The highly successful UK Junior XC program vs. USA's nonexistantJunior XC program. Why?

Before we can host Junior Nationals with 70 plus participants we need to start producing the pilots needed to accomplish this feat. Soaring was not pioneered by a bunch of old men flying expensive super gliders, in many instances the early pioneers were barely more than schoolboys, in small groups resourceful enough to further their ambitions on a shoestring budget.

Build it and they will come. The Australian Junior Nationals started over a decade ago with a handful, and this year there was 31 juniors racing (with a third of the population of the UK).
A big part of the event is experienced senior pilots who bring along two-seaters and teach presolo up to early XC junior pilots how to race alongside the juniors. Dozens of juniors come just for the training, and the next year they come back to race.