As Spring emerges and we prepare to change the clocks, Hitchin Nub News caught up with Jake "Papa Lièvre" Amos and Dave "Rhino" Wardle to see what the upcoming race calendar looks like around the town.

To kick off the warm weather season of events, we have the Hitchin 10km.

This year it is on 4th May, with the tagline "May the 4th Run With You!", so you can expect to see the Burnt Hare (BH) team in a Star Wars themed costume or two! And of course, some little nods to the film franchise as part of the race too, as we like to make sure that you have just as much fun at the event as the BH will.

Jake explained that there is a lot of interest in "the children's Golden Mile, a closed road one mile race for all children aged 5-15 years old, and, based on feedback, the children's race will go first this year, so that parents who are taking part in the 10km, will have the chance to run with their children in the mile, plus it would be great for the children to be cheered across the finish line by a thousand runners and spectators, making the children feel like rock stars, and this we hope will help inspire the young generation to see how much fun taking part in fitness activities can be!" 

As always the 10km features a town centre start and finish (with the new start line on Tilehouse Street), chip timing, medals for all finishers and prizes for the overall and age group winners too.

Dave said that "this year we also have an 80 strong choir, Somewhere 2 Sing, coming to sing and inspire you across the finish line too"

If people would like to run then they can sign up at www.burnthare.com and click on the 10km link to enter. If people would like to volunteer to marshal then BH are always grateful to anyone who can do so, and they always get little goodies too for doing so. 

In June we have the return of the Hitchin Half Marathon, or also affectionately known as the Hard Half, featuring the legendary "Heartbreak Hill". This year also sees an option to enter the Tough 10 miler too. This was the old Tough 10km, but with the town already having its flagship 10km in May, and no local 10 mile race, it was decided to offer this option to people to do so. 

July sees the return of the Hitchin Triathlon too. A swim, bike, run event that starts with a swim in Hitchin's outdoor 50m pool, giving you that outdoor feeling but within a safe environment to swim in, then it's off on their bikes into the countryside before returning to the pool grounds to complete the run section in and around the town centre areas. There are two options for this event for the adults, the Sprint distance or the Nitro distance (The sprint consists of a 400m swim, 20km bike, and a 5km run. The Nitro consists of a 200m swim, 12km bike and 2.5km run). There is also the Atom event too for the children, consisting of smaller distances and all of them off road too on Butts Close. 

September sees the return of the legendary Town centre 5km. This little icon of an event literally is the town centre for its route and is as intimate as it comes for a race, with spectators being able to see the runners several times before they cross the finish line.