BYU’s Kenneth Rooks, the 2023 NCAA steeplechase champion and the U.S. champion, has decided to forego the remainder of his NCAA eligibility to turn professional and has signed a contract with Nike.

He plans to stay in Utah under coach Ed Eyestone and will train alongside Conner Mantz and Clayton Young.

Rooks was one of the NCAA’s breakout stars in 2023. He caught the attention of many with an 8:17.62 win over George Beamish and ‘22 U.S. champion Hillary Bor at the On Track Nights: Los Angeles meet in May. He backed up that performance by winning the NCAA title a month later in Austin, Texas. At the U.S. Championships. Rooks went viral after falling during the race but managed to recover in the closing stages to win in a personal best of 8:16.78. The video of that race has been watched nearly half a million times on YouTube.

At the 2023 World Championships in Budapest, Rooks made his debut for Team USA by beating out Olympic champion and reigning world champion Soufiane El Bakkali in the prelims. Rooks went on to take 10th in the final.

Rooks says there were opportunities to turn pro after the summer but he chose to return to BYU for one more cross country season. We reflect on his BYU career, the highlights of 2023 and what it was like going so viral outside of the track world and into the greater sports world. Plus, a few stories of his mission in Uganda.

The following interview has been edited lightly for clarity and space. You can listen to the full interview with Kenneth Rooks on the CITIUS MAG Podcast – available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your shows. You can also watch it on The CITIUS MAG YouTube channel.

CITIUS MAG: And now we welcome Kenneth Rooks to the podcast – NCAA champion, World Championships finalist and U.S. champion. How does it feel as the calendar flips from 2023 to 2024?

Kenneth Rooks: There's a lot of new beginnings for me this year. I’ve signed a professional contract with Nike and am also going to get married this year. As I reflect back on 2023, I'm grateful for all the opportunities that I've been able to find success with running.

CITIUS MAG: You just broke the news to everyone: you're forgoing the remainder of your NCAA eligibility to turn pro and sign with Nike. How did this come about and why is now a good time?

Kenneth Rooks: Now is a good time because I feel satisfied with my experience in college. I didn't quite feel satisfied this summer and that's part of the reason why I came back and ran cross country. But this past summer, running professionally became a reality. Running professionally has not always been a dream of mine. It’s something that I've grown into the idea of, but with the success that I had this summer, I recognized that this was something that I could do and that it was something that I also wanted to do.

Something else that I wanted to do in college before I left was finish accomplishing a few goals in cross country… I wanted to come back and support the team and be there for my teammates this year. I also wanted to race at nationals in cross country and be an All-American. I was able to do all of those things, so now I can leave on a high note and feel satisfied that I've done everything that I wanted to do in college. I'm excited for what professional running may hold for me and to learn and grow through that.

CITIUS MAG: How does flipping that switch work for you? You were at the World Championships competing against Olympic champions and world record holders and then all of a sudden you’re back to racing college kids. But at the same time, we're in a place where all the college kids are pretty good now.

Kenneth Rooks: I don't think there's really a sport out there like college cross country, so it's exciting to be a part of that. There’s professional cross country, but it's not as exciting to me as college cross country. The level of competition in college is really good right now. I think competing in college has helped prepare me to compete against the best in the world because some of the best in the world are competing in the NCAA system. I'm just super grateful that I've been able to be a part of it.

CITIUS MAG: How does your major benefit you as a runner? Do you see any part of engineering that makes you a better runner?

Kenneth Rooks: There's a little bit of an engineering mindset that if you put the work in, you get the output. There's that relationship with running too – you put the work in both physically and mentally and then hopefully you get the output. It doesn't always work 100% the way you want, but that's just life. You don't always get the output you want all the time.

CITIUS MAG: 2023 was a breakout year for you. When you close the book on this year, what were the biggest lessons you took away from all the success you've had?

Kenneth Rooks: One of the big takeaways is an immense sense of gratitude. This year, I focused a lot more on the mental side of running. It's something I really tried to work on with coaches and sports psychologists. I'm really happy that I was able to put myself into a mindset that allowed me to accomplish the things that I did this year.

I definitely was not expecting to have all the success that I had. At the beginning of the year, I remember setting goals and putting the goal down of competing and not putting a limit on myself. I'm going to get out there and put myself in a position to compete for the win in whatever race I'm in and just see what happens. It started out at Sound Running where I ended up winning. I was not expecting to win that race going into it so that changed my mindset. I was like, ‘wow, I won that race. I could make it to the World Championships and could win the National Championship in college.’

I knew winning the U.S. National Championship was a possibility at that point in time, but my goals were not necessarily set on winning. It was more about competing and putting myself in a position to win and giving it everything I had. I learned a lot through doing that this year and it’s something I'm going to take with me into the future. It’s also something I'm going to continue working on because running is a muscle; you have to work your mental side and not just the physical side.

Something else I learned this year was just experience. I gained a lot of experience being in different races with different strategies and race situations. Competing at the World Championships was amazing. Competing in the prelim and final were two very different races, both of which I hadn't really experienced before. I learned a lot from that. I'm excited to have had that experience, especially going into this year as an Olympic year, with the Olympic aspirations that I have. I have a lot of confidence that I can compete with the best in the world.

CITIUS MAG: Let’s break down some of the major points that you highlighted from these races. The final at USAs: It wasn't this whole, ‘I'm going to go out and inspire the world that you should never give up,’ but the race still ended up taking on a much bigger meaning than it felt like in the moment.

Kenneth Rooks: It's humbling to see the impact that my performance has had on so many people and how it's helped lift others. When I finished the race I was in shock and excited that I had won, but it was like, ‘did that really just happen?’ Pretty soon after the race, I realized that it was going to have more of an impact than I thought. I especially felt that when we were on our victory lap after the race was over, just with all of the things people were saying to me. I've done a lot of interviews talking about that race and people are probably going to ask me about it for a long time to come. I'm super grateful that I’m able to help inspire and lift others when I can.

CITIUS MAG: For you having to get up, mentally collect yourself, push to secure top three, then win the whole thing – how much was that physically taxing on your body?

Kenneth Rooks: I definitely could feel it, but I was expecting that race to probably be the hardest race that I had ever run. I was preparing myself mentally to be like, ‘this is probably going to hurt more than I've ever hurt before in the steeplechase.’ I think that helped me be ready for it. There were times in my mind, especially in the last two laps, where I knew that I had expended extra energy to get up and I knew I was hurting. I was honestly wondering, ‘When am I going to hit the wall? When am I going to tighten up?’... I collected myself, dug deep and made it through. It was one of the most painful races that I’ve been a part of, but I'm glad I had the determination that day to just keep moving forward. I wanted to race with no regrets and I did that.