Hog Calls

Hogs' cross country teams get serious

Arkansas' Stanley Kebenei approaches the finish line during the the 25th annual Chile Pepper Cross County Festival Saturday, Oct. 5, 2013, at the University of Arkansas Cross County course located on the UA Agriculture Farm in Fayetteville.
Arkansas' Stanley Kebenei approaches the finish line during the the 25th annual Chile Pepper Cross County Festival Saturday, Oct. 5, 2013, at the University of Arkansas Cross County course located on the UA Agriculture Farm in Fayetteville.

FAYETTEVILLE -- Although their teams already have run in meets in August and in September, the Arkansas Razorbacks' cross country schedule really begins Saturday.

Arkansas men's coach Chris Bucknam and Arkansas women's coach Lance Harter will tell you that.

Saturday marks the 26th annual Chile Pepper Festival, a daylong event that runs from 7:15 am. to 3 p.m. at the UA's Agri Park course and includes college, high school, junior high, open division and recreational runners.

Bucknam's 12th-ranked men will try to defend their Chile Pepper title at 9:45 a.m. and Harter's eighth-ranked women will try to defend their Chile Pepper title at 10:20 a.m. against teams that include Kansas State, Texas Tech, Lamar, Houston and Drake.

The Chile Pepper accelerates a schedule that includes what Bucknam and Harter call "the mini-nationals" when many of the elite collegiate teams assemble Oct. 17 in Madison, Wis., for the Wisconsin adidas Invitational, followed Oct. 31 by the SEC Championships in Tuscaloosa, Ala., and the South Central Regional Qualifying meet Nov. 14 in Fayetteville that determines who advances to the NCAA Championships on Nov. 22 in Terre Haute, Ind.

"The season starts at Chile Pepper," Bucknam said. "We're done with our exhibition races. We're focused that we want to win the Chile Pepper and make improvements individually with the mini-national championship coming two weeks at Wisconsin."

"Now we are going to truly put the team together," Harter said. "This is where we narrow to our top 10 for the SEC meet and top seven for NCAA regionals."

All-Americans Stanley Kebenei and Patrick Rono will debut Saturday. They are Bucknam's two best runners but have rested from racing after their outdoor track and field season extended through the NCAA Outdoor Championships in mid-June. They will run with regulars Gabe Gonzalez and Cale Wallace,freshman flashes Alex George, Austen Dahlquist and Ethan Moehn, and sophomores Aidan Swain of Fayetteville and Noah Findlay of Little Rock Catholic.

Harter has Dominique Scott, Grace Heymsfield, Diane Robison, Valerie Reina, Shannon Klenke, Regan Ward and Kelsey Schrader running together for the first time since they placed first through seventh Sept. 7 at the UCI adidas Invitational in Irvine, Calif. Jessica Kamilos, who joined Heymsfield last June as NCAA Outdoor steeplechase All-Americans, will compete unattached Saturday. Harter is weighing whether to redshirt Kamilos for next year with Heymsfield and Klenke back for their senior season.

Bucknam and Harter praised the Chile Pepper board again for scheduling Chile Pepper -- whose mission remains donating some of its proceeds to Northwest Arkansas area high school cross country programs -- to avoid conflicting with the Wisconsin meet. Bucknam and Harter learned the hard way that it is essential to run against enough ranked teams to accumulate points for at-large consideration for nationals.

Each Arkansas team also has skipped running in the Chile Pepper one time in favor of running at Wisconsin, and detested having to do so. They returned to the Chile Pepper last year in the cold rain and mud and loved it like Hogs in slop.

"Even with the rain, it was a phenomenal turnout," Harter said.

Sports on 10/01/2014

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