Meet Canada’s top NCAA XC performer
After achieving her best-ever result at the NCAA Championships, Quebec's Florence Caron is looking to qualify for the World Cross Country Championships at ACXC on Saturday
Penn State University Athletics
At Saturday’s 2025 Division I NCAA cross-country championships at Gans Creek course in Columbia, Mo., La Malbaie, Que.’s Florence Caron led a strong contingent of Canadian women, finishing in 19:00.6 and placing 14th. The performance marks the Penn State University (PSU) athlete’s best-ever finish on the national XC stage, earns her All-American honours and led her school to a top-10 finish.
Barrie, Ont.’s Jadyn Keeler of the University North Dakota was the only other Canadian to achieve All-American status, taking 26th in 19:13.5. (All-American accolades are awarded to the top 40 finishers in the women’s 6K race.)
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Surrounded by talented athletes
For the second straight year, the University of Alabama’s Doris Lemngole took the crown, in a time of 18:25.4. First-year phenom Jane Hedengren of Brigham Young University took the runner-up spot in 18:38.9, after facing intense pressure to become the first freshman to win the women’s NCAA title in 40 years; Hilda Olemomoi of the University of Florida took back-to-back bronze medals, rounding out the podium in 18:46.4.
Closing off her final NCAA cross-country season, Caron said she just wanted to do her best within the stacked field of competitors. “You just have to be prepared for any scenario and to race the people around you,” she told Canadian Running. “The goal was to be a top-10 team, and my personal goal was top-15 at the beginning of the season, but after regionals, I lowered my expectations to top-40.” At the Mid-Atlantic regionals in Bethlehem, Penn., on Nov. 15, Caron was aiming for the win or a runner-up spot, but faded to fourth, finishing in 19:35; she still succeeded in leading the PSU women to qualify for the national championships.
For Caron, the past 12 months have been defined by substantial improvements. The 25-year-old took 19th at last year’s collegiate XC nationals, already an unbelievable jump from her 182nd-place finish in 2023. In the track season, she rewrote almost her entire slate of personal bests and grabbed her first Canadian title at the 2025 national 10,000m championships, running 33:18.84.
In August, the runner signed an NIL (Name, Image and Likeness) deal with Hoka.
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The Canadian XC championships
At the Canadian cross-country championships set for Saturday in London, Ont. (a 10K course), Caron is aiming for a top-six finish and a spot on the national team headed to the 2026 World XC Championships in Tallahassee, Fla. (Athletes must finish in the top 10 to be eligible.) It’s a quick turnaround between these events, but by this point, Caron is an expert.
“I am pretty used to doubling back with races,” she said. “We do that a lot in the NCAA. Last year, I raced the NCAA 10,000m and 5,000m and the Canadian 10,000m championships within seven days–so I’m not stressing too much about it. I’ll just do the classic good sleep, stretching and foam rolling, and will eat well to help my body recover.”
Top Canadian NCAA results
Rachel Forsyth (Michigan State University) – 48th, 19:30.5
Siona Chisholm (University of Notre Dame) – 52nd, 19:32.8
Kaiya Robertson (Boise State University) – 53rd, 19:33.0
Erin Vringer (University of Utah) – 59th, 19:38.2
See here for full results from the 2025 NCAA Championships.
