Tulane is home to a total of 15 Division I sports. But these teams make up only one aspect of the athletic culture of the university. For decades, thousands of students have participated in clubs and intramural teams ranging from flag football to competitive canoe battleship. Some of these teams particularly stand out in their participation and level of competitiveness. Tulane’s cycling team is one of these.

The Tulane cycling team competes in the South-Central Collegiate Cycling Conference, or SCCCC. The SCCCC represents universities from Louisiana, Texas, Arkansas and Oklahoma and competes throughout the year. On the team website, the number of rides, total distance, elevation and time can be tracked for each week, allowing the team and others to monitor its progress.

For many team members, including President Grayson Rosenfeld, cycling has had a major impact on their lives. It even impacted some of their college decisions.

“When I was trying to decide where I was gonna go to college … the number one priority was that they had to have a cycling team,” Rosenfeld said.

Rosenfeld, who has been team president for more than a year, has been racing since the age of 14. While many other members have also been racing since a young age, some are very new to the sport. As a result, Rosenfeld and other team members do their best to foster an environment in which newcomers can learn about the sport and pick it up quickly.

“Most people who come to the team have never raced a bike or thought about racing a bike. They just found out we exist … We have a fleet of loaner bikes, really nice race bikes, that we let the new kids hop on to test out cycling and see if it’s for them,” Rosenfeld said.

The cycling team has almost doubled in size this past year, according to Rosenfeld. With many of these members new to racing, the team has been facing a quick turnaround for the upcoming racing season.

“Every spring we have a full calendar of races against other collegiate teams, and we put on our own race. For the past couple years, this race has been the conference championships, so it’s been a pretty big event,” Rosenfeld said.

Despite the relative inexperience of many new members, the cycling team still looks to be competitive in the SCCCC following a third-place finish in the conference last season, as it returns many of its top racers.

“I’ve been riding for a long time, I really love it, and I think people kind of underestimate the sport,” Rosenfeld said.

The first race of the cycling season will take place at Texas State University on Feb. 18.