Foto: Victoria’s geologists Ryan Bresnahan, Derek Unger, Dr. Raul Madrid, and Dr. Marcus K. Johnston, explaining structural components of the Battle Mountain and Carlin gold belts, on the morning of Sept. 22nd, on the way to Barrick’s Pipeline mine.

Behind Victoria Resource Corp’s (VIT.V) recent core hole NW-5 at the Cove-McCoy project

By Dirk Masuch Oesterreich

I wanted to write this for months. I had Victoria Resource Corp. on my mind ever since I came back from the Geological Society of Nevada’s fall field trip in September. Now events passed me by, and what events they were.

Yesterday, Victoria Resource Corp. announced gold assays from core hole NW-5 at the Cove-McCoy property in north-central Nevada that were just outstanding. They intercepted a composite interval of 61.9 m (203 ft) of 12.57 g/t (0.367 oz/ton) including 13.9 m (45.5 ft) of 37.21 g/t (1.087 oz/ton) gold. It’s share price almost doubled on the news. It has come down somewhat since. True thickness has not been reported yet, though, and is likely to come down. Congratulations to a team of dedicated geoscientists!

I became aware of Victoria Resource Corp. during the GSN fall field trip in September. Eight out of ten of Victoria’s geologists participated in the field trip. Marcus Johnston, Senior Geologist at Victoria Resource Corp., was behind almost every aspect of the field trip. Marcus functioned as coordinator, editor of the geological guide book, and as a field instructor. Field explanations were also given by Dr. Raul Madrid, Vice President of Exploration, and Dr. Mike Ressel, Senior Geologist. They were assisted by geologists Scott Briscoe, Derek Unger, Ryan Bresnahan, Tomas Correa, and Ken Coleman, who diligently took field notes in the gold mines we visited (“spying”, as I heard someone say…. well, we all were spies these days…). Victoria even sponsored the drinks rather than dinner at Elko’s Western Folklife Center on saturday night, which, I guess, may have reflected their preferences.

The discovery at Cove-McCoy did not come like a rabbit out of a hat. In January this year, Victoria reported high grade intercepts at Cove-McCoy which kept their share price soaring during the spring. These results were followed up by another, less spectacular intercept announced in may. These initial phase-I drillings were designed to test the geometry of a structural intersection projected at depths sufficient to intercept the silty limestones of the Favret Formation, which is considered to be a very good host for Carlin-type gold mineralization in this area. Victoria drilled a total of four holes (NW-1 – IV) to test structural intersections and the geometry of a potential orebody. In other words, they were refining their structural model and narrowing down on potentially more successful drill targets. Drill hole NW-5 is the first of a series of phase-II drillings and hit the bullseye right away. It is now clear that Victoria has a potential tiger by the tail.

How did it come to this? The secret behind Victoria’s success is people. Victoria’s geologists have been working diligently on this project and others in Nevada for years and have a profound understanding of how structural controls and Eocene magmatic activity interrelate in the formation of Nevada’s Carlin-type gold deposits. They even made their knowledge available to the public by several scientific publications. Take Marcus Johnston’s 353 pp. PhD-thesis as an example:

Johnston, M. K. (2003): Geology of the Cove Mine, Lander County, Nevada, and a genetic model for the Cove-McCoy magmatic hydrothermal system.- PhD. Dissertation, University of Nevada, Reno, 353 pp.

Right. This is the same Cove mine close to Victoria’s Cove-McCoy property. Small wonder they knew where to look for gold in this area and where to find it.

Other important articles written by members of Victoria’s exploration team include:

Henry, C. D. & Ressel, M. W. (2000): Eocene magmatism of northeastern Nevada: The smoking gun for Carlin-type gold deposits.- in: Geology and Ore Deposits 2000: The Great Basin and beyond. Geological Society of Nevada Proceedings, p. 365-388.

Johnston, M. K. & Ressel, M. W. (2004): Controversies on the Origin of World-Class Gold Deposits, Part I: Carlin-Type Gold Deposits in Nevada.- Society of Economic Geologists Newsletter, v. 59, p.1, pp. 11-18.

Ressel, M. W. & Henry, C. D. (2006): Igneous Geology of the Carlin Trend, Nevada: Development of the Eocene Plutonic Complex and Significance for Carlin-Type Gold Deposits.- Economic Geology, v. 101, pp. 347-383.

And finally, Mike’s PhD dissertation:

Ressel, M. W. (2005): Igneous Geology of the Carlin Trend, Nevada: The Importance of Eocene Magmatism in Gold Mineralization.- University Of Nevada, Reno, 276 pp.

The real secret weapon in Victoria’s pool of highly qualified exploration geologists, however, is Dr. Raul Madrid and the wealth of experience he brings to the company.

Raul Madrid worked with Dr. Ralph Roberts for 18 years. During this period they refined the criteria for defining gold belts in the western United States, gold belts that go beyond what is usually referred to as gold bearing trends in the Great Basin. As an example, see the map of gold belts on the start page of Victoria Resource’s website. Besides the established gold trends (Battle Mountain-Cortez, Carlin, Getchell, Walker Lane, Independence, Round Mountain – Northumberland) there are several other gold belts that extend into Utah. Note the northwest-southeast alignment of most of the gold belts.

Dr. Raul Madrid is applying structural analytical methods leading to refined predictive methods in gold exploration. Raul sees the need for future exploration in Nevada in deeper exploratory efforts than today which could open a potential for about 1.5 billion ounces in the gold belts in the western US (that’s right, that’s billion with a “b”). In fact he compares the potential in Nevada and Utah to South Africa’s Witwatersrand.

It is that vision that separates Victoria’s approach to gold exploration from most of their peers. The success at Cove-McCoy impressively proves that they are on the right path.

A good starting point for your own due diligence on Victoria Resource Corp. is their website which is a bit of a showoff for whoever coded it. On the other hand, it’s refreshing to see a design that does not use the same design template that 90 % of all the other junior companies seem to be using. It is certainly among the better and most informative sites in this sector.

If you are interested in a Google Earth kmz-file to see the exact location of the drill site I'll be happy to email it to you. Please contact me at [email protected].

Nevada Gold Investor

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