Written by: Shelli Stevenson PT, DPT
JD Jordan was born and raised in the small town of La Jara, Colorado in the San Luis Valley. Growing up in a small town, JD was a multi-sport athlete playing basketball, football, wrestling, and running track in middle and high school. It was his parents who inspired him to begin cycling. He recalls his dad started a passion for cycling when he was a kid. “My parents are my inspiration for riding and they have ridden together for years.”
Following high school, JD went to college at Colorado State University in Fort Collins, CO. JD studied Health and Exercise Science and decided to pursue a career in physical therapy. In college, he began to enter the world of individual sports with mountain biking and rock climbing. It was at this time that JD decided to train and ride his first “Ride the Rockies” event with his Dad. This is a 7-day road bike ride covering roughly 500 miles through the mountains of Colorado. JD says “This ride sparked the flame for long-distance riding.”
Once in graduate school at the University of Montana in Missoula, JD continued riding his mountain bike to maintain his fitness and sanity and graduated in 2009 with his Doctor in Physical Therapy. After PT school, JD decided he needed a reason to stay in shape and continue his love of riding, so he signed up for his first mountain bike race, the Butte 50. “I went out way too hard, ended up bonking, and it was the most painful race I have ever done because I didn’t really train and I had no idea there were 9,000 ft of climbing. But after the race was over, I left wanting more.”
JD has completed the Butte 50 three times and the Butte 100 once. A couple of JD’s lifetime mountain biking goals are to complete the idyllic Leadville 100 and the Colorado Trail Race, a solo bike packing race covering 500 miles from Denver to Durango. Although he enjoys doing a race or two each year, JD’s favorite types of rides are long-distance rides with friends, exploring all the great trails around Bozeman and in Montana in general. “It’s exciting to live and work in a place with such great mountain biking opportunities and a good biking community.”
JD works full-time in our Bozeman location and strives to maintain a good work/life balance. His motto for training when you don’t have a lot of time is “Go hard and ride uphill!” It is that training mentality that has allowed him to be successful at long-distance mountain bike racing. One of JD’s favorite quotes, which applies to any sport, is by Alex Lowe – “The best climber is the one having the most fun!”
