XavierButler

Xavier Butler is the fastest 200m runner in Texas program history. At the 2025 NCAA West First Round he ran 20.02, breaking a school record that had stood for six years, and on the same day he helped the 4x100m relay set a program record of 38.57. Two weeks later he reached the 200m final at the NCAA Championships in Eugene, placing seventh after a 20.12 semifinal, and earned First Team All-America honors in the 200m and the 4x100m. In 2026 he added Second Team All-America honors on the relay.

Butler grew up on the Texas Gulf Coast and raced for Brazosport High School, winning silver medals in both the 100m and 200m at the 2023 UIL 4A state meet. He was also the football team’s offensive MVP. He began college at UTEP, where he won the Conference USA outdoor 200m title as a freshman, then transferred to Texas to compete in the SEC. A Sport Management major and two-time USTFCCCA All-Academic honoree, he says he studies Noah Lyles and other elite sprinters to sharpen his own racing.

Elite sprinting runs on planning: race models, relay exchanges and a season built around a few days that matter most. As a 2026 Project Manager Intern at Feniex Industries, the Austin manufacturer of emergency-vehicle lighting and electronics, Butler applied that discipline to schedules, task tracking and coordination between departments. Relay running taught him that a handoff only works when both people know the plan, and he carries that lesson into every project, along with the organizational grounding of his Sport Management studies.