Christmas comes, but once a year, and so does this very special task for GoodGym Woking. The purpose was to assist Woking Foodbank with filling 50 bags with 36 food items ready for distribution to Woking residents who likely find December a particularly challenging time of year.

As usual, the GoodGym Woking team was delighted to be requested again to help Woking Foodbank with this vital service: to provided free food to vulnerable Woking residents. The GG 12-strong crew arrived at the task ready to help bring some Christmas cheer to others less fortunate. The team, welcomed by Alison, the Foodbank Project Manager, arrived at 6.30 pm; some had travelled together in Wayne's car or made their way to the location independently. Anne ran 4.5 km to the location, and Kirsty ran a shorter distance from her house to the Foodbank premises. Both ladies are participating in a Good Gym Woking group distance challenge to raise funds for mental health charities by 'running up to Christmas'. Every km helps!

The GG crew was excited. The excitement increased seeing Wayne wearing his fancy Christmas shirt, the girls put on their December tutus, provided by Kirsty, (GG red, of course), and the boys wore light-up Christmas woolly hats. Everybody was very enthusiastic about dressing up, having heeded Kirsty's warning that any 'Grinches' would have to complete a set of dreaded burpees!

Adam, Alys, Anne, Rebecca, Caterina, Julie, Katie, Kirsty, Lauren, Louise and her son Henry, Nadia & Wayne were ready to begin the task. Wayne quickly gathered the list of 36 items provided by Alison. He nominated each item from the list to an individual whose job it was to collect them . Meanwhile Rebecca carefully counted out 50 bags ready to be filled with said items. Having previously completed the challenge on many occasions in an organised fashion, GG Woking was confident of being faster than ever.

Organised quickly turned into disorganised chaos as the 12 elves raced around the unit collecting the required articles losing count and their way in the process. Order was eventually restored, and enough of each item was located. Adam and Rebecca were designated 'quality control', ensuring each of the 50 bags contained the requisite items, then lining up 'finished' bags in neat rows of 10. Some of the 'finished' bags had to be completed more than once, and 5x10 is harder to count, with 'helpful' teammates darting in and out with an item that had been missed. Wayne was spotted checking the list more than twice.

Everyone felt pleased as the task was achieved; it was time for the obligatory team photo in front of the 50 stuffed bags of goodies. We all agreed this was our favourite task of the year, and we hope we are invited back next year. Then we may remember to use a systematic approach ! :) Everyone bundled outside and on to our GoodGym Christmas party at the new Sky Bar in Woking town centre!

Lighthouse Foodbank

On this chilly evening Wayne, Nadia, & Julie met at Woking leisure center.

Wayne got Nadia a little gift a head torch, but Nadia had already bought a light vest which was very fancy 😀

From here They ran from the back of the Park up the hill, Traffic seemed very bad this evening around the area. We got to the foodbank and were surprised to see the lighthouse closed. We has a little walk around the town and headed back to the lighthouse but the shutters were still down. Wayne double checked his email just to check there was no mix up with dates.

We waited till about 19:10 and then decided to head back to the leisure center. We ran 🏃‍♀️back down hill and got talking about what races we were all looking to sign up to.

We got back to the park said our good byes and headed home.

This Sunday Woking Junior Park are still looking for volunteers.

Hope to see you all soon. 😀

Wayne and Anne ran to Woking Foodbank for our monthly cleaning task.

Before reaching the venue, Wayne ran to Woking Park to investigate the spot where Kirsty fell over yesterday during a training session. Poor Kirsty has broken her right elbow (she is right handed). I am sure you will all join me to wish her a prompt recovery.

Alison from the foodbank asked us to send her best wishes to both Kirsty and Adam who is also recovering from a running injury.

Every Thursday the foodbank opens in the evening to allow more people to benefit from their services. Once the last customer had left, we tackled the vaccum cleaner, the broom and the mops. In no time the floor was sparkling clean! To thank us, Alison offered us to take some baguettes which were left over from the fresh products on display.

Will you join us this coming Sunday to celebrate the 7th birthday of Woking junior parkrun? James will be the run director and would greatly appreciate your joining the GG team.

Next Wednesday, we will help the Knaphill Community Fridge to perform a deep clean and then you may wish to join us for our summer social meal.

All events are publicised on the GoodGym Woking page.

In the meantime, happy running to everyone.

This evenings task was to carry out a deep clean at the foodbank but then a last minute request from a local charity to deliver leaflets to highlight up and coming martian race

On this beautiful evening Wayne, Nadia, Kirsty, & James met at Woking leisure centre. Katie ran from home and met us at the foodbank. Julie also met us at the foodbank as she came straight from work. Adam who is currently nursing a injured ankle which happened during the Richmond 1\2 marathon walked to the foodbank Hats off to him 👍🏻

James brought along a ruck sack which had over a 1000 leaflets which Kirsty volunteered to put on for the first half of the run (Up until we got the the hills 🤣). While running we were hearing about Nadia recent trip to Singapore it sounded amazing. Once we got the the first hill Wayne took the ruck sack and continued running up the hill to the foodbank. When we arrived we met the rest of the gang along with Allison who gave us our tasks.

Nadia, Adam, & James were on sweeping & hoovering duties. Kirsty was giving the shelves a good wipe down, while Julie & Katie were following behind with the mops. Wayne was doing a littles bit of everything 😄.

in no time we had given the whole place a deep clean and the place was looking and smelling fresh. We took our customary photo on the famous stairs said our good byes and headed off to the apartment blocks to deliver the leaflets for te up and coming Martian Race 👽. With James knowledge of all the blocks we managed to hit the first block which had 76 letter boxes. After that we went to the 2nd block were we did another 124 letterboxes. In total we did 442 apartments which was pretty good going 🏃🏼‍♂️.

Once we finished we headed back to the leisure centre and said our goodbye's.

This Sunday we have two tasks. Volunteering at Junior Park Run And The All Aboard club building the big train set. We have reached the max amount of volunteers for the All Aboard but plenty still needed for park run.

Next Wednesday we are running to the All Saints Parish Church In Woodham. We will be meeting at WWF by the steps along the canal.

See you then. 😄

This evening was our first group run for a while and it lovely running while still light ☀️.

Wayne , Anne, & Alys, along with Quinn met at the leisure centre and ran up the hill to the local foodbank at the lighthouse.

Rebecca, & Julie met us at the foodbank as they were coming straight from work. It was nice to see Allison again who runs the foodbank as it was our first visit back in a while.

We quickly distributed our roles for the evening. Wayne & Julie were on sweeping and hoovering duties while Anne & Rebecca followed behind with their mops. Alys with her cloths was on wipe down 😄 with Quinn supervising us all 🐶.

Rebecca who is currently training for the London Marathon has her final longish run this weekend before the big day 🏃🏼‍♂️ we all wish her well and will be following her on the day.

Anne continues with her training for the San Fransisco marathon, Anne has really been getting the miles in 🏃🏼‍♂️ keep going Anne.

In no time we had given the foodbank a deep clean the smelled and looked good. 😄

We said our goodbyes and headed back to the Leisure Centre.

Keep an eye out for more tasks which will be listed soon.

Last night we headed to the Foodbank to help pack up the bags for Chrismtas.

We had a great turn out with members and welcomed Victoria to her first GoodGym Group run experience. Well done to Rachel, James, Adam and Anne ran just over 4km to Knaphill Food bank in the Landsbury estate. The obviously had the run back.

It started off an eventful night with Anne and Lauren getting locked in the porridge cupboard and Sharon, Rosie and Rebecca being lost in the car park.

Once we were all ready we had 55 bags to load, we started by getting all the goods in crates. We were all assigned a good to pack and got in a line, with Kirsty starting the Conveyor belt it made it down the line to be taken into reception ready to be given out to those in need.

Last night was out last session of 2023 and my last offical Group run as area activator. I will be helping out in the background until a new activator can take over but due to personal reasons I will not be able to continue.

Remember to join in for the first session in January - more sessions will be appearing soon for you to sign up to.

Have a Wonderful Christmas and a Happy New Year.