Although Alice was restricted to race in the under 17 girls division, the five-time junior-girls national champion was the fastest Australian woman at the recent Australian Mountain Bike Championships.

Alice flew down Eagle Mount-ain in Adelaide in a time of 2 minutes and 30 seconds, a time only beaten by two elite women’s competitors from Canada, Claire Buchar, 2min 18secs, and Leigh Douglass, 2min 26sec.

Mountain Bike Australia rules dictate that Alice cannot compete against the elite women for three more years but without many girls her own age to race, the Argenton teenager has been pitting her self against the elites at state level anyway.

The 15-year-old raced the elite women at state competitions “just for practice” last season and won every meet.

“When I turn 19 I’m allowed to go to elite . . . and I’m going to go to nationals and qualify for worlds (championships),” she said.

Alice said none of her friends at school were keen to jump on a bike with her but had plenty of respect for what she did.

“My friends always think I’m crazy because I show them pictures and they say they would never go down the hills I go down,” she said.

Alice has been racing down-hill mountain bikes since the tender age of nine, and had raced BMX at the local park in Argenton for a few years before then.

So by the time she can race the sports top women, Alice will have 10-years experience and be itching to show them who is the boss.

Then she said it’s off to compete against the best in the world in Canada and Europe, where mountain biking enjoys more popularity.