by Justin Lagat
There will be four individual and one mixed relay titles to be won this weekend, the 10th of January, when the world’s finest runners descend in the USA for the World Cross Country Championships in Tallahassee, Florida.
With major upsets and great surprises at the Tokyo 25 World Championships, it remains to be seen whether the same trend will be seen in Tallahassee 26.
Two individuals are returning to defend their titles, along with one mixed relay team.
Uganda’s Jacob Kiplimo will defend his title in the senior men’s race, seeking to maintain a Ugandan winning streak since 2019, when Joshua Cheptegei won, and Kiplimo finished second in his maiden senior world cross country race. Before that, Kiplimo had won the U20 title on home soil in Kampala in 2017. He went on to win the senior titles at Bathurst 2023 and Belgrade 2024.
But before the arrival of Kiplimo and Cheptegei, the senior men’s individual titles had often gone to either Ethiopia or Kenya, with runners such as Ethiopia’s Kenenisa Bekele, Kenya’s John Ngugi and Paul Tergat winning five individual titles each in the senior men’s race.
This weekend, Berihu Aregawi of Ethiopia, who finished as first runner-up in the last two editions, and Kenya’s 10,000m specialist, Daniel Ebenyo, are the two big stars standing between Kiplimo and his ambition to extend his winning streak.
World 10,000m champion Jimmy Gressier of France and Spain’s European cross-country champion Thierry Ndikumwenayo will be the other notable protagonists to watch out for.
While Kenya’s world record holder for the 10,000m won’t be present to defend her title in the senior women’s race, the world record holder of the 10K event will be there. Beatrice Chebet, who had a great season in 2025, has gone on maternity leave for the rest of 2026. But Agnes Ngetich, who won bronze at the 2023 edition, is ready to ensure the throne remains in Kenya. Maurine Chebor, who won the Kenyan trials, is a relatively new talent, untested in major international competitions and could bring up a surprise victory in Tallahassee.
(Photo by © Adam Nurkiewicz for World Athletics)
The other individual runner defending her title is Ethiopia’s 17-year-old Marta Alemayo, who will compete in the U20 race.
Kenya’s Samuel Kibathi, who was to defend the men’s U20, didn’t make the team. But that is not to say Kenya has a weaker team this time around. If anything, it means Kenya is teeming with talent and won’t rely on a few runners to rule the cross-country event.
With Ethiopia having fewer runners entered in the U20 races, it gives better chances for their Eastern African rivals, Kenya and Uganda, to win more individual and team medals here.
Kenya will be hoping to win a third consecutive mixed relay title, as they again face the medalists from Belgrade 24: Ethiopia and Great Britain. With Kenya’s squad including world 1500m bronze medallist Reynold Cheruiyot, Purity Chepkirui, and Kyumbe Munguti, who were part of the gold medal-winning team in Belgrade two years ago, their chances of winning again look good.
