6 Goodgymers met this Saturday morning to help with the final clear up from Lightopia - the Christmas light show that ended with the company going bust, leaving an almighty mess in the park!

We met Lisa from Crystal palace park trust at the bottom of the park and talked through the plan. 4 zones needed sweeping for metal spikes, pegs and the dreaded zip ties! Emma darted off towards the dinosaurs, I took the east side and the rest of the team started work on the middle. We all reconvened on the centre field where Sami led the way with his spike hunting skills, we must have cleared hundreds of the little sticks from that field alone. All in all we filled 4 bin bags, a job well done by all!

Puns provided mostly courtesy of Nick, Stephen and beer.

Apologies for the toilet humour in today's run report, but that's what happens when you go down to the loos today...

Urine for a big surprise!

And if you go down to Crystal Palace Park's toilets tomorrow you'll be greeted by some lovely green doors courtesy of a fantastic GoodGym team!

---

This evening's run began with a discussion about favourite transport methods (as you do) and welcoming brand new to GoodGym - Catherine and Kate - So lovely to have you along!!

🎵 Paint cistern, Go cistern 🎵

We had a brief warm up before doing a 2k loop of a pretty dark Crystal Palace Park (the clocks change soon 😬). When we got back to the bottom of the park we met Penny (from Penge) who equipped us with paint, gloves, foot coverings and brushes and we got straight to work turning the doors of the ladies loos green!

Penny's desire to get the loos looking lovely for the public was flush with what GoodGym do, so it didn't take long until coat 1 of 2 was applied.

Once we were done, we cleaned up and did a quick round of Rock, Paper, Scissors (with sprints and squats) and a bonus loop of the lake!

---

A great time at GoodGym without having to spend a Penny.

Yes, that's another toilet pun... 💩

Great stuff everyone!! 💥

Sign up to next week's alternative Group Run here...

In a galaxy far, far away...

Sam set himself a goal to reach 500 good deeds by the 24th December 2021.

He absolutely smashed that target, by 3 months and 16 days, and chose to spend it at a humble GoodGym Bromley group run, weeding a planter in Crystal Palace park's secret garden. What a hero.

---

May the 4 be with you

Tonight's four(m) troopers met outside the Bridge House, we went for a quick jog around the park, discussed the cooling drinks we would have at the pub afterwards and got a bit sweaty 🥵 It was nice.

We then met Penny from the park who gave us a couple of tasks:

1️⃣Nick and Hannah got to work sorting the container which had a bunch of tools in but lots were out of place. They were done in no time!

2️⃣Sam and I were in the secret garden (forgot to bring masks....) digging out weeds from a planter and trying to avoid the rosemary!

---

And if you were wondering where the Star Wars puns came from...

Afterwards, we decided to go on another loop of the park, this time all the way up to the top where the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra were delivering a concert of John Williams' scores. We couldn't see them, but we heard them blasting the Star Wars Main Theme 🚀

A pretty epic accompaniment to a beasty hill run and Sam's number 500 💯💯💯💯💯

Great work guys and a huge congrats to Sam for doing soooo much good. Enjoy the new t-shirt 😉

Ten terrific runners braved the heat (and the dinosaurs) in the lovely Crystal Palace Park. A big Bromley welcome to Carol and Rob who had joined us for some GoodGym tourism, and to Sam who has recently moved to the area.

The beer garden was full of post-work revellers but we resisted the lure of cold drinks and headed over to the park for a quick game of 'head, shoulders, knees and cone' to warm up, as if we weren't warm enough. Tim educated us on the foxglove tree that was shading us from the sun, which was fascinating stuff.

Whilst I thought nobody would want to do much running in the claggy weather and headed over to the task, the group thought differently and headed off for a lap of the lake, collecting Sam en-route, whilst I wrestled with the storage container doors to get our tools for the evening. Armed with litter pickers and rubbish bags, the group split up and headed around the lake, expecting the dinosaurs to be swamped with litter after the bank holiday weekend. We roamed the paths, picking up beer cans, dirty nappies (yuck) and wrappers, with Tim coming up with the unusual find of the night, a car registration plate. We were pleasantly surprised with how little rubbish there was.

Rounding everyone up once time was up was easier said than done, with half of the group missing in action. I headed off to try and find them but they soon reappeared from the opposite direction. Once we had piled our rubbish bags in the container, we just had time for a quick 1km time trial. The light was fading but everyone set off at pace, being heckled as they ran. Great work everyone.

Next weeks task will be a little more 'together' as we run to Lower Sydenham station to clear some overgrown paths. It's a slightly longer run at around 3km each way, but we'll regroup during the run and will have a back-marker in place so nobody will be left behind. Sign up here. Congratulations to Tim who will be running his 100th parkrun this Saturday at Bromley, go along and support him if you can.

Six superstars ran 2km and shifted gravel, weeded weeds and pruned brambles at the Secret Garden.

(I am quite ridiculously excited to have had the chance to use this pun at last! In the week when Stone Henge has been in the news as well!)

We had some half-marathon heroes out there at the weekend. Well done to Ian, who had a great run in the Southampton Half, running steady and strong from the start and enjoying the event. Bradley had a less relaxing time in Richmond, with the trains presenting challenges against getting there for a very early race start. He ran an incredible time but, with the race using the 'gun time' rather than 'chip time', he didn't quite get the time he wanted - we will watch his next race with great interest!

News!

• We have been asked to help out with the St Christopher's Fun Walk on Sunday May 19th, where they need volunteers at 12.15pm and 3.15pm - could you encourage the final finishers as they complete their challenge. Let me know!

• If you are coming along to South Norwood parkrun on Saturday May 25th, don't forget to email the parkrun team to let them know which role you would like to take: southnorwoodhelpers@parkrun.com - give your full name and your parkrun 'A-number' so they can find you easily on the system.

• The GoodGym monthly social is in Peckham this week, as our friends and neighbours at GoodGym Southwark play host. All details here - a chance to meet runners from other areas and to vote for the International Pun of the Month.

Our task was a local one this week, with a short run taking us into Crystal Palace Park. All tooled up, we trundled over to the Secret Garden, a magical hidden space, used by all sorts of groups, including a forest school. This week we had been instructed to use up all the gravel to cover the path at the top of the garden. With fast work from our barrow team, the stones were lifted, shifted and raked in record time, so it was on to weeding and pruning. The area is surrounded by trees, including a few Sycamores, so of course the paths are littered with tiny saplings, rapidly taking root. It can get a bit meditative pulling up the little blighters, so we gathered and chatted, enjoying the company of a pair of robins as we went.

Once our tools had been carefully placed back in storage, we quickly set-to with some running drills to warm up for the main event. Taking our very popular Time Trial course, we ran 1km at a conversational pace, then took on another with 'chain running', where the person at the back sprinted to the front, continuing in a chain whilst completing the lap - really great work, that is a tough one!

Next week we will return to Anerley Town Hall to move some items from the basement into a container - expect heavy lifting (there will be an alternative if you're not into lifting!). In the meantime, our runner Kerry will be tackling the Crystal Palace Triathlon at the weekend, so we wish her all the best and most importantly, all the fun!!

On a bright, chilly morning, eight eager runners helped to keep the Secret Garden looking lovely, covering 1km of running and drills.

How wonderful to be out in the fresh air to start our year as we mean to go on! A very big welcome to our newcomers, Rachel, Lizzy and Mary and welcome back and a Happy New Year to Clare, Darryl, Stephen and Oli!

Thank you also to Oli for our rather delightful title pun (and others in this report), we will be in the running for International Pun of the Month, surely?!

As this was a starter session, we did things a bit differently, meeting outside the Information Centre in Crystal Palace Park instead of our usual Bridge House. Well done to Clare, Stephen, Oli and Darryl, who ran Crystal Palace parkrun before meeting us, what a great start to the day! We did our introductions then I cracked open the container to gather tools. At this point Penny appeared, with a rather fancy trolley for us to use, so we piled everything in and trundled over to the Secret Garden. Here Penny told us about the various groups that use this space and we admired the lovely new community orchard that has popped up since our last visit - we will enjoy seeing this grow over time.

Top Secret: For Your (Mince P)ies only!

Once in the garden, we took our pick from the various tools and jobs on offer, with some grabbing rakes and clearing paths, some getting to work with loppers and shears and others tending to the raised beds. As we worked we were watched closely by a beautiful and very friendly robin, waiting patiently for any grubs and worms that we might unearth.

Time passed quickly and we were soon scooping up the last of the leaves, putting away the tools and gathering to warm up for our fitness session. It's always fun to get playful with our warm-up and even better to be able to see each other at this time of year! We did become the focus of attention for a very playful dog though, not so great! Today's session was looking at form, so we performed some drills to encourage high knees and to drive our arms, before we ran as a group around a 1km loop, picking up the pace on my signal - otherwise known as 'fartlek' (stop giggling a the back!).

As we finished our loop, I introduced a little game to embed the idea of driving our arms backwards, encouraging our upper bodies to be more still and our arms to do more work. To test this, we took to the hill, where I saw some really strong work from everyone - now just remember to switch this on next time your body tires and you start to lose form.

Tea-for-new (GoodGymers)

After a little stretch we went into the office, where Penny had very kindly left mince pies and Christmas cake for us to have with a hot drink - thank you, it was just what we needed! On Tuesday we will have our first Tuesday group run of 2019, when we will run up to the Upper Norwood Library Hub for some painting and general tidying - sign up here.

See you soon!