Great Boulder Resources' gold story is only just beginning with focus on Side Well and Whiteheads

Great Boulder Resources Ltd (ASX:GBR) continues to enhance its gold story at the Side Well and Whiteheads projects in Western Australia, with managing director Andrew Paterson saying the former has “all the hallmarks of a big gold system”. The company believes Side Well in the Murchison province is poised for “outstanding growth through exploration” on the back of bonanza gold grades of up to 3 metres at 34.5 g/t from 32 metres and 6 metres at 31.25 g/t from 130 metres returned earlier this year. Most recently, GBR exercised its option to acquire a 75% interest in the Side Well Gold Project in Western Australia from Zebina Minerals Pty Ltd. Under an agreement signed in July 2020, Great Boulder had a two-year option to explore Side Well before deciding to acquire a 75% interest in the project.  The company has decided to fast-track the exercise of this option 12 months ahead of schedule after the Side Well project produced “exceptional” gold grades in May.   “Ticking all the right boxes” Great Boulder managing director Andrew Paterson said with the anniversary of its Side Well agreement approaching, it made sense to exercise the option now rather than extend into the second year. “Mulga Bill is the most exciting early-stage gold project I’ve seen. It has all the hallmarks of a big gold system. “We’ve already hit high-grade intervals of up to 31 g/t, so it’s ticking all the right boxes.” In June, the company’s multi-element sampling at the Mulga Bill prospect returned copper grades of more than 1% associated with gold in parts of the veins. The mineralised veins occur within an extensive district with highly elevated levels of bismuth and molybdenum, suggesting Mulga Bill is part of a large intrusion-related vein system.                                                                        In an interview with Proactive, Paterson said: “We had Dr Scott Halley have a look at the multi-element data … about 450 drill samples there, for those who don’t know him he is arguably Australia’s foremost geochemist and he is really excited about this. “When Scott gets excited about something it's time to sit up and take notice. “His conclusion is that these multi-element pathfinders are all coincident with primary gold at depth and is indicative of an intrusive related gold system. “So that is exciting but the real meat of that is that the bismuth anomaly is really, really strong – any bismuth of say 1 parts per million or above is regarded as significantly anomalous and we’ve got bismuth of up to 121 parts per million. Paterson continued: “We think we’ve got potential here for a really big system – we are talking for comparisons of systems like say Mt Isa which has multi-million-ounce gold camps where bismuth is their exploration pathfinder tool.” Mulga Bill phase 2 drilling  Since then, Great Boulder has kicked off phase 2 RC drilling in the central area of Mulga Bill, with plans to add definition to the western and eastern high-grade lodes defined by drilling in April, including areas where results such as 6 metres at 31.25 g/t gold and 4 metres at 26.42 g/t were intersected. The gold stock is also looking to confirm a diamond rig to drill some deeper holes at Mulga Bill in conjunction with the current program. Paterson said: “The rig and field team finished drilling at Whiteheads last week and moved straight onto the next Side Well program using the same contractor. “We’re continuing to advance both projects as quickly as possible.” White Heads Gold Project While Side Well remains a key area of focus for Great Boulder, the Whiteheads Gold Project is another exciting prospect, comprising 450 square kilometres with more than 25 kilometres of prospective strike. To date, GBR has completed 22 RC holes for 2,985 metres within and around Blue Poles, with drill holes designed to infill and extend the Blue Poles mineralisation. Drilling was completed in the third week of June, with initial assay results expected by early August. The project is surrounded by the likes of Norton Gold Fields Pty Ltd, Northern Star Ltd (ASX:NST) and neighbours Estrella Resources’ (ASX:ESR) T5 nickel sulphide discovery at Carr Boyd. At the Proactive Gold Webinar earlier this month, Paterson said Great Boulder’s focus had been on finding new targets and making new discoveries, which led the company to the Arsenal Trend – a surface gold anomaly, more than 5 kilometres long at 10ppb including the Gunners and Blue Poles prospects.