Results
 
FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. – The #1-ranked Colorado School of Mines Men's Cross Country raced to a dominant team victory on Friday afternoon while the #2-ranked Oredigger women took sixth overall at the 33rd Annual Chile Pepper Festival hosted by the University Arkansas at Agri Park.
 
Mines' men controlled their 8,000-meter race from start to finish with 39 points as a team. The second-place team was #4-ranked Augustana which registered 131 points, making a 92-point margin of victory for the Orediggers. Dillon Powell and Dylan Ko led the way for Mines by taking third and fourth overall with respective times of 23:39.7 and 23:44.0. Loic Scomparin's seventh-place finish put three Orediggers inside the top-10. Kyle Moran (12th), Luke Julian (14th), Chris Cathcart (18th) and Jake Mitchem (19th) gave Mines seven individuals inside the top-20. Duncan Fuehne, Andrew Kaye and Steven Goldy all finished top-40. John O'Malley and Max Sevcik also competed for the Orediggers in the field of 350 runners. Mines' top seven runners finished within 48 seconds of each other.
 
The women's sixth-place finish as a team came off 205 team points. The only teams ahead of the Orediggers were NCAA Division I Arkansas, Tulsa, Nebraska and LSU along with #4-ranked Augustana out of NCAA Division II. Heather Keniry and Molly Maksin were Mines' top runners in 28th and 29th out of 322 runners. Brin Strouse and Alayna Szuch took 42nd and 49th, respectively. Holly Moser rounded out the Oredigger scoring in 57th with Alex Raichart and Emma Arterbury rounding out Mines' roster. The Orediggers did compete without #1 runner Zoe Baker.
 
Among multiple nationally-ranked teams in both races, the most significant were #8 Arkansas and #11 Tulsa on the men's side with #6 Southwest Baptist, #17 CSU Pueblo and #27 Western Colorado behind the Orediggers on the women's side. It should be noted that the University of Arkansas announced it would not run its top six men in hopes of challenging the deeper part of its lineup. It marks the second straight time Mines' men have competed at the Chile Pepper Festival and defeated the hosting Razorbacks. The last time was 2019 when the Orediggers took second to the University of Texas.
 
Mines closes the regular season next weekend at the Colorado Springs XC Open hosted by UCCS at Cherokee Ridge Golf Course. A full preview and coverage information will be available next week at www.minesathletics.com.
 
Fans can keep up with Mines cross country on Twitter and Instagram at @csmtrack. They can also keep up with Colorado School of Mines Athletics all year long on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram using the handle @MinesAthletics.