and won gold the world championships in Slovenia as part of the country’s mixed relay team.
This week, he ensured he’ll have the chance to do it all over again.
Hollmann was the fastest skier on the course at Lappe Nordic, capturing the overall title in the 10-kilometre interval start free technique race at the 2025 Noridq Canada selection trials. On Friday Hollmann was fourth in the 20-kilometre mass start classic, but was the top U23 finisher, ensuring he’ll be part of Team Canada next month at the U23 world championships in Italy.
Sunday’s overall win was a bonus, he said.
“It was a great day,” said Hollmann, the former Lakehead University star who now races for the Alberta World Cup Academy team.
“It was very typical Thunder Bay January weather, -20 C for most of the night. Luckily we got just above that because the race cutoff is 20 (below). But I like it. I grew up here. I’m used to the cold.”
Hollmann, the third-to-last skier on the five-kilometre course, was clearly the fastest skier on the day, the only racer to post a sub -11-minute time on the first lap, at 10:51.1, and also recorded the fastest second lap, completing it in 11:12.6 for a 22.03.7 final time, 21.7 seconds ahead of second-place finisher Tom Stephen of Foothills Nordic.
Derek Dueling of Whitehorse Nordic was third, crossing the finish line in 22.43.7 and Jonas Rolseth, Hollmann’s teammate on the Alberta World Cup Academy squad, was fifth overall and claimed Team Canada’s U20 spot up for grabs in the race.
Hollmann said it helped knowing the course so intimately, having grown up skiing it as a member of Big Thunder Nordic.
“Especially today, with it being so cold and firm. I’ve raced this for 18 years. I know every curve, every hill, every bump,” he said.
Hollmann is aiming for gold again in Italy.
“Hopefully we can do it again. Maybe two medals. But we’ll see what the season has in store,” said Hollman, who one day hopes to represent his country at the Winter Olympic Games.
In the women’s race, Alison Mackie, who qualified for Italy on Thursday in the sprint races, took top spot again in the 10-kilometre race, finishing in 25:56.5 to edge Whitehorse Nordic’s Sonjaa Schmidt, whose second-place finisher earned her the U23 spot at the World Junior/U23 championships next month. Olivia Bourffard-Nesbitt, another AWCA skier, took third.
It was Mackie’s third gold medal of the week.
Thunder Bay’s Clara Hegan has yet to finish on the podium this week, but punched her ticket to Italy in the U20 category, with a pair of fourth-place finishes, crossing the line on Sunday 1:43.1 behind Mackie, about half a minute ahead of Yukon’s Aramintha Bradford, the next fastest in the U20 category. A fourth-place result in Friday’s 20-kilometre race had already earned her a berth overseas.
Racing wraps up on Monday with the free technique sprints.
