On Tuesday we ran in the rain to St Augustine’s to assist Sue.

As customary prior to us arriving Sue would send me an email with all the tasks she have for us to complete. Today’s email;

Dear Conroy, looking forward to seeing you all again this evening. Usual mix of heavy and light options. Woodchip delivery in the car park needs moving including loading into some ton bags and sweeping up afterwards. Lighter options include moving some smaller bags to spots around the garden, more edging / trimming the grass edges and sweeping the car park at the end. There's also a small dead tree to cut down / remove and a couple of smaller bushes to dig out. Lots of options as usual. Sadly I'm on crutches so not able to do much. Grrrr. Sue.

Dear Conroy and all you wonderful people, thank you for your work last night. I can't thank you enough. Such a relief to have the car park as good as cleared and sustainably packed mulch for the future. On June 27th 10.45 the garden at St Augustine's will be assessed by RHS. Sue have requested to have one representative from GoodGym Croydon.

On Tuesday, we had some sun and a lot of rain, I spent a lot of my time looking out the window during the day hoping the forecast rain for the evening was not going to happen but the weather forecast was right. Despite the weather forecast it was good to have Emily back for her second outing with us glad to see she was not put off by us on her first visit and we were not too lairy when we went out for drinks.

We ran 3.46km in the rain and wind to assist Sue in the community garden at St Augustines Church. On the journey to the task I was tempted to burst out in a song "We are running in the rain" but I was able to contain myself as I remembered that singing was not one of my strong suits.

When we arrived Ingrid and Sue had already began working on the tasks, so we just all jumped in as it was pouring and there was no time for standing around.

Looking at the transformation of the church yard and the now blooming flowers, it does take me back to that hot day in July 2018 when we started to help out at St Augustine's.

Thank you and the fantastic team for working in the stormy rain last night. It was good to see so many new members too as well as familiar faces who noticed how well the new trees and garden have come along over the years due to their efforts . What a great job emptying the compost and bagging up ready to mulch. Guess there are some good snaps of drenched runners. Looking forward to seeing you all again May 9th. Sue.

Next week, Liz will be leading the group in my absence, please come and support her sign up you don't want to miss out on her surprise

Last night 9 Good Gymers ran over 6.5km to help Sue at St Augustine's Church improve the soil in the church flower beds with composted leaves and grass.

Although it started off as a chilly night, a quick warm up and we were all feeling toasty and set off at a gentle pace down to South Croydon. We arrived at the church to find three runners already there and making a great start on the task. Sue asked us to clear the grass away from a new bed the church is creating and move the turf into some patchy areas of the lawn. It was an atmospheric evening as we arrived in mist and worked to the music of the choir practice. Ingrid also set to work cutting away the grass to make a larger circle of earth around one of the new trees which both makes it easier to cut the grass and to water the roots. We helped move a large bag of compost Sue had made from leaves and grass into smaller bags and carried them round to the new bed ready to make a lovely border.

It was a lot of work all done very quickly and the gardens will look great for it. Join us next week when we will be Keeping Croydon Beautiful.

Last night 6 members of Goodgym Croydon met at Solutions Gym to run to our task for the evening at St Agustines' church.

Before we set off we all chatted and checked how we spent our weekend, including talking about the VLM and who had entered the ballot for next years event.

**Big congratulations to our parkrun journey woman Nicola who over the weekend completed her 500th parkrun and 400th different parkrun. I remember Nic planning for this pre-pandemic and I am happy that almost two years on she has finally got the chance to achieve this great achievement.

On Saturday while most long distance runners were getting ready for the VLM, Nicola was running with Grace Momanyi she has the picture to prove it look through the photos.

After listening to Nicola's fantastic weekend of running we did our warm up then set off jogging to St Augustines', where Sue had been awaiting our arrival with her three new lights to ensure we could complete our task.

There were some tree stumps to be moved and placed in a circular shape, Sue had acquired from a local resident which she informed us that while out on her stroll and being nosey, she spotted them in the resident's yard and she knocked the door to enquire if she could have some for her project to which the resident was happy to offer some.

After moving and placing the logs there were still a few more bits to do, collecting two benches that had been donated by another local resident to the garden, digging a hole for a fig tree that was in a neighbour's garden that was being donated.

Four of us went off with Sue to collect the benches while two remained back at the garden under the watchful eyes of the Vicar, by the time we returned with the benches the hole was finished being dug, which left only one more task to be completed. Digging up two massive iris sibirica plants for Sue to separate them into smaller plants and plant through out the garden. (I totally forgot the name of the plant and had to call Sue to remind me of the names, she informed me that the garden was looking lovely this morning and that she will be letting her neighbour knows the spot is ready for the fig to be planted.)

With all our tasks completed Sue informed us she had baked a bread pudding for us which we ate before running off back to our start location.

Next week we will be heading to Park Hill to do some work in the walled garden sign up here to join us.

Last night 6 members set off from solutions to run to St Augustine's where we were going to assist with getting the garden and church yard ready for the community showcase on Saturday. As the weather was hot we ensured that we took a nice jog gentle jog to the task. When we arrived there were 5 other members awaiting our arrival with Sue. We greeted each other including having a mini presentation for YasserYasser, where he was presented with a pair of new running shoes from Sue.

As usual Sue had a list of things she wanted us to do, after reading out the list members volunteered for the roles they wanted to do and went off with the appropriate tools to help them do their selected task.

I woke up this morning ready to write the run report but after checking my email to see the below message from Sue I knew I would not be able to top her comments so I'll let her tell you what we did.

Thank you all so much for what you did yesterday. It was beyond perfection in the early morning light today. The under beech area is almost level after years of GG attention, benches clean preserved even fragrant, trees and bushes perked up with water, all rubble neatly stacked, bags of beech nut mulch collected, gabion completed and more. Great up beat event from the start with humour throughout. Some of my best bits include Yasser breaking into a hip wiggling dance when asked to wiggle the gabion, people quietly holding torches so we could work in the dark, quietly helping each other on new tasks, noticing the difference they have made like trees planted and beds developed and cleared over the years and stories of me being sucked into wet holes during big bush and tree planting endeavours. A great evening all round. We can't thank you enough and hope everyone enjoyed it too. Sue.

ps. no one was sitting down on the job even if there is photographic evidence.

It was an amazing sight walking around the church yard as I remembered what it looked like before we started helping out to what it has been transformed to now. Sue and the local community has turned the space into an amazing community space, however there was that disappointing sign warning off the plant thieves.

Next week we will be heading to Wandle park to help the friends of Wandle Park please walk with your head torches as we will be working in darkness towards the end of the task.

Signup to next weeks task here

Today we welcomed Emma to her first group run, had it not been for my announcement that it was her first run you would have thought she has been running with us since we started. It's always good to see how quickly the new members integrates into the group.

Our task today was at St Augustines's Church, we visited twice this year before all in preparation for today. Today all the rubble and rubbish we had cleared away over our last two visits had to be packed into the skip. We arrived at the church where we were met by Bill and Sue who had began to put the rubbish into the skip.

For those who didn't want to do the lifting there were a few areas still to be sieved and the rubble placed into buckets that would later be emptied into the skip.

Sue told us that there wasn't much instructions for us, unlike last time when she had job cards for the various job she wanted us to do, today's job was quite simple. All we had to do was carry the rubbish to the skip and pack it evenly so everything would fit in it. There was a lot of rubbish to be emptied into the skip. Given the amount of lifting to be done and despite there being 12 of us Sue did notice that her two strong men were missing Dan and Andy never the less we all got stuck in and within 30 minutes we had emtiped everything into the skip and had time for some light refreshments, as always Sue ensures that we refuel before heading off on our return run. Dan and Andy was unable to make it today but we put on a good show in there absence, especially our strong woman, Emma. Changing of the gaurds some would say or when one door closes another is opened.

Next week we will be celebrating our 3 years anniversary to mark the occasion, Councillor Louisa Woodley who is the chair of the Health and Well-being Board will be sending us off she helped launch us 3 years ago.

For next week only we will all meet Bernard Weatherhill House, 8 Mint Walk Croydon, CR0 1EA, though if you need to change and drop off your bags, go to Solutions to lock them away and head down.

There is also a competition to see who can bring the most extra people. Winners and prizes will be announced and distributed at the celebratory drinks in the Porter and Sorter

Thanks to the anonymous writer for the below paragraph and the participants who will remain nameless and represented by (?,! and %) to protect their identities.

During our warm up, Conroy took out two surprise objects from his bag for this weeks activity. Before we had a chance to see what these were "?" shouted with excitement "Balls!". There was a ripple of giggling at the back of the line as "?" quickly ordered us to be quiet . "This can't make the run report" she hissed whilst blushing. "!" turned around and reassured "?", "don't worry it cant sound as bad as what I've just done. I don't know how I'm going to explain that I've pulled a muscle during a workout whilst passing balls through my legs to the girl behind me." The giggles returned followed by lots of "Shhh" as Conroy approached. During the task, the group were asked to load large bags of rubble into smaller boxes to transport to the skip. "%" immediately got stuck in and grabbed a spade to try and shovel some of the rubble into the boxes. As the spade bent in half she swapped to trying to use her hands. "%" quickly discovered this was a better approach she proudly announced " Yep, this one here is definitely a hand job guys". The group laughed like naughty children before "%" insisted we were quiet. " This cant make the run report. No one will ever want to join the Croydon group."