BATON ROUGE — The men’s and women’s cross country teams return to action this Saturday at the 20th running of the Chile Pepper Festival in Fayetteville, Ark.
The Arkansas-hosted event will take place at Agri Park. The collegiate race begins with the men’s 10K race at 9:45 a.m. CDT and the women’s 6K is set to go off at 10:30 a.m.
“This is the competition I look forward to all season,” said LSU cross country coach Mark Elliott. “It’s the most consistent course and I’m looking forward to see how we stack up against good competition.”
The men will compete against a total of 33 teams as the women face a large field of 41 teams.
The Tigers and Lady Tigers will be tested against tough competition as they compete against nationally ranked fields. On the men’s side they include ranked teams; No.1 Oregon, Oklahoma State second, No.3 Colorado and No.27 Arkansas. The women face No. 10 Lady Razorbacks and No. 29 Texas Tech.
Last time out, the LSU men’s cross country team picked up an 11th place finish at Tiger Invitational in Auburn, Ala. Sophomore Richard Chautin led the Tiger pack. Elliott feels his men’s team have a shot at top-10 finish the talented fields.
On the women’s side, Elliott again looks to senior Christina Porter to lead his Lady Tigers across the line. Porter recorded a career-best time in Auburn of 18:22.86 in the 5K course. Freshman Laura Carleton finished in 18:48.24 for another career-best time.
Both teams are expected to compete on a higher level on Saturday. The Chile Pepper Festival will mark the second NCAA standard 10K and 6K run for the Tiger and Lady Tigers in 2008.
“This race will allow me to evaluate our progress before we enter the conference championship,” said Elliott. “If the athletes can compete better and best their personal best on this course than I’ll be pleased with the outcome.”