Hull Santa Run is Sunday 6 December at Pickering Park: 2.5k or 5k, start 11am, adults £10 with the Santa suit included. How to enter and collect your suit.
The Hull Santa Run is on Sunday 6 December at Pickering Park, and the organisers want as many Santas as they can get. Anyone can take part, running or walking, over 2.5km or two laps for 5km. The entry fee includes the Santa suit.
The run is organised by Friends of Pickering Park, the volunteer group of local residents who work with Hull City Council on the park, on the west side of the city. They wrote to us asking for help spreading the word:
“We at Friends of Pickering Park are hoping you can help us with a festive plea, to try get as many Santas as possible to run the Hull Santa Run 2026 at Pickering Park.”
Times on the day
The event page gives this timetable:
- 10am: Santas start arriving
- 10.30am: warm-up, hosted by Dean Robertson of Hybrid Fitness, with music from Creed Sound
- 11am: starting hooter
- about 11.15am: 2.5k runners finish
- about 11.30am: 5k runners finish
The organisers add that everyone else finishes “any time after that, maybe even Monday”.
How much it costs and how to enter
| Entry | Price, Santa suit included |
|---|---|
| Adult (17 and over) | £10 |
| Child (3 to 16) | £7 |
| Family (2 adults, 2 children) | £30 |
Entries are taken online through The Entry Point, linked from hullsantarun.org. Under-16s must be with an adult, though the group says that adult does not have to take part.
Suits are handed out in the days before the run, at the reception of Askew Avenue Methodist Church, Askew Avenue, HU4 6NP, on the Wednesday and Thursday before the event, between 5pm and 8pm each evening. There are adult, youth and child sizes. If you cannot get there, the group asks you to get in touch and it will find another way to get your suit to you.
Run, walk or raise money
“Anyone can take part, whether it’s to walk or run,” the group told us. “Participants have the option to either complete a 2.5k or 5k if they’re feeling up to it; this can be just for fun or as part of a fundraiser for their chosen charity.”
It is not a race and nobody is timed. The course is measured at exactly 2.5km and, the organisers say, takes in most of the park, including the whole of the lake. They keep it to hard paths where they can and hope it is wheelchair and pushchair friendly, weather permitting.
Fundraising is optional. The group can supply sponsorship forms for a school, club or charity of your choice; you collect the money and pass it on yourself, and on the day you are asked for a rough figure so it can quote a total for the run. Its page puts it simply: “If you’d rather join for fun and not raise money, that’s perfectly fine too!”
For spectators
Spectators are welcome. “On the day there will also be a catering van for refreshments for spectators to keep warm or for the participants afterwards as well as a tombola being run by members of the Friends of Pickering Park team,” the group said. “Any donations would be greatly appreciated but are of course not necessary.” The event page says the van will serve bacon sandwiches, burgers, tea and coffee, and there will be a raffle too.
Parking is on the street, on Hessle High Road and Pickering Road. No vehicles will move inside the park from 9.30am.
Posters for shops and workplaces
The group would like businesses to put the poster up in windows and on notice boards. If you cannot print one, it says a member of the team “will happily drop one off”. It also suggests entering as a workplace team: “rallying round the staff and employees for a bit of festive team building (or competition if you’d prefer!).”
The run was set up by the Holderness and Humberside Rotary Clubs in 2019, according to the entry page, and is hosted again this year by Friends of Pickering Park.
To order a poster or ask a question, email friendsofpickeringpark@yahoo.co.uk or call 07564 980893.
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