Chumba, Lalang Ready to Compete at NCAA Regional

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LITTLE ROCK – Two Trojan men will test themselves against the best cross country runners in the region on Friday afternoon and hope to earn a berth to the NCAA Championship meet.
 
Isaac Lalang and Kennedy Chumba will represent the Trojans at the NCAA South Central Regional on Friday with the men's 10K race set to go off at noon. The race will be held at Agri Park in Fayetteville.
 
This will be the first competitive 10K race for Chumba and Lalang this season.
 
In order to qualify for the NCAA Championship, the Chumba and Lalang will have to finish as one of the top four individuals who are not part of team that qualify for the NCAA Championship as a team. The top two teams and four highest-finishing individuals not on those teams earn an automatic berth to the championship on November 19 in Terre Haute, Indiana.
 
Last season, Lalang did just that, qualifying for national championship as the final individual.
Lalang was the fourth individual to cross the finish line who was not on teams that qualified as a team, ending up with a time of 30:17.1 in the 10K race. That time, the second-fastest in school history at that distance, was five seconds better than the 10th-place finisher to send him to Louisville, Ky., for the national championship meet two weeks later.
 
Lalang was the first Trojan to reach the NCAA Championship since Brent Corbitt in 2002. No Trojan man has ever run in the NCAA Championship meet twice.
 
Lalang and Chumba should be very familiar with Agri Park, as the team two competed on that course earlier this season as part of the Chile Pepper Festival. At that highly competitive race, Lalang and Chumba were the top two Trojan finishers, scoring 55 and 66 points for the team, respectively.

The Trojan duo last competed at the Sun Belt Championship on October 29 where Lalang came in 17th and Chumba took 24th.