Taking out the Runners of the Week silver medal is Allup Silica which recorded a share price hike of more than 333 per cent – an increase that would often secure a clear gold medal in any other week.

The company’s stock leapt from a previous close of 3c to touch 13c during intraday trading today on the back of a pair of significant announcements over its silica sands operations in both the north and south of Western Australia.

A sampling program at the explorer’s Cabbage Spot project near Wyndham in WA’s Kimberley region has highlighted several areas of high-grade silica sands with 43 surface samples returning grades of more than 98 per cent silicon oxide at an average grade of 98.6 per cent.

Peak assays from the samples returned an outstanding 99.4 per cent silicon oxide.

The company also recorded exceptional results from bulk sample testwork on product from its Sparkler silica sands project in WA’s Great Southern region, which hosts a JORC-compliant mineral resource of 70 million tonnes at 96.84 per cent silicon dioxide.

Testing completed by CDE Global showed the project’s silicon dioxide was beneficiated to 99.84 per cent without magnetic separation, allowing it to enter into the lucrative solar panel and high-end ceramic markets in addition to some other high-tech manufacturing industries.

Making its way onto Australia’s Critical Minerals list in 2022, high-purity silica is an essential raw material in glass manufacturing, building construction, ceramics and oil and gas exploration, with increasing demand in the electronic renewable energy sectors driven by its use in semiconductors and solar panels.

More than 30 million Allup shares changed hands following the two latest announcements which represents the highest trading day for the company in more than 12 months.

Claiming the bronze medal on today’s Runners of the Week is Many Peaks Minerals, which just missed out on second place with a stock price hike of just over 300 per cent. Shares in the company leapt from a previous close of 7.3c to touch 29.5c on Tuesday after it announced a deal to acquire a 100 per cent interest in a joint venture (JV) operating with four mineral permits in the West African nation of Cote d’Ivoire.

The deal involves Many Peaks entering into a binding share sale agreement with Turaco Gold to acquire its 89 per cent interest in CDI Holdings. Predictive Discovery holds the remining 11 per cent of CDI. Under the terms of the agreement, Many Peaks will also pick up Predictive’s 11 per cent stake in CDI.

The acquisition will include the Ferke gold project, that hosts the recent Ouarigue South discovery with open mineralisation ready for follow-up exploration, in addition to the Odienne project immediately along strike from new gold discoveries in Cote d’Ivoire.

Recent diamond drilling at Ferke delivered some mouth-watering results with a 77.6m intercept grading 2.33 grams per tonne gold from 45.9m including 35.95m at 3.88g/t gold. Historical trenching at the operation also delivered impressive figures from surface such as 34m at 5.29g/t gold.

First-pass air-core (AC) drilling at Odienne also returned solid assays including 12m grading 1.18g/t gold from just 4m and 12m going 1.06g/t gold from 16m.

The permits cover a 1275 square kilometre land package that includes recent gold discoveries made courtesy of a US$4 million (AU$6.12 million) prior exploration spend.

With gold maintaining a healthy market price that is hovering around the $3300 per ounce mark, the market will be keeping a close eye on what Many Peaks can unearth at its new holdings when it kicks off drilling in the coming months.

But for now, all eyes this week have been on the Olympic efforts of Osteopore who delivered its shareholders that elusive ten-bagger result.

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