Virginia 10 Miler Announces Men’s Elite Field for 2025

Part of the Virginia 10 Miler’s rich history includes attracting top national and international runners. World champions, Olympians, NCAA champions and All-Americans have raced up and down Langhorne Road and Rivermont Avenue, crossing the finish line at EC Glass High School with a feeling of accomplishment and perhaps some anguish along the way. Bill Rodgers, Frank Shorter, Rod Dixon, Lasse Viren, Rob DeCastella, Jon Sinclair, and Julius Kogo are just some of the names.

The 2025 Men’s Elite Field promises to be quite a race as there are at least six men capable of crossing the finish line first.

The top returning finisher from 2024 is Josh Izewski of ZAP Fitness (Boone NC). Josh placed 2nd and was the top American running 48:56, just eight seconds behind the winner. His fitness was demonstrated by his seventh-place finish (2:11:00) at Australia’s Gold Coast marathon in early July.

The other top American is three-time NCAA champion, while at Liberty University, Sam Chelanga (Fayetteville NC) who ran 4th in 2022 with a time of 47:56. Sam continues to excel even at 40 years of age – in early September he placed 9th in the USATF 20K championships with a time of 58:38 (4:43 pace).

Earlier this year, three runners battled for the top three places in the Cooper River Bridge (Charleston SC) 10K. Global Mbio (Chapel Hill NC) teammates Peter Njeru placing first and Ali Abdilmana third with Athanas Kioko sandwiched between them in second.

Kenyan Peter Njeru makes his 10 Miler debut and is ready for a fast time given his 1:01:42 half marathon earlier this summer. Ethiopian Ali Abdilmana placed third in the 2024 10 Miler just three seconds behind Josh Izewski.

Kenyan Athanas Kioko (Winston-Salem NC) returns to Lynchburg after placing 6th in 2022 (48:35) – travel difficulties precluded him from getting a good night sleep that year. Athanas was a six-time All-American while competing for Campbell University. His PRs include 13:09 for 5K and 27:23 for 10K.

New to the US road racing scene is Kenyan Nicholas Rugut, who is fresh from his second-place finish in the Boulevard 4 Miler (Spokane WA), where he ran at 4:33 pace.

Others in the field eyeing a top 10 finish include:

Issac Prather (Summerville WV) – 9th in 2024 in 51:16. Issac ran 49:06 in the 2025 Cherry Blossom 10 Miler

Stan Linton (Crawfordville FL) – 10th in 2024 in 51:2. Stan ran 28:59 for 10K at the Portland Track Classic in June.

Keith Carlson (Washington DC) – making his debut. Keith has a 29:33 10K PR.

Sean Ryan (Tampa FL) – 2025 Flying Pig Marathon (Cincinatti OH) Champion 2:22:41

Kyle King (Dumfries VA) – 2022 & 2025 Marine Corps Marathon Champion

Jerry Greenlaw (Alexandria VA) – 2024 & 2025 Shamrock (VA Beach) Marathon Champion

Oliver Wilson-Cook (Boone NC) – recent Appalchian State grad with 29:47 10K PR.

Dominic Korir – 5th in 2023 (48:19)

Nicholas Rotich – NAIA All-American with a 2:11;24 Marathon PR

The Men’s Master’s Field is comprised by Sam Chelanga, Ethiopians Girma Bedada and Abebe Negewo, as well as Matthew Shock (Boone NC) and Charlie Magee (Charlottesvile VA). Chelanga is expected to cross first, but beyond that it could be a dogfight.