Talent- und Speed-Cross Leverkusen 2026

Talent- und Speed-Cross Leverkusen is a cross-country race series at TSV Bayer 04 Leverkusen’s athletics facility on Kalkstraße, run in November. It is built as a compact spectator-friendly meet: the course stays visible from the venue, and the schedule is designed so race decisions come quickly one after another. The format includes selection races for boys and girls from U10 through U16, alongside races for older and more established athletes. The course is deliberately rougher than a flat track race. Organizers add a hill on the meadow inside the athletics facility, so runners have to go up, down, and across grass instead of simply chasing pace on a smooth loop. TSV Bayer 04 keeps the same basic concept from earlier editions because the event is part of a wider push to bring more cross-country running back to North Rhine-Westphalia. Tobias Kofferschläger, who leads running at TSV, has said cross-country had faded from view and lacked varied race options, which is exactly the gap this meet is trying to fill.