Hello!
I love to run
It's definitely my posion of choice so far as exercise goes. I have found its worked miracles on my legs and bum but also helped my core strength and toned my arms and back.
I don't really have any races coming up any time soon. The nearest ones are in Winter (16km mountain run in July and a 14km fun run in August).
Because it's summer here and far to hot to be running great distances (unless I get up at 5:00am - not happening!) I am mainly treadmilling it at the moment with a nice outdoor run on the weekends...when its not searingly hot from dawn to dawn!
Come early next month I am going to start increasing my distances again out to 30kms. I'd love to get up to marathon distance (40kms).
My speed is okay - I do about 5k in 20 mins. For me I found (if you go to a gym) Spinning classes are wonderful for increasing you running capacity and speed. Otherwise interval sprints - slow jog and then all out til you can't go any further, slow jog then all out etc.