FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — Tarleton State Cross Country is back in action for the first time in nearly a month on Saturday morning at the Chile Pepper Festival at the Agri Park Cross Country Course.
 
The men will open on Saturday morning for the Texas running in the McDonnell Memorial 8K at 10:25 am. The Texans will be in the field of 31 programs alongside WAC foes, Abilene Christian and UT Arlington. The women will run the Harter's Habanero 5K following the conclusion of the men around 11 a.m. The Texan women will be in a 32-team field also competing with the Wildcats and Mavericks.
 
Both the men's and women's races will be live streamed by RunnersSpace.com. Live results will be provided by flash results. For the latest updates and highlights follow @tarletonxctrack on Instagram and X.
 
The Texans will make their fourth consecutive trip to Fayetteville to compete in the Chile Pepper Festival. Last season, both the men's and women's squads posted tenth-place performances. Jace Poole led the Texan charge posting a 36^th overall finish. Kaitlyn Gale is the only current Texan to run for the Purple and White at the event last year where she finished third on the team and in 66^th place overall.
 
So far this season, freshman Tyler Hedgepeth has posted a pair of top 10 finishes. He crossed in sixth at the John McKenzie Invitational in his collegiate debut. In the Texans first full race with the entire squad, Hedgepeth paced the Purple and White with another sixth-place finish followed by Jerryth Buckingham in seventh. Buckingham made his return to the course for the first time since 2023 after battling injuries the past two seasons.
 
Kaitlyn Gale led the Texans in her first race of the season at the Gerald Richey Invitational. She crossed in seventh place overall and was one of two Texan women to cross in the top 20. Freshman Victoria Guerrero recorded a 19^th place performance at UTA and was the first of two Texans running at TCU to garner a 13^th place finish.
 
As a team the Gerald Richey Invitational was their first scoring race of the season. The men placed fourth ahead of BIG 12 programs, TCU and Baylor. The Texans placed third among the WAC programs at the site of the 2025 WAC Cross Country Championships. On the women's side, the squad finished fifth and second amongst WAC schools. The Texans beat ACU by nearly 40 points and will look to do the same at the end of the month at the same course for the conference championships.
 
The Texans will be back in action in two weeks in College Station for the Arturo Barrios Invitational on Oct. 17 at the Watts Cross Country Course.