Race Date: Friday 13 February 2026

Race Report from coach Malcolm Baggaley

The York Even Splits is 5km around a 1km cycle route, they take place once a month from February to November. There’s not a lot of glitz about it, especially in the dark of a February evening: no medal, no official photographer, just a fast, flat, flowing, UKA Licensed, chip-timed race with a chocolate bar at the end. Perfect for a fast time and there’s something different about running under floodlights. Three Steel City made the trip for the February race, Gareth Winter, Bethan Varney, and myself.

Definitely worth mentioning first is Gareth’s race. Setting a new PB with a blistering 15:46, making him the second fastest Strider ever!!! I’m excited to see how he does as he closes in on Seth Kirby’s club record of 15:42 with a pack of other fast lads not far off the pace either.

Bethan’s quest for a sub 20 minute 5km is well documented from last year ( Project Twenty and Personal Best Fest ) and since then she has broken her 10km PB twice. York was one last race before a well-earned break. For myself it was a test to see if my speed was back after an injury-hit 2025. The parkrun cup had served me well, and despite training through all of them I had been getting faster. Going into York it felt as though a PB was on the cards (a nice feeling to have).

For Bethan and myself this was about execution of the race plan. The whole drive over to York was spent discussing how to not set off too fast, something we’re both terrible at. This was going to be tough given how fast the field was with the easy option being to get carried away in the first 1km. We leaned heavily on our experience from track sessions. Week after week, rep after rep, consistency is the key to getting the most out of track. Working hard, without burning out. Looking at our split times, it’s pretty safe to say we put this into practice and executed our race plans perfectly.

With a break in the weather, Bethan and I lined up almost on the back row (143 of the 178 finishers broke 20 minutes) and off we set.

The first km was smooth, and felt like I was cruising, and after the initial first corner melee, had started to pass people ticking through in 3:44. Second km was very much the same, didn’t feel like I was working all that hard, but still flowing, and still overtaking people, 3:43. The third lap saw a pickup in the wind on the back straight but not enough to really hurt. Passing through halfway, I was feeling really good, still overtaking people, and by now lapping some, and came through in 3:43 again.

The penultimate lap is usually the hardest, and it was here that I needed to really focus and felt like I was trying now. It probably helped that the leaders were coming around fast for the finish, not wanting to be lapped, I started my final lap about 3 seconds before they finished the race. 3:41.

I knew to get the 18:30 I wanted I needed to pick it up a little on the last lap. Usually I would have a sprint finish so wasn’t stressing. It turned out I didn’t have a great sprint finish this time, with the last 200m the only time anyone overtook me in the race. I had picked the pace up enough though, and with a 3:38 final split, came in at 18:30. This was a 5km PB by over a minute and 15 seconds, and a distance PB (if you include parkrun) by 1 second, set over 3 years ago.

The whole race I’d also been keeping half an eye on where Bethan was, especially at the turn around at the far end. She was closer than we’d talked about so knew she was well under 20 minutes again. When I finished, caught my breath and turned to see, she was already sprinting down the final straight, finishing in a new PB of 19:31. Amazing having gained almost 15 seconds from September and a minute and a half from this time last year. Looking at her splits, she also managed to not go off too fast, and held on well, picking it up in the last km.

When a race comes together like that, you can know from a long way out, and by half way we’d both known that we were going to PB, you can just feel it. Personally, I’ve never felt that comfortable, for that long, in a 5km race, but also, at the end, I knew I had nothing more.

Would highly recommend these races if you want a fast, official test over 5km. But they do sell out every month, so get booked in early. (Editor: Steel City are already signing up for March.)