Today I want to tell you about a very interesting running series of races, which was revived in 2019 in one of the running capitals of Ukraine, namely the city of Kharkiv. I got acquainted with the Kharkiv running triad quite by accident in the first year of its restoration. Compiling your running calendar for 2019, it was difficult to miss the "Kharkiv Half Marathon", as this half marathon in Kharkiv is actually one of those that opens the season of city half marathons in Ukraine.

That's how the Kharkiv city half marathon got into my running calendar. After the "Kharkiv Half Marathon", two other races of the "Kharkiv Grand Prix" racing series were announced, so I decided to include them in my calendar and run.

He finished his prehistory of acquaintance with the "Kharkiv Grand Prix" series, it's time to move on to the main one, namely the "Kharkiv Grand Prix" running series. The first edition of the "Kharkiv Grand Prix" took place in 2014 (the first mention I found on the Internet) and consisted of three races:

  • six-kilometer trail "Kharkiv Trail Run"
  • five-kilometer "Kharkiv Night Run"
  • ten-kilometer "Kharkiv City Run"

In this format, the first "Kharkiv Running Triad" lasted until 2016 (the last mention I found). After 2016, it seemed that the "Kharkiv Grand Prix" running series had disappeared and would never return to Kharkiv street, but it did not. 2019 became a landmark year in the history of the "Kharkiv Grand Prix", as the running series returned to the streets of Kharkiv only in a new format.

The second edition of the "Kharkiv Grand Prix", like the previous edition, consisted of three races, but if in the first edition it was a race for a distance of 5 - 10 kilometers, the updated series consisted of three half marathons:

The restoration of the "Kharkiv Running Triad" was quite correct, in my humble opinion. First of all, it had a positive impact on the main city half marathon of Kharkiv - "Kharkiv Half Marathon", because after three years and the efforts of the organizers of the half marathon got a really interesting new track that corresponds to its status and suits him. The "Kharkiv Night Half Marathon" became a tribute to the running traditions of Kharkiv half marathons, as it received the old "Kharkiv Half Marathon" route. The "Kharkiv Trail Half Marathon" blended well into the company of the two previous half marathons and interestingly complemented them. The result was a very interesting running series "Kharkiv Grand Prix".