Members of the Carbon Composite Mountain Bike team filled the council chambers of the Price City Hall on Wednesday evening, joining the council for a recognition.
Mayor Mike Kourianos began the presentation by stating that he is excited to see the young athletes in the community and representing the area. From there, head coach Mark Jespersen stated that this was their seventh year as an official mountain bike team in the state of Utah.
In fall of 2022, the athletes participated in a number of races and the league had many kids registered. Coach Jespersen said that it is a fast-growing sport in the state and is the biggest league in the country. He expressed his gratitude to Price City and Carbon County for allowing them access to the “play land.”
“The ability to host an event is, economically, a great blessing to the community and it’s awesome for us,” Coach Jespersen stated.
He explained how the events bring a lot of people into the community on a race weekend. Coach Jespersen also stated that they try to mitigate community concerns and that Price City has been a great partner in that.
He then announced that this fall, there will be three races hosted in Price and that they are working on a fourth race, which would be having the state championship in Price. This would feature over 2,000 athletes racing.
Carbon Composite had 27 riders this past season and Jespersen expects the number to rise in the coming year. The council then brought up Andrew Loveless, who was the state champion in his category. His success marked the fourth state champion on the team over the years. As a team overall, they also secured the region title.