Darcie Morton is a cross country skier who was awarded a Tier 3 Scholarship within the 2021 Sport Australia Hall of Fame Scholarship and Mentoring Program.
Darcie was born in Marlo in far East Gippsland in 1999 and actually started her international sporting career as a table tennis player, representing Victoria and Australia, as well as Oceania at the 2012 World Cadet Championships in Slovenia.
At age 15, Darcie swapped her bat for a pair of narrow skis and followed her brother Damon into Cross Country Skiing and Biathlon. Just a few years later, she finished 16th at the Youth Olympic Games in Lillehammer, Norway, in Biathlon, and achieved the same result at the World Youth Junior Championships.
In 2017 and 2018, Darcie won the Australian Open Junior Female Cross Country title and was selected to represent her country at the Junior World Championships in Finland in 2019. She was also one of the first Australians to compete in the Sapporo Asian Winter Games, and overcame a bout of chronic sinusitis in order to take to the starting line.
Darcie currently splits her time between Australia and Europe, and will be based in Sweden during the 2020/2021 European winter in order to train with the world’s best and to achieve her ambition of qualifying for the World U/23 Championships for Cross Country Skiing, and the World Biathlon Championships.
Away from the snow, Darcie dreams of working in animal care and rehabilitation and is studying Medical Science at Australian National University. Once completed, she plans to complete a Postgraduate Doctorate of Veterinarian Medicine at Melbourne University.
“I am extremely grateful to have been welcomed into SAHOF as a successful Scholarship recipient as it provides me with encouragement and belief to continue my relentless pursuit to be the best athlete and person possible. A belief that I am part of a greater legacy, which is the SAHOF and collectively we represent the spirit and essence of being a hard-working, Australian athletes. This Scholarship will directly support me with the costs of traveling overseas to race internationally, providing me the opportunity to gain qualification points towards Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics.” – Darcie Morton on being selected as a 2021 Tier 3 Scholarship Holder.
Awards, Honours & Achievements
- 2018 & 2017: Australian Open Junior Female – 1
- 2018 & 2017: Australian Birkebeiner 21km, Falls Creek – 1 (XC Skiing)
- 2019: World Junior Cross-Country Championships, Finland – 76th 5km skate & 62nd 15km mass start classic
- 2021: Sport Australia Hall of Fame Scholarship Holder – Tier 3
Bio picture credit: Adrian Blake
