Happily Ever After
Life in The Rural Retreat with a beautiful wife, three cats, garden wildlife, a camera, a computer – and increasing amounts about running
Earlier posts can be found on Adventures of a Lone Bass Player, where this blog began life. Recent entries can be found here.
Leeds 10k 2025
by Russell Turner - 21:05 on 16 June 2025
My series of pre-breakfast runs have had the positive effect of making me not worry about what I eat – if anything – before a race. I might think differently ahead of a half or a marathon, but before the Leeds 10k I made do with water and one energy bar. One less thing to fret about.
More of a worry was finding my way to the baggage point in Millennium Square, Mrs Google having sent me all round the houses the day before on what I later learned was a three-minute walk from the CitiParks car park to the Premier Inn. Following other runners proved most effective.
Having deposited my bag – which contained no more than an after-race hoodie and my phone – I wandered through the throng for a while, having 30mins to kill, before falling into conversation with a local runner, as you do: young, athletic-looking, and worrying about his first marathon later this year. Youth is wasted on the young.
A few minutes’ further walk found me near the start line outside Leeds University, where I positioned myself halfway between the 1:00 and 1:05 pacers. This was by a long way the biggest 10k I’d run, with more than 5,000 taking part. Chat this time was with someone nearer my age but attempting his first 10k, which he’d be happy to complete in 90mins. Achievement is all relative.
The weather wasn’t as fearsome as yesterday’s storms: mild and breezy rather than hot and windy; there’d even been a few spots of rain, so when the hooter sounded at 9am, and I’d completed the 10min shuffle to actually pass beneath the starting gantry, I was feeling optimistic. Lots of cheers, lots of signs: what could possibly go wrong?
Bravely, I began the race with no water, my favoured hand-held soft bottle having sprung a leak and there being no time to replace it. I knew there was an aid station at 3k, where I could collect a 330ml bottle, so need to panic. By then I’d run just over 18mins and was feeling fine. Two more kilometres and I passed 5k dead on 30mins. This was unexpected.
The course was unmemorable – just city and suburban streets (I probably missed all the exciting landmarks) – so I’d nothing to distract me from holding my pace over what was a slightly undulating course. Garmin claimed 54m of ascent; the organisers say it’s 81m. I believe them. The only fancy dress I saw was three guys as a caterpillar; maybe the wacky costumes were all behind me. As usual, the runners were all shapes, sizes, ages, and (presumably) abilities. I took particular pleasure in passing the young, slim, tanned blonde in immaculate gear, which I know is petty. Maybe she was coming back from injury.
My comeuppance came in the ninth kilometre, when two modest inclines found me disinclined to keep running. What a wimp. Fortunately, my slowest kilometre was followed by the fastest, including a sprint to the slightly downhill finish. I crossed in 59:39 – a negative split (!) and my first sub-60min race since York in 2023, 3,001st out of 5,157 runners and 90th of 145 in the M60 category. A triumph. I’ll overlook the fact that the fastest M60 finished 219th in 39:44.
After the finish line outside Leeds Art Gallery, we were efficiently funnelled back to Millennium Square via medals (disappointing design), water, goody bags (crisps, chocolate, flapjack, isotonic Lucozade, Zero tab) and shirts (which I’d declined) to collect baggage. The hoodie in place of a very damp shirt was good planning. I hung around a short time to take in the atmosphere before returning to the Premier Inn to shower and pack before its very useful noon check-out time. Then it was back on the road, this time up the A65 – another route I’d not been on for a long time.
This was probably a mistake. Ilkley, Skipton, Gargrave and Kirkby Lonsdale (or their bypasses) are scenic, as is the countryside between them, but the road is a traffic nightmare. Just short of Kendal I cut short the meander and took the M6 and M74 the rest of the way back to the Stepps Premier Inn.
Today saw more meandering and confirmation of one car-as-a-bike drawback: some back roads perfect for motorcyclists can be stressful for drivers. Fortunately, I negotiated a couple of narrow byways with no passing places without encountering more than a cyclist. Some back roads are just too far back.
All in all, a most satisfactory weekend. I doubt I’ll repeat the Leeds 10k experience but I can recommend another well organised Run for All event. Hopefully it’s a harbinger of an equally good trip to York in August, and maybe an even faster 10k.
Add your comment
© Russell Turner 2008-2025