A local ski cross racer has returned from Europe after claiming fourth-place in the first ever Winter Youth Olympic Games in Austria.

Hosted in Innsbruck, India Sherret, a 15-year-old ski-cross racer, claimed fourth place in the qualification round, which ended up turning into final results as the medal round was canceled due to inclement weather.

So it was Sherret's run of 1:00.21 on Jan. 19th that stood as her final ranking in the Ski-Cross event, which featured 12 racers in her age group from around the world.

Ski Cross pits four racers together on a specially designed course featuring jumps and rollers as each racer jockeys for the first-place position, however, the qualification round was a timed event.

As far as the results stand, she's happy with where she ended up, but is disappointed that the medal round wasn't able to get the go-ahead.

The International Ski Federation (FIS), which oversaw the skiing events for the YOG, cancelled the race after snowstorm buried the racecourse, which officials couldn't clear to make way for the finals.

"They got about a metre of snow overnight the day before our race and there was really strong winds," said Sherret.

As far as the qualification run went, Sherret said the course was a little slow, which made it feel like a Super-G racing event.

"There wasn't too many turns, just a lot of straighaways with rollers," Sherret said. "There was a lot of room for passing and I think it would have been a good race for heats, but we never got around to that."

The course was designed the way it was because a lot of the racers who participated weren't familiar with ski cross, but versed in other styles of racing such as Alpine or Super G, she added.

She had training for two days prior to the qualification run to get a feel for the course, but she said like she made a few mistakes that shaved some time off.

"Off of the one jump I didn't quite hit it right; I almost crashed actually," said Sherret. "And then there was a roller section that was kind of tricky.

"I'd been doing really well at it during training but for some reason I didn't go into it right and went into it really, really wide and lost a lot of speed."

Matty Herauf, Sherret's counterpart on the mens side, took third place with a time of 0:57.34. Herauf and Sherret train with the Alberta Ski Cross Team, coached by two-time Olympian Stanley Hayer, who was born in Kimberley.

However, looking past the racing and the ski-cross, the whole event was well worth the trip to Austria, she said.

The YOG structures itself like the Olympic Games, but focuses more on celebrating youth sports and exploring cultural diversity.

This was the first crack at the winter side of the sport, as Singapore hosted the first Summer Youth Olympic Games in 2010.

"I was actually surprised by the seriousness of it," said Sherret. "I wasn't expecting it to be so legitimate. It's actually a big deal over in Europe, it's very strongly advertised. Over here in Canada and the U.S., I don't think it was."

Opening Ceremonies kicked off on Jan. 13, but India and her parents arrived two days earlier, flying into Munich and driving down to Innsbruck.

While they were there, India stayed in the athletes village and didn't get to spend too much time with them, which was one of the things she took away from the experience.

"I got a lot of independence out of it," Sherret said. "I'll definitely remember a lot of the people I met, friends and stuff, from Canada and different countries as well.

"Who knows, maybe in a couple years I'll see some of the kids in Ski-cross again."

And she may well yet.

Sherret is gunning for a spot on Team Canada for the Ski-Cross event in the 2018 Winter Olympic Games, which will be held in Pyeongchang, South Korea.