Race Date: Wednesday 22nd April 2026

Race report by Lucy Broom

The Leeds 5k series of races are hosted by EvenSplits (who run the York 5k series) and take place monthly from November to February at the University of Leeds Brownlee Centre.

Fresh from the DonFaster 5k (Silver Lining, Donfaster 5k March 2026) I wondered if I could improve my time at Leeds. I wasn’t feeling super confident on arrival after crawling through Leeds City Centre in rush hour (my least favourite place to drive), arriving later than planned and realising that the cycle track is hilly (approx half a minute slower than the York course a fellow runner informed me).

Anyway, the set up is efficient and I had parked, registered and changed in a flash, leaving plenty of time to warm up. The course is a 3×1 mile lap course, which I preferred to the 5x1k courses – psychologically preferable and less tight and twisty. Like DonFaster, the race is chip timed, with the added bonus of timed mile splits reported in the results.

I had a pretty good race. Half a minute quicker than DonFaster and evenly paced. The sharp uphill is unpleasant but the downhill section is long and winding, meaning plenty of time to get your breath back. I found myself running behind another Lucy (an FU20 version) who was being cheered on by a big group of university mates. I fed off this and stuck behind her, eventually taking down ‘young Lucy’ on the finish line – not necessarily intentionally, more in the process of sprinting to the line when I realised I could dip under 21 minutes!