© Kap Course
Torchlight Run in Louvain-la-Neuve: May the Flame Be With You
26/11/2025 16:04When night falls over Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium’s student city slips into a completely different skin. The Torchlight Run floods its streets with hundreds of glowing torches, and every relay becomes its own tiny adventure shared among friends. Students run, laugh, pass the flame like a secret that needs to stay alive, and turn the Belgian night into a quirky, warm, and magical sports celebration. The 2025 edition took place on 12 November.
Marc from “Le Flambeau : Les Aventuriers de Chupacabra” would probably faint on the spot—if that eccentric fictional character ever wandered his way over to central Belgium. Louvain-la-Neuve, already an unusual university town by day, transforms completely when the Torchlight Run, organised by the student collective Kap Course, sweeps through the countryside campus. Once a year, the streets light up under a choreography of torches painting orange streaks across the buildings. It’s a night where students run, shout, cheer each other on, and turn the darkness into an offbeat sports festival.
The race unfolds on a roughly 1 km loop through the heart of Louvain-la-Neuve and runs in relay format for 90 minutes. Each runner completes one lap before handing the torch to a teammate—over and over again.
Between the cobblestones, the sharp turns, and the packed cheering zones, the accelerations pile up quickly. Each relay is short but intense. You often see runners finishing their lap with the flame flickering to the rhythm of their footsteps. It looks like a scene from an adventure movie filmed right in the middle of student life.
The handover zone is always buzzing—flares sometimes, shouts often, smiles always. The goal is simple: rack up as many laps as possible in 1h30, tracked electronically.
| When the City Goes Dark, the Party Begins
Night settles gently over the Grand-Place. Terraces close, the paving stones cool down, windows glow one by one. A solemn quiet drapes the campus. Then the first flames appear at the far end of the street. Nothing but a few bursts of laughter from warming-up teams. In the dark, the light slowly advances, as if someone were switching the city on from within.
The Torchlight Run is far more than a basic relay. Everything revolves around this glowing torch being passed from hand to hand every ten minutes or so. One team carries it, another takes over, then another again. The gesture has a charm of its own: in the night, silhouettes brush past each other and the flame changes hands like a secret entrusted to someone who must keep it alive.
| The Torch Tells Its Own Story
In Louvain-la-Neuve, each handover feels like a tiny piece of theatre. The runner arrives out of breath—sometimes laughing, sometimes on the verge of cracking. Their teammate waits, eyes fixed. The torch passes. Fingers touch for a split second. And the next silhouette disappears into the night. Spectators love this moment. Phones flip on, flames dance on screen, and Instagram turns the evening into a glowing tapestry.
The loop winds through the town centre, weaving between narrow alleyways, bright squares, and packed cheering zones where spectators shout encouragement at each torch exchange. The city sounds like a mini festival—music, shouts, applause, jokes tossed into the night. Students run to stack up laps, but also to be part of a ritual. The time doesn’t matter. The torch is enough to make everything else fade away. A small stick of wood and fire—and suddenly, the night becomes a game. A celebration. A new way of experiencing the city.
| A Finale Worthy of the Night
When the torches finally burn out and the last relays draw to a close, Louvain-la-Neuve slowly returns to its usual rhythm. Runners gather around the stands. Comments fly, jokes too. Some teams pose with their now-cold torches to immortalise the night. The town still breathes under a thin veil of smoke and that unmistakable scent of a sports event run under the stars.
The Torchlight Run leaves behind glowing memories and a strong sense of collective joy—the feeling of having run together in a setting that only exists once a year. A unique moment where the city, the sport, and the celebration move forward hand in hand.
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Dorian VUILLET
Journalist
