USU Eastern’s first year Mountain Bike team

This is Utah State Eastern’s mountain biking team’s inaugural year. Mountain biking is a sport that requires immense concentration and power. Yet it is often overlooked in favor of the more flashy sports. Sports like football, volleyball, basketball, and soccer. Mountain biking makes it so difficult, though.

Racing at a competitive level requires great endurance to complete the course, as Olympic-level courses can last around two hours. You must have excellent spatial awareness to navigate challenging trails that are littered with various obstacles. You also need excellent bike handling skills to avoid crashing when navigating the course. USUE’s team is headed by Coach Mark Jespersen. Jespersen is primarily responsible for the growth of mountain biking in the surrounding area and is well aware of what it takes to succeed in this sport. Jespersen was asked what the goals were for this season. He had three main goals for the team. One, “To introduce the athletes into collegiate racing under the USA Cycling umbrella.” USA Cycling is responsible for all rules and regulations governing most cycling events, including mountain biking.

As USA Cycling is the official governing body of these sports. Two, “Find our place where we are at and where we need to go.” It is the first year that USUE has had a mountain biking team, so the program is just getting started. There are currently many unknowns about where USUE will stand in this sport. Three,” To have the individual athletes progress throughout the year, meaning getting faster, stronger, and more capable.” Jespersen was also asked about the overall goals for the mountain biking program. He said, “ The goal of the program is to develop not just strong riders but student athletes to represent the university on a collegiate level throughout the state, throughout our region, and even throughout our country, as we attend national championships. And to give riders a place to continue to race mountain biking.”

Jespersen also further explained why giving riders a place to race in college is so important. “Part of that is there are two types of teams on the college level there are club based teams and varsity level programs. Utah State Eastern is a varsity level program. One of only two in the state of Utah.”

Beyond being one of only two varsity-level programs in Utah, there are few nationally. In the 2022-2023 season, there were only 17 varsity-level collegiate teams. The number has grown since then but not by much. The main difference between club and varsity teams is that club teams are student-led and varsity teams are officially sanctioned. That means for the USUE team that they have a coach, university funding, and access to scholarships. How does having this lack of opportunity to race collegiately affect mountain bikers? Jespersen further commented, saying, “So as they come out of high school, Utah has one of the strongest high school programs called N.I.C.A. National Interscholastic Cycling Association; it’s the largest league in the country. But there’s a real gap between our NICA riders as they graduate and are going into college. So that’s one of the goals of Utah State Eastern to bridge that gap. So that student athletes can continue to participate in the sport while getting an education. But also elevate the collegiate level of racing in the state of Utah.”

Numerous opportunities come with competing at the collegiate level. Jespersen commented on a few. “ As a student athlete, there is an opportunity as they excel in the sport and at those races. They receive national recognition, and with that comes opportunity. The opportunity opens up for them to be sponsors but also to be seen on a professional level by teams that travel all over the world.” Some of these teams include Decathlon Ford Racing Team, Specialized Factory Racing, Trek Factory Racing – Pirelli, and Team USA. Being able to race with USUE’s varsity-level program gives riders the chance to turn their passion for the sport into a career. And possibly later become coaches themselves to pass down what knowledge they have. If you would like to see the Utah State Eastern Mountain Biking team in person, they have their first home race this Saturday. Sept. 27, 2025. Come cheer on the team as they make history as Utah State Eastern’s first-ever mountain biking team.