By Jesse James McTigue

When you grow up in Telluride or Mountain Village, your chances of making it to the NBA or MLS are slim, but excelling in climbing, mountain biking, kayaking or mountain running at elite levels? That’s a real possibility.

Meet three high school athletes who’ve honed their skills in these niche mountain sports and are now setting their sights on competing at the highest levels.

Pella Ward
Downhill and Enduro Mountain Biking

For Pella Ward, mountain biking was just as much a part of childhood as coloring and juice boxes. “I’ve been able to bike my whole life,” she says, recalling family mountain bike trips to Fruita, Dolores and Ridgway. 

When she was in 8th grade, after the COVID-19 shutdown, the ski resort’s lift-accessed bike park was one of the only places open. “My dad wanted me to ride Tommyknocker [a flowy beginner downhill trail] with him,” she recalls. And, “I thought it was so fun.”

Drawn to the speed of downhill biking, Ward and a group of teens spent the rest of the summer riding the park’s berms, tabletops, and drops, constantly videoing and encouraging each other as they lapped the park. When they weren’t riding the park, they rode local trails, like Remine Creek Trail and the uber-technical Kave Trail. 

“It felt good to teach myself and to learn,” Ward says. “It helps me to watch other riders and to ride with people who are better than me. Training is really about riding.”

The next summer, Ward entered enduro races, events in which athletes pedal uphill, untimed, to access a series of timed downhill segments. Ward placed third in her first enduro race, then won the next six races she entered.

Four years later, Ward has advanced to the sport’s highest level. She won the 2024 Monster Energy Pro Downhill Series and the 2024 USA Cycling Gravity Mountain Bike National Championships for her age group. She also qualified for and placed fourth in her first UCI Mountain Bike World Cup. She will continue to compete in the professional and world cup tours this season.

Four years later, Ward has advanced to the sport's highest level. She won a race in the 2024 Monster Energy Pro Downhill Series and placed first in the 2024 USA Cycling Enduro Mountain Bike National Championships for her age group. Ward also earned third place at the 2024 Rockshox Canadian Open Downhill among Elite, under-19 women, and qualified for her first WHOOP UCI Mountain Bike World Series race in October 2024, where she earned fourth place. 

Ward will continue to compete in more Elite, Professional and World Cup Races this season.  

“My dad has been my biggest influence,” she says. “If he hadn’t taken me biking growing up, I don’t know if I would’ve known I loved it.”

Spencer Mortell
Freestyle Kayaking

Spencer Mortell remembers his dad giving him his first kayak, a Jackson Fun 1, when he was 9 years old. “The cold waters of Telluride were intimidating for a 9-year-old,” he recalls.

But he kept practicing, at least one day every weekend. He learned in the Down Valley Pond, before graduating to the Uncompahgre River and the Water Sports Park in Montrose. He finally gained the skills to boat the San Miguel River in Telluride.

When high school approached, Mortell left Telluride to attend Colorado Rocky Mountain School, a college-preparatory boarding school in Carbondale, Colorado with a strong kayaking program. 

He was introduced to freestyle kayaking, which he describes as “gymnastics in a small kayak,” and realized he wanted to compete. “My kayak is 6 feet tall,” he explains. “I use it to jump out of the water, do front flips, back flips and cartwheels.” 

In the last year, Mortell won the 2024 Kayak Freestyle Colorado Cup, a three-event competition over four weeks, and the 2024 USA Junior Freestyle Kayaking Nationals.

His future goal is to place in the top 10 in the Little White Salmon Race, an iconic, Class 5 competition. He also hopes that freestyle kayaking will debut in the next Summer Olympics, and that he’ll be representing Team USA.

But for this summer, he dreams of bushwhacking into some godforsaken put-in with his younger brother, Marcus, to launch a waterfall that only a certain caliber of kayaker would consider.

“Marcus and I have a similar relationship as my dad and his brother,” Mortell says. “Now we spend our weekends, just the two of us, boating.” 

Kendal O’Callaghan
Orienteering

Like Ward and Mortell, Kendal O’Callaghan’s dad introduced her to a sport he was passionate about. At first, she wasn’t so sure. It’s called orienteering and is often described as the sport of navigation.

“It’s like cross-country running, but you’re lost, and you have a map and a compass,” she says. “My friends call it ‘Hunger Games’-esque.”

O’Callaghan explains that there are three types of orienteering races: urban sprints that range from 1 to 2 kilometers, middles that are 3 to 4 kilometers, and longs that are around 5 kilometers. The latter occur in wilder terrain, such as high deserts or forests. 

On the morning of a race, competitors are put into “quarantine,” or an area where they cannot access cell phones, social media, maps or the internet. When the race starts, the competitors receive a paper map of the course. They must use the map to access each required point in a certain order. The fastest person to get to the finish, wins. 

O’Callaghan started racing when she was 10 years old. “It took me a while to enjoy it,” she says. “Winning probably helped. I wasn’t winning and loving races until two or three years ago.” 

In the last few years, O’Callaghan earned a spot on orienteering’s National Junior Team, represented the U.S. in the European Youth Orienteering Championship, and placed third in the North American Orienteering Championships – Sprint among competitors under the age of 20. Her goal is to make the U.S. Team for the Junior World Orienteering Championship.

“That’s my Olympics,” O’Callaghan says.

And, like Ward and Mortell, she especially looks forward to practicing her sport with those she loves. “We’ll also orienteer as a family in Europe,” she adds.