Heavily favored to defend his NCAA cross-country title, Lawi Lalang began to falter and fell off more than 10 seconds behind the leaders during last year’s National Championship in Louisville. Kennedy Kithuka of Texas Tech took the crown in 28.31.3, which left Lalang hungry for revenge indoors and outdoors. 

Afterwards, Lalang and coach James Li did not make a big deal of the loss and moved forward towards indoor season. He captured two indoor and two outdoor national championships before traveling abroad for the summer.

After a successful track season on the European circuit, Lalang and Li had a brief conversation about shifting the focus towards cross-country season. Lalang saw his personal best in the 5,000-meter run drop from 13:08 to 13:00. He decided to fly home to Kenya for a few weeks before beginning his training and studies again at Arizona.

One of the most decorated collegiate runners of all-time, Lalang decided to return for his education and to accomplish some unfinished business.

“I still have some things to accomplish in the NCAA,” Lalang said before sharing his thoughts on a tough triple crown, “It crossed my mind before and I was thinking of tripling during indoors, but right now probably not. Sometimes you have to give other people some chances to win other things.”

Not even the taste of professional competition was enough to lure Lalang to turn professional.

“Right now, I’m not the best in the world. So there’s no way I’ll be like ‘I’m ready. I’m strong enough to go and compete with those guys and win all those Diamond League meets.’ I still have have a lot to work on my strength, my mileage and even prepare mentally. I don’t want to rush into something that I am not ready to do.”

Do not expect Lalang to tear up the cross-country scene right away. Li and Lalang will hold off on racing until late September as the junior begins to rebuild his training block.

“I’m not ready yet, but I still have time to get ready,” Lalang said. “My goals for this year are to stay strong and stay healthy. When it comes to cross-country, indoors and outdoors I’d like to defend my titles and take back what is gone.”

Before last year’s season, Lalang saw himself running approximately 70 miles per week. A strong believer in quality and not quantity, Lalang may bump up his mileage to 80 miles per week.

“I think in this last year, what’s really worked for him – we obviously in his races and number of races – is he learned and he’s grown. He’s a better athlete and has a better understanding of this racing and training,” Li said. “Therefore, he’s not killing himself everyday at practice and running every race at a maximum effort every time. I think he’s done a great job or at least a better job than he had in the past years.”

One of the biggest changes for Lalang has come in his racing style. When he first arrived as a freshman, Lalang loved to race from the front. Over the years, patience has become a lesson for Lalang as he conserves energy for the first half of the race.

He’s still learning. Lalang opened his 5,000-meter race in Monaco faster than Kenenisa Bekele did when he set the world record in 2004. 

What kind of a race will it take for Lalang to retain his title and beat Kithuka?

“Kennedy is a great runner. There’s no doubt about it. You can not control what others are going to do. On that day, you have to feel good,” Li said. “The fundamental belief is that if you’re consistently training and you’re injury free, after some time things are going to work out. We’ll try our best to continue to do our best and keep training. He’ll do his job. Lawi will do his job and if he gets stronger, he’ll be pretty hard to beat.”

While Lalang had his shining moments in Europe, Kithuka continued to train hard. Kithuka was also rumored to have entered the Prefontaine Classic’s 10,000-meter race before withdrawing due to a minor hamstring injury. He redshirted outdoor season for Texas Tech and now begins his senior cross-country season. 

"It's his senior season, so we're anticipating some good things," Red Raiders coach John Murray said in a press release. "He is looking very good."

In a recent Q&A session, Kithuka broke down some of his recent workouts building up on his 10,000-meter strength.

"Before my injury I could do six by mile repeats under 4:25 with three minutes of rest and I would run under 4:20 in last two. All of my eight by 1,200-meter (reps) were under 3:17 and the last two were under 3:09. My tempo runs were eight miles and I could run those in 39:50. I had alot confidence by balancing my workouts," Kithuka said. "I also did short tempos for four miles in 18:35."

Kithuka headed into the NCAA National Championship with five undefeated races under his belt. Lalang entered with four victories. A smiliar situation where Kithuka enters with more races under his belt could be expected while Lalang rests the earlier portion of the season. With no overlapping schedules, expect the rematch and another tale of the tape between two giants take place before their meeting in Terre Haute.