[3] The 19-year-old Agnes Jebet Tirop was the women's champion, establishing herself as a senior athlete for the first time after her runner-up finish in the junior race at the 2013 edition.

The cross country event preceded Beijing's holding of the 2015 World Championships in Athletics later that year.

[12] In the year before the competition, the Guiyang International Half Marathon was inaugurated, increasing local running participation.

[13] This added to the history of athletics in the region, which included a long-running Guiyang road race in its 44th edition that year.

[20] This represented an increase of ten nations from the previous edition and thirteen additional participating athletes in total.