After an evening of shovelling manure on the Hackney group run, the gang were unsure what kind of reception we would receive when we turned up at the restaurant unannounced and ponging.

But we needn't have worried, as there's always get a warm reception at Tad - a Hackney favourite for socials, due to the enormous portions of delicious Turkish food. As the huge piles of flatbreads and dips, salad platters, mezze, moussaka and shish arrived, we soon forgot about the whiff of our trainers and tucked in.

Tonight the group was celebrating Mireille's 50th good deed, as well as some recent great performances at the Big Half so it was cheers all round!

24 speedy GoodGymers ran 3k to Gascoyne Estate community garden and shovelled a cubic tonne of soil!!

Some new faces to Hackney this week, giving our GoodGym and Hackney first timers a warm welcome! Our returning Big Half Heroes we’re out in force after their magnificent efforts of Sunday morning, legs a bit tired but huge smiles from a massive achievement!!

With a little condensed time time to play with as the Bakehouse was closing up slightly early so we set off at pace to Gascoyne Estate, 10 minutes and we were in! Meeting up with Derek from the garden we set to work trying to make a dent in the monstrous pile of soil that the council had given them on Friday.

Thanks to Peter for bringing along extra wheelbarrows and shovels to allow us all to be as productive as possible!

Our help allowed the community garden to accept the 3 tonne soil delivery from the Council which allows not only community gardens to prosper but also residential Gardens to thrive with a little extra growing magic soil. Without the soil being moved away from pavements and parking bays it would be impossible for the soil donation to be accepted. Paying for the amount of soil to keep a community garden blooming is not viable.

We got stuck right in ferrying the soil to all corners of the community garden, using wheelbarrows, bins, big pots and anything else we could lay our hands on! Speedy shovelling and precision tipping made light work of this heavy duty task!

Making use of every available second we managed to squeeze in 55 minutes of soil shifting action before we took advantage of the local hospitality comprising of fruit and water then zipping back to base to grab our bags before they were locked in!

Great to see a big contingent head off for the monthly social to celebrate our Half marathon success as well as Mireille’s 50th Good Deed!!

Next week we will be heading off to Abney Park look forward to seeing you then!!

Smooth Running

Joel

Big shout out to GG First timer Ali for the epic pun!!

23 non stop GoodGymers ran over 8k to Clissold Park to lay over 100 metres of Mulch path for the new all weather running trail!!

Are January Mulch Marathon continued but this time with our first longer run of the year!!

Setting off at a dash to maximise our time even picking up Alice on the way. We headed a wiggly 4k our to Clissold Park to meet Hackney Park Ranger Bruce.

Tooling up in the well stocked shed on the far side of the park we go straight to work. Splitting up into little teams each team attacked a Mulch mound spreading it out on the pre dug track.

A variety of techniques on show with the shovel and barrow, rake the mulch mountain and even the scoop and chuck used to devastating effect!

Working a pace with time ticking we pushed on beefing out the paths to maximum thickness and taking down 6 huge mulch mounds.

Employing a staggered leave to use every last second at the task we got the Sexy paced runners leading the charge back to base then once the last chip had to been raked the speedy runners zipped down the 4.5k route back to base picking up some serious pace along the way!

Great effort on show by all and loving the Team Hackney vibe!! Hope to see you next week for our Group Run or if you are around come along to the Hackney Starter session and Parkrun on Saturday morning at the Marshes Centre.

Smooth Running

Joel

23 GoodGymers ran 6k to Abney Park Cemetery to shovel, barrow and tip mulch to create 80 metres of woodland foot path.

Great to be back in Abney!! And awesome to have so many new runners along for their maiden GoodGym voyage!!

With January Challenge Miles at a premium we set to work on the 3k Run to Stokey. We must have done something bad wrong last week as we had some bad traffic light karma. The Green people were not our friends! But given the amazing work we put in am sure our luck will change next time!

With the run under our belts we met Park Ranger Tom who locked us into the Cemetery, grabbed a barrow each and followed Tom deep into the Cemetery to find the biggest Mulch pile in London no doubt!!

Splitting into Barrowers and Shovellers we set up a slick system to ensure maximum impact! With 6 Shovellers going like the clappers and 20 barrowers zipping deep into the undergrowth to save the path with much mulch reinforcements! The steam was rising from the huge mulch pile and only served to fire up the squad to work even faster!!

Tipping faster and faster I accurately counted 554 barrow journeys completed in 40 minutes of lighting quick action!!

With 80 metres of path locked in we steamed out of the park (after saying goodbye to Tom) and continued our New Years resolution to get a little stronger by crushing 5 minutes of perfectly performed body weight strength exercises!

With body popping we cranked up the pace for the 3k Run back to base!!

All stretched out and smiles at the end after a top GoodGym evening!! Sign up and come along next week for a trip to the award winning Wilton Estate community Garden!

Anyone fancy joining me on Saturday for Hackney Marshes Parkrun? If you have one get your Red T-shift on and I will see you on the start line!

Have a great week

Smooth Running

Joel

13 GoodGymers Ran 4k to a new project for Cordwainers Grow as they revitalise an abandoned community garden hidden in the heart of Hackney.

After 2 weeks away even the heavy rain couldn’t keep us away!!

Heading off towards Hackney Downs we had a nice gentle run to ease us into 2018 while chatting through our festive season stories and wearing our next running Christmas gear!

2k later we were at the Garden to meet Kate from Cordwainers Grow! Zipping in, splitting into groups and getting stuck into a Proper GG task.

With A little destruction of 3 compost containers and shifting the compost over to create a big space for a monster amount of Mulch!!

With a nice relay going some speedy mulch shovelling into three wheel barrows which were speedily run over to tip into the newly created space where they can be used in the garden.

The third group were weeding, clearing and hoeing the patio area to leave it spotless and ready for some new plants to grow in the spring.

In 45 minutes of super productive action a tonne of Mulch was shovelled, shifted and tipped. The patio was looking pristine and the compost had been shifted. We worked so hard we even had a little accident with the trusty boom, which snapped in two!!

With a little time to play with we ran down to the Town Hall where we had our first go at trying to join the 100 Club in 6 minutes of epic strength and conditioning action!! 2 minutes of Press Ups, Squats and Burpees trying to muster the highest cumulative score as possible in a battle of You Vs You. Amazing effort put in by all!! Everyone who remembered to count set themselves a top score to better throughout 2018. A few very fit souls even topped 100 total reps!! A monumental 149 from *Bella * took the overall lead!!

Next week we will be heading to Abney Park for some more fun on a run!! See you there!!

Remember all your efforts running and GoodDeeding this moth count towards the January Challenge!! the groups and leaderboards will be on website (can’t find them yet)

Have a great week

Smooth Running

Joel

Third time's a charm.

After our last two planned tasks for the night had got scuppered, we finally had a task no one could cancel. We had a bulk of leaflets left over from a previous week that still needed delivering. These flyers were helping promote Wand's Project that provides support for people affected by the Grenfell Disaster. Gladys at Wand was quick to think on her feet just hours before we were due to meet and asked us to visit the Charecroft and Edward Wood Estates.

Let the festivities commence

There was a festive fancy dress theme for the evening. Ellie worn some fairy lights around her head and Jason had a very striking outfit (see the photos). After getting a group photo in front of the Christmas tree we set off towards Charecroft estate.

We almost couldn’t get into the buildings at first because the don’t allow people in to drop flyers. However once the security guard had heard about the project he was very impressed and allowed us in.

Then with flyers the spare we headed over the Edward Wood Estate, where we managed to deliver throughout Stebbing house .

After that it was once round Shepherd's Bush park before heading back to base. There Jason was crowned best ‘fancy' dressed and was rewarded with a edible Santa trophy. We had a big Secret Santa swap and Justine got the perfect present... a head torch (that will help make the pavements be a bit less treacherous for her knees..).

Festive fun and farewells

There was more festive fun afterwards when we went on to Bill's for a lovely Christmas dinner// December Social. There were crackers, bad jokes and tasty food. Plus, and farewell speech for Will who was moving back up North. Will has been coming regularly to Goodgym Hammersmith and Fulham since he moved to London in April. He’s been a fantastic addition to the gang and will be greatly missed. Make sure you give him a cheer when he comes back for the London Marathon.

Tonight it was round 2 as we once again met Nicola from A Mile In Her Shoes to help sort kit donations. We had 12 lovely runners including one newcomer Emily, big welcome!

We mixed things up tonight and did a hill session before the task by running over the the infamous West Walk to complete a few reps. To encourage/bribe the runners I promised prizes for the first person up the hill each sprint rep. Michael K and was first over the line on attempt number one and looked like he'd really worked hard for his haribo reward and second time round Tim bounded to victory to claim the treasured red GoodGym laces. Good work from everyone all round!

We then jogged down to The Kings Arms (a massive thank you to them for hosting us for the past two weeks) to start on the new batch of donations to sort. We had a few different things crop up this evening including an array of running knickers with delightful motifs printed on the bum, unfortunately not very useful for the charity but a good source of entertainment for the group!

Again even though there was a mountain to sort through this evening we got it all done and everything is now ready to be given out women who are finding their feet through running with this great charity. We will continue to work with A Mile In Her Shoes in the future but if you'd like to be involved more in the meantime head over to their facebook page and think about popping along to their free fun running fitness session on 16th December.

Last but not least a little shout out for Michael C who looked after Hannah on the run tonight as she is a little injured, it's lovely to see everyone working together and looking out for each other.

Great job tonight everyone, happy running!