Race Date: Friday 11th September 2026
Our Special Correspondent reports:
The York Evensplits is a series of Friday evening races held from February to November on a five lap course at the York University Campus. A rich source of personal bests for Steel City over the last couple of years, Yasmine Chaffer, Paul Hawdon and Hannah Holliday were the latest to come away with an improvement in their times.
Both Kathryn and Phil, deep into a marathon block of training, were running only five days after racing the South Cheshire Twenty the previous Sunday and a punishing set of 3x3200m on the Tuesday. Yasmine also did Tuesday’s track session (the 5k is predominantly an aerobic event after all) but this didn’t stop her adding to her tally of personal bests set over five different distances this year. Hannah Holiday was a happy girl after a hit and miss summer knocking 24 seconds off her personal best and getting oh so close to the twenty minute barrier.
Paul Hawdon, recently turned forty and formerly of Handsworth Roadhogs, has been chipping away at his personal bests this summer taking another 5 seconds off his 5k mark to go with bests set at 10k and half marathon this year.
A fine evening in York. L-R Hannah Holiday, Kathryn Liddiard, Phil Gregory, Claire Wren, Yasmine Chaffer
| Pos | Name | Cat | Chip | Gun |
| 73 (pb) | Yasmine Chaffer | FSEN | 18:47 | 18:50 |
| 84 (pb) | Paul Hawdon | MV40 | 19:42 | 19:45 |
| 85 | Kathryn Liddiard | FV40 | 19:43 | 19:46 |
| 95 (pb) | Hannah Holliday | FV45 | 20:08 | 20:12 |
| 104 | Claire Wren | FV40 | 21:06 | 21:06 |
| 105 | Phil Gregory | MV40 | 21:03 | 21:07 |
First of the 121 finishers were Owen Ashdown (Keighley and Craven) 15:18 and Ruth Jones (Leeds) 17:36. Link to full results York Evensplits 5k Results September 2026.
The graph of shame. Everyone mustered a final hurrah with Yasmine running really nice even splits. Paul looks as though he went off a little too hard but really we’re only dealing in a few seconds here and there.