After earning the second All-America honor of his career last month at the 2024 Division III Outdoor Track & Field Championships, Colorado College recent graduate James Settles was named the Male Track Athlete of the Year by the Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference (SCAC) for the second consecutive season.
 
Settles, from Claremont, Calif., finished eighth in the 5K at this year's national meet, following up a fourth-place result in 2023. He joined Julian Boggs as the only Colorado College males to earn multiple All-America honors in track & field. Boggs was an All-American in the 5K in 2006 (2nd) and 2007 (5th).
 
At the 2024 SCAC Track and Field Championships, Settles was runner-up in the 10K (to teammate Ayden Cherry) and 5K (to teammate Devlin Swanson) and placed third in the 1500. His time in the 5K (14:59.64) was the fourth-fastest time in SCAC Championship history.

Settles is the fifth SCAC male to win the Track Athlete of the Year honor in back-to-back years and just the second to win it in back-to-back years since the conference split the Track and Field Athlete of the Year awards up in 2011.
 
Settles, who set the school record in the 5K (14:07.78) and 10K (29:46.90) this season, is just the second CC Tiger to earn SCAC Track Athlete-of-the-Year, joining Josh Fry, who secured the award in 2021. Additionally, Settles was recognized as the recipient of the SCAC Men's Track & Field Elite 19 Award for the second-straight year during the conference's post meet awards ceremony in April.