Our terrific 10 braved the cold and the dark for an extended session, helping out Penny Lane Development Trust.

The first challenge of the evening was to find the meeting room. Our usual space, kindly lent to us each week by the Hope Street Hotel, was in use. Rather than using a room next door as we sometimes do, we adventured up to the 5th floor, and then found an extra mezzanine to climb up to. Once on the sixth floor we enjoyed a panoramic view of the city at night. It was a great room, nice and warm, and we were tempted to stay. But no, not when there were good deeds that needed to be done!

With the clocks just gone back it is really dark out, but nothing frightens a GoodGym runner! After a more vigorous than usual, weather beating warm-up, we headed off on the 4+km to Penny Lane. We were warmly greeted at the project and even given cups of tea and coffee to warm our cockles. Our task was to remove three rotten flower beds. Limited by lack of tools and lack of time, we managed to totally clear 2 of the 3 beds (not bad, eh Meatloaf?!).

This week's shout outs go to Sam, who has quickly turned from a newbie into a dependable regular and is managing to run further than he knew he could. And to Mat for spreading the GoodGym love far and wide, and for coming up with the title pun.

Back on the road and we retraced our steps in great time. I was hugely impressed by all of the runners who kept a solid pace on a longer than usual run, on the coldest night we've ever run together (yet...!). Nice one.

Next week we're back to a newbie friendly distance of around 2km each direction and don't tell Central Office but we're going to skip the fitness session in favour of some 5 November sparklers! So sign-up now and tell your friends.

An heroic effort this week from our neighbourly nine.

On a blisteringly hot evening, the team tackled the heat and the busy roads to make it (a little later than expected) to Penny Lane Development Trust (yes THAT Penny Lane, welcome to Liverpool!). We were met by the lovely Julie who explained the plan to transform an older flower bed into a community food growing initiative. And while we didn't have quite as long as we'd have liked to complete the task, the team quickly got to work digging, cutting and pulling out all of the old plants and weeds.

Shout outs go to fab newbie Sara, who together with Adam and John, managed to upheave some real monster roots.

We couldn't resist a bit of Beatles tourism on the way back (check the photos!) and took a slightly longer but super scenic route via the rest of Penny Lane, Sefton Park and Princes Park for some lovely green and shaded paths on the way back to base, clocking 8.8km in total. What a fantastic effort team!

Next week, while I can't turn down the temperatures I deffo will turn down the distance with a task at Jubilee Sports Bank that involves a steady 2km run in each direction. Although, there is a Strava segment I reckon we should give a bash... ;) Sign-up now to this newbie friendly session and then send the link to a mate.

Don't forget we have our social run on Sunday (at the beach!) so let me know you're coming here.

See you next time, Char <3