No. 10/19 Razorbacks open season at Chile Pepper Festival

FAYETTEVILLE – Arkansas, nationally ranked No. 10 by Flotrack and No. 19 in the USTFCCCA coaches poll, competes on its home course Saturday during the 37th annual Chile Pepper Festival.

The Razorbacks will cover an 8,000m distance at Agri Park as they open the 2025 season. Race time is 10:25 a.m. for the McDonnell Memorial. Live coverage of the meet is available through subscription with runnerspace.com at this link: Chile Pepper Festival. Live results are available here: Flash Results.

“We’ve got some work to do,” noted Arkansas men’s head coach Chris Bucknam, in his 18th season with the Razorbacks. “Luckily, it’s five weeks away from the SEC Championships. The kids have been working real hard, and we’ve been in training six to seven weeks now. Tough training in the afternoon, I like to train in the heat. The guys have responded well and worked hard.

“We have a ways to go. With the variety of events that we have guys in we have some 10k guys, some 3k steeple guys, and some true 1,500m runners. It’s going to take the full  two-and-half months to get everybody on the same page. We’re not there yet.”

There are 56 schools in the men’s collegiate competition, which includes a pair of nationally ranked Division II schools in No. 9 Northwest Missouri and No. 28 Missouri Southern along with four nationally ranked NJCAA programs in No. 3 Iowa Central, No. 6 Crowder (Mo.), No. 12 Garden City (Kan.), and No. 23 Cloud County (Kan.).

Division I teams ranked in the South Central region include No. 5 Texas, No. 6 Stephen F. Austin, No. 12 UT Arlington, and No. 14 Abilene Christian.

“Brian Masai, Tim Chesondin, and Ben Shearer are our top three guys,” said Bucknam. “They’ve been great leaders and have been working hard.

“We have a couple new guys in Owan Logorodi and James Sankei. They’re two great kids who have arrived on campus from Kenya. They’re making their adjustments, learning the language and lingo, as well as their routine. I’m really happy with them, they’re very talented kids.

“So, we’ll see what happens at Chile Pepper and build from there.”

Chesondin is the top Razorback returner from last year’s Chile Pepper race where he finished third in 23:23.6 while Masai placed sixth in 23:59.4. Shearer finished as runner-up in the 2023 Chile Pepper with a 23:36.6 performance.