Toronto, Ontario--(Newsfile Corp. - August 19, 2026) - Athena Gold Corporation (CSE: ATHA) (OTCQB: AHNRF) ("Athena" or the "Company") is pleased to announce a near-surface, high-grade, grassroots gold discovery at its flagship Laird Lake project ("Laird" or the "Project") in Ontario's Red Lake Gold District. Hole LL-26-006A returned 23.85 g/t Au over 5 m, from 21.0 m to 26.0 m, defining the newly named Scooby Zone.

Highlights from Maiden Drill Program – Laird Lake Project, Ontario

• Hole LL-26-006A ("Hole 6") returned a new, high-grade, near-surface discovery (Scooby Zone):
  • 23.85 g/t Au over 5 m from 21 downhole, including:
    • 62.9 g/t Au over 1 m from 21 m, and
    • 54.1 g/t Au over 1 m from 23 m.
• Scooby Zone has also been intersected in a large step out in hole LL-26-008 at a vertical depth of approximately 400m below LL-26-006A returning 8.03 g/t Au over 0.62 m within a broader zone of 1.37 g/t over 4.5 m (from 609.5 m).
• Scooby Zone occurs proximal to Balmer-Confederation contact, a well-studied structure known to host most of the gold production in the Red Lake Gold District; the Balmer-Confederation contact has been traced for greater than 10 km at Laird.
• Anomalous gold encountered in other drillholes testing the GBZ Zone.
• Discovery generated from a modest nine-hole, 5,134-metre maiden program on greenfield ground with limited historical drilling; several targets remain to be tested.
• The follow-up program planned this upcoming Fall/Winter to include: ~10,000 m of drilling testing the extensions of the Scooby Zone, in addition to ground truthing historic trenches near LL-26-001 and the Nemo Zone.

"This is a genuine grassroots discovery on ground that has still seen such little drilling," said Koby Kushner, President and CEO of Athena. "Hitting nearly 24 grams over five metres, this close to surface, in our first program validates the two years of systematic targeting we put in. It's early days; the Scooby Zone is open, and we still have over 10 kilometres of Balmer-Confederation contact remaining largely untested."

"Hole 6 represents the best gram-metre hit⁶ within a roughly 10 kilometre radius, with the next closest discoveries⁶ being at the Madsen Mine and the Great Bear project, respectively. We are incredibly proud of making Red Lake's newest discovery. What we find particularly encouraging about this discovery, is width of the intersection, and that Hole 8, drilled over 400m vertically below Hole 6, was able to demonstrate mineralization continues. These results fundamentally change the project and follow up work will be focused on delineating this new gold zone," said Ben Kuzmich, Vice President, Exploration of Athena.

Background

The Red Lake Mining District has produced over 30 million ounces of gold since the late 1920s and is widely regarded as one of the highest-grade gold camps in the world.⁴ Notable recent discoveries in the district include the Great Bear deposit, now being advanced by Kinross Gold. Approximately 94% of all gold (production, reserves, and resources) in the Red Lake district is hosted within the Balmer assemblage proximal to the unconformity with the Confederation assemblage.⁵

Figure 1: Regional map of Red Lake District. Mineralization on nearby or adjacent claims is not necessarily indicative of mineralization at Laird.

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Athena's Laird Lake project covers more than 10 kilometres of this contact, most of which remains untested by modern drilling. The Company acquired the option on the project in 2024 (see Company press release dated October 1, 2024) and spent the following two years systematically advancing it through surface sampling, a +2,000-sample till program, and 3D inversion of historical geophysics. That work guided a maiden nine-hole, 5,134-metre diamond drill program completed in early July 2026 (see Company press release dated July 2, 2026).

Figure 2: Plan view map of remaining drillholes from Laird Lake's maiden drill program.

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Figure 3: Plan view map highlighting the newly discovered Scooby Zone.

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Geological Discussion

Scooby Zone

Hole LL-26-006A was designed to test the G4 geophysical anomaly and the structural corridor linked to high-grade surface showings, including the previously reported 373 g/t Au grab sample (see Company press release dated December 4, 2024). The hole intersected 23.85 g/t Au over 5 m beginning at 21 m downhole, establishing the newly named Scooby Zone. Further down the hole, broader intervals of anomalous gold were also returned, including 0.27 g/t Au over 32 m from 227 m. The Scooby Zone was also intersected in hole LL-26-005 which contained visible gold (see Company press release dated May 26, 2026) and returned 2.18 g/t Au over 2 m from 30 m. Additionally, the Scooby Zone was targeted in hole LL-26-008 which returned 8.03 g/t Au over 0.62 m at a vertical depth of 400 m demonstrating that the system is open along strike and at depth.

Figure 4: Core photos from hole LL-26-006A returning 23.85 g/t over 5 m from 21 m depth.

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GBZ

The Gold-Bearing Zone (GBZ) is a historical banded iron formation hosted gold occurrence located ~1 km east of the Scooby Zone and also located proximal to the Balmer-Confederation contact. Historical channel samples have returned up to 35 g/t Au over 2.1 m and grab samples up to 84.1 g/t.⁷ The current program tested the depth extent of this showing which returned 2.17 g/t Au over 2.6 m from LL-26-002 from 118.3 m. Drill hole LL-26-009 designed to test the down plunge of the GBZ returned anomalous results along with a separate zone of 0.89 g/t Au over 4.5 m from 168 m depth.

Table 1: Significant Intercepts from the Laird Lake maiden drill program. Sample intervals represent core length and not true thickness. Athena does not have enough information to know the true thickness at this time.

Next Steps

Field crews will return this fall for targeted prospecting to better define the geometry of the Scooby Zone. Concurrent work will include examination of historic trenches near Hole LL-26-001 to further evaluate the banded iron formation that returned 0.7 g/t Au at surface, and follow-up on the Nemo anomaly - a gold-in-till feature coincident with a magnetic low in a setting analogous to Great Bear. Detailed geophysics is also planned to better characterize the structure hosting the Scooby Zone. These datasets will support a subsequent approximately 10,000-metre drill program using oriented core to expand the discovery and resolve structural controls.

QA/QC

Drill core was logged and sampled by Bayside Geoscience, with each sample interval cut in half by diamond saw at Red Lake, Ontario. Half of each core sample was retained on site for reference, and the remaining half was securely shipped to Paragon Geochemical Laboratories ("Paragon"), an independent, arm's-length analytical laboratory, for gold analysis at its PhotonAssay facilities in Hamilton, Ontario and Surrey, British Columbia. Paragon operates ISO/IEC 17025-accredited geochemical laboratories and is independent of the Company.

Samples were analyzed by two-cycle non-destructive PhotonAssay (PA-AU02) on nominal 500 g sub-samples, with sample weights recorded gravimetrically. PhotonAssay is a non-fire-assay technique that interrogates a large sample mass and is well suited to gold mineralization where coarse-gold ("nugget") effects may otherwise compromise reproducibility.

The Company implemented a quality assurance and quality control program consistent with industry best practice and CIM guidelines, under which certified reference materials (CRMs) were inserted into the sample stream as blind quality-control samples. Two commercially available, independently certified OREAS CRMs sourced from Ore Research & Exploration Pty Ltd (ORE) were used: OREAS 234b, a lower-grade gold standard with a certified value of 1.219 g/t Au, and OREAS 243, a higher-grade gold standard with a certified value of 12.59 g/t Au.

As an additional check on gold intervals, the Company submitted re-assay for selected core samples to Paragon using 30 g fire assay with an atomic absorption spectroscopy (AAS). The company also submitted samples for hole LL26-006 for screen fire assay (screen metallics) analysis to assess the influence of coarse gold. The re-assay results showed some variation relative to the original PhotonAssay values, as is expected for coarse-gold-bearing mineralization subject to nugget effect; however, the check results were consistent with the tenor and distribution of the original assays and confirmed the presence of significant gold mineralization. The Company considers the original PhotonAssay results to be representative and appropriate for the style of mineralization. The Company considers the gold assay results reported herein to be reliable and suitable for public disclosure. The QA/QC data have been reviewed by the Qualified Person, who is satisfied that the analytical results meet the standards required for public reporting.

Qualified Persons Statement

The technical information presented in this news release has been reviewed and approved by Benjamin Kuzmich, P.Geo., Vice President of Exploration for Athena Gold Corporation, and the Qualified Person as defined by NI 43-101 "Standards of Disclosure for Mineral Projects".

About Athena Gold Corporation

Athena is engaged in the business of mineral exploration and the acquisition of mineral property assets. Its objective is to locate and develop economic precious and base metal properties of merit and to conduct additional exploration drilling and studies on its projects across North America. Athena's Laird Lake project is situated in the Red Lake Gold District of Ontario, covering more than 7,000 hectares along more than 10 km of the Balmer-Confederation Assemblage contact, where recent surface sampling results returned up to 373 g/t Au. This underexplored area is road-accessible, located about 10 km west of West Red Lake Gold's Madsen mine and 34 km northwest of Kinross Gold's Great Bear project. Also in northwestern Ontario is Athena's Forester project, a 14,930-hectare land package located less than 30 km southeast of Equinox Gold's Musselwhite Gold Mine, with historical drill intercepts showing strong potential for both high-grade, narrow-vein and low-grade, bulk-tonnage gold mineralization. Meanwhile, Athena's Excelsior Springs project is located in the prolific Walker Lane Trend in Nevada, where it is currently under an earn-in option with Mammoth Minerals Limited (formerly Firetail Resources Limited). The Excelsior Springs project spans more than 2,500 hectares and includes at least three historic mines. For further information about Athena Gold Corporation, please visit www.athenagoldcorp.com.

On Behalf of the Board of Directors

Koby Kushner
President and Chief Executive Officer, Athena Gold Corporation

Forward-Looking Statements

This press release contains forward-looking statements and forward-looking information (collectively, "forward-looking statements") within the meaning of applicable Canadian and U.S. securities laws. All statements, other than statements of historical facts, included herein, including, without limitation, statements regarding future exploration plans, future results from exploration, and the anticipated business plans and timing of future activities of the Company, are forward-looking statements. Although the Company believes that such statements are reasonable, it can give no assurance that such expectations will prove to be correct. Forward-looking statements are typically identified by words such as: "believes", "will", "expects", "anticipates", "intends", "estimates", "plans", "may", "should", ''potential", "scheduled", or variations of such words and phrases and similar expressions, which, by their nature, refer to future events or results that may, could, would, might or will occur or be taken or achieved. In making the forward-looking statements in this press release, the Company has applied several material assumptions, including without limitation, that there will be investor interest in future financings, market fundamentals will result in sustained precious metals demand and prices, the receipt of any necessary permits, licenses and regulatory approvals in connection with the future exploration and development of the Company's projects in a timely manner.

The Company cautions investors that any forward-looking statements by the Company are not guarantees of future results or performance, and that actual results may differ materially from those in forward-looking statements.

Readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on forward-looking statements. The Company undertakes no obligation to update any of the forward-looking statements in this press release or incorporated by reference herein, except as otherwise stated.

Neither the Canadian Securities Exchange nor its regulation services provider accepts responsibility for the adequacy or accuracy of this release.

¹Mineral resources are estimated at a cut-off grade of 3.38 g/t Au and a gold price of US1,800/oz. Please refer to the technical report entitled "Independent NI 43-101 Technical Report and Updated Mineral Resource Estimate for the PureGold Mine, Canada", prepared by SRK Consulting (Canada) Inc. and dated June 16, 2023. A full copy of the SRK report is available on the Company's website and on SEDAR+ at www.sedarplus.ca.
²Mineral Resources are stated in accordance with CIM (2014) Definitions as incorporated by reference into NI 43-101. Mineral Resources are estimated for the LP zone and satellite Hinge and Limb zones and have an effective date of April 2, 2024.. Please refer to the technical report entitled "Voluntary National Instrument 43-101 Technical Report Preliminary Economic Assessment", dated September 1, 2024. A full copy of the report is available on the Company's website and on SEDAR+ at www.sedarplus.ca.
³For further information on Evolution's Mineral Resources and Ore Reserves as at 31 December 2024 refer to ASX release 'Annual Mineral Resources and Ore Reserves Statement' dated 6 June 2025 and available to view at www.evolutionmining.com
⁴ Mining.com / Visual Capitalist (2015): "Red Lake - The high-grade gold capital of the world".
⁵Dubé et al. (2003), as cited in Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences (2024): 94% of all gold (production, reserves, and resources) in the Red Lake district is hosted within the Balmer assemblage proximal to the unconformity.
⁶Gram-metres (g/m) is a standard industry metric representing the product of an interval's average metal grade (in grams per tonne) multiplied by its core thickness (in metres), providing a combined measure of metal accumulation and width. When referring to a "discovery", it is meant that an interval of over 100 gram metres has been intersected.
⁷Ontario Mineral Inventory, MDI52L16NE00009 (Laird Lake - No. 2 Showing), GeologyOntario / Ministry of Mines. https://www.geologyontario.mines.gov.on.ca/mineral-inventory/MDI52L16NE00009

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Source: Athena Gold Corporation