What a year it has been. Last night 50 runners celebrated 51 runs, which is a colossal 102 hours of doing good, in Wandsworth. We've been to schools, cancer charities, community gardens, food banks, independent theatres and refugee support groups. We've covered an enormous 295 kilometres together, have run races, made wonderful friends and have done too many squats to count. You've made GG Wandsworth the wand-erful place it is, gang!

We had a whole bunch of ace new runners join us to celebrate, people of GoodGym give a huge cheer to Steph, Nick, Georgia and Cathy! There was some lovely GG tourism - hello Patrick, Katie, Pritesh and Andy - and we even shared our anniversary with birthday boy Dan. So much good stuff!

To mark this special run we were heading back to our very first task at the Katherine Low Settlement, an amazing charity that works to tackle poverty and build stronger communities. They run a range of community projects to support children, older people and refugee communities in Wandsworth. And we love them! But first we had some warming up to do. After a few dynamic exercises we found out what makes everybody happy. From cheese, to puppies, Goodgym to birthdays, we really a cheerful bunch.

Like a small do gooding army, we set off for KLS and smashed out the 2k run in no time. While half of us headed inside to wash down walls, deep clean the kitchen, clear the cellar and scrub windows, the other half got busy outside with a fun fitness session. We played planking lions, pass the parcel, and a moderately successful musical workout to Squats and Shots. We swapped teams, and then finished off the night with a monster game of Clusters.

To run back we divided up into three groups depending on pace, and finished up back the BAC at pretty much the same time. Great running, team. After a few stretches, there was a very beautiful collage of happy memories, and we headed up to the common to see off the night right - with a quiz and a picnic. Well done to the winners who won with a brilliant visual representation of GG Wandsworth, and also guessed the Snakes on a Plane quiz question correctly.

Here's to an amazing year - bring on Year Two of running and doing good in Wandsworth! Let's kick it off with a cracking run next week.

Happy Golden Run Anniversary, Wandsworth! Over the past year we have run together to make the borough 50 times better, which is pretty amazing. It is a nice little warm up for next week when we will be celebrating our very first birthday. Join us for a special celebratory run, some fun little surprises, and a picnic after the run. So grab your party hat and sign up here.

So many congratulations this week - you've been busy, team. First a huge well done to the lovely Sophie who has motored through the good deeds, and shares her 50th good deed with Wandsworth's 50th run. That is some very pleasing symmetry. Way to go, Sophie!

Another huge well done to Sally who had a cracking run at the Richmond Half on Sunday (and still turned up to run on Monday!) and came in as 5th woman in a huge field. Wow.

During our warm up session outside we asked which one food we would choose to eat for the rest of our lives. I suspect some of you would last longer than others, with answers ranging from cheese to malteasers. Peanut butter came in as one of the top answers, plus various forms of curry. This picnic next week is shaping up to be a belter.

We only had a short run to our task tonight, so we set off at a nice lick and arrived at the Omnibus theatre. This lovely place receives absolutely no guaranteed funding or statutory support, and box office proceeds only cover a fraction of its income. They rely on donations and volunteers to keep the doors open and to provide creative opportunities for the whole community, so we're always happy to lend a hand.

Tonight's job was to clear a newly acquired section of land at the back of the building which was very overgrown. It has a lovely apple tree right in the centre and the aim is to turn it into a garden plot where botanical gin will be grown to sell at the Omnibus bar. Gang, I think it's only right we come back and check out the finished product after our efforts. Who's in?

Annoyingly, someone (cough, me) forgot to take a before shot, so there's no photographic evidence of our work. Shame, because as Ben said, 'this is probably the best example of swarm of locust efficiency'. Still, we got a nice after shot - check out the pics attached.

Job done, we took ourselves off to the common to do a fitness session which involved dividing up into teams of five. There was a bag of exercises to complete, and whoever had collected the most slips of paper at the end won. How one team, who shall remain nameless, got three freebie passes, is unclear, but the ultimate winners came in with a massive 11 sets of exercises complete. As a reward they got to choose a game. They selected, um, a core blast.

After a series of exercises that strengthened our abs, we set off back to the BAC, with Jo, Luke and Matthew making a dash for the end. All that was left to do to mark the end of our 50th run was a few stretches and a drink at the bar to celebrate Sophie's landmark good deed.

Have a great week, Wandsworth, and see you next week for our birthday party!

14 FANTASTIC @GGSHEFF runners ran 4km to help a local community Co-op get back to their roots and develop a community club garden.

After a welcome back to Kat & Ash and hearing about their trip to Peru we all took a strong squat circle position for our pre run brief and headcount before setting off to Reagther with SENSATIONAL STEVE as our trusty back marker.

On arrival at Regather DANGEROUS DOUG greeted us with water, tools and a brief for the evenings task which this time around involved:

• Litter picking

• Digging up massive roots

• Hand weeding

• Berry picking

The team did an amazing job with some real trophy roots being claimed! The garden is really developing and taking shape thanks to all our runners efforts!

Following the task we dealt the Cards of destiny for some *FANTASTIC FITNESS which this week comprised of;

• Inch Worms

• Wall Sit

• Burpees

• Plank

• Squats

• Lunges

With a top effort being put in from all we had a quick drink and polished off the left over berries we had harvested and ran back to the Showroom Cinema with a speedy sprint finish from Sarah who is making great progress in her running!

We stretched off among special guests DELIGHTFUL DAVE fresh off the train from Manchester and HIPPY HARRY who used the #redthunder to identify his location to his friends across the train tracks (he's not shy).

With the Striders Ladybower 10K on Fri, Park Run get together on Sat and Chatsworth 10k on Sun there is plenty of GG action to get involved with this weekend so head to the race section of the website to find out more and sign up!

Don't forget to sign up to next weeks run to Abbeydale Picture House!

GoodGym Sheffield is funded by Age Better in Sheffield in association with South Yorkshire Housing Association and the Big Lottery fund. Find out about the project here and sign up to visit an older person with GoodGym and end social isolation in Sheffield here

Could we....dare we believe...might it possibly be summer? It was the perfect night for a run last night - warm, sunny, and brimming with lovely runners.

A massive GG welcome to the excellent Chantelle, Ben, James and Elizabeth, all of whom joined us for their very first Wandsworth run last night. Give them a cheer, people!

We had a loooot of congratulations to give last night - you've been very busy people! So - deep breath - an enormous pat on the back for Sarah, who casually ran a marathon on SUNDAY and still came along, to our fabulous fresh from Riga Racers Sophie, Jessie, Dave, Jack and Vix, to Matthew for a park run PB, to Luke for doing a mammoth 100k walk, Jo (and her mum) for doing a bit of park run tourism, and to Alyx for doing a whole lot of lovely good deeds. You are all superstars.

It was bound to be a great run last night after kicking it off in our fave teletubby room, but the sun was shining and our task was waiting, so after a quick hello we made our way outside for some warm ups and to get to know each other a little better. Tonight we found out what everybody likes to whack on the BBQ (thanks for the inspiration Jack!). The shock winner tonight was....halloumi! Who knew that little cheesy squeaker was so popular. With that decided we headed off for our task at Balham Baptist Church.

We have been working at the church a few times now, forming a human chain to empty a room of junk so that it could be turned into a foodbank. We've discovered some exciting things in the past - a huge crucifix, a mannequin, records, a pair of oars - but tonight we were down to the last big stuff. We filled the van with doors, chairs, planks and a lot of nails, and just managed to squeeze the final few bits into the van before declaring it Job Done. Way to go team, it's great to see a task done from start to finish, and especially one that would have taken the team at the church much longer to complete.

We waved goodbye to Pastor Jim, and set off to the common, where we smashed out a fitness session. Starting off by buddying up, we found out something nice about our partner. Jo found out that Ruth works with children with hearing impairments, while Luke found out that Dave had missed him when he was in Riga. So lovely. Then, while one person was doing a shuttle run, the other was doing a strengthening exercise - either holding a plank, squat, doing press ups or ab crunches. There was some interesting running from Will and Matthew, both trying to make each other suffer with the plank segment as long as possible - bet you can feel those abs today! Then we moved onto our core triathlon, before finishing the evening off with a quick game of British Bulldog. That was a tough session tonight, so well done everyone. Back to the BAC we went, finishing off a splendid evening of running with some stretches. Next week it's bank holiday but that doesn't faze us - we'll still be running as usual, as well as having a drink or two afterwards to celebrate. You can sign up here, and I hope you do!

https://www.goodgym.org/happenings/distributing-flyers

Hey Wandsworth, check you out! Delivering a couple of hundred flyers for our local re-use and recycling charity, sorting out a whole pile of fabric, and smashing out an 11k run. So casual! What a bunch of doing gooding, muscle-building legends you are. First of all, let’s give a big GG Wandsworth welcome to Kate who joined us for her first run last night. Lovely stuff. A massive well done also to all our excellent park runners – we had three of you do Tooting on Saturday, and one do Wimbledon Common. It’s fantastic to see so many of you representing GoodGym, and I think we can all agree it’s the perfect way to start the weekend. Sarah also deserves a cheer for all that running that got her to top of the distance leader board this week. On behalf of all the Wandsworth team not in Riga this weekend, it’s an enormous good luck and cheer from us to all our runners tackling the 10k and half marathon races in a matter of days. You got this! Jack, Sophie, Dave, Tom, Jim , Jessie and Amy - we’re behind you every step of the way!

We talked about the GoodGym Olympics – you have less than one week to sign up to defend Team Wandsworth’s honour on the 10th June. You can do that here, and you definitely should – it promises to be a cracking day full of fun and a little bit of competitiveness. Let’s start limbering up.

There was a champagne reception going on last night at our starting point – our invitation must’ve got lost in the post – so we had a quick headcount outside. This week we discussed everybody’s favourite spot in London – if there was any doubt, you can tell we’re a group of runners from the number of parks that topped the list. Richmond, Battersea, Hyde, Wimbledon, Bushy, Kew and a few others all got a mention, along with ‘my house’, and ‘beer garden’. It was set to be quite a long run last night, and with just over 5k to get to our task, we set off at a steady lick. Before long Nick and Will were leading us across Wandsworth Common to reach the Work & Play Scrapstore in Tooting. It’s a tough run, but so worth it, as this is one of GG Wandsworth’s favourite organisations.

”The Scrapstore is my favourite spot in London” said Sophie.

Half the team divided up into groups to deliver flyers for the community event the charity is putting on. The theme for the event, ‘Hazelfest’, is artful re-use and the emphasis will be on getting people on Hazelhurst Estate to get involved and be creative. The other half were tasked with sorting out a huge pile of ribbons and elastic, cutting them into sections and bagging them up.

”Team Ribbon had an excellent time” said Team Ribbon.

There were still a few flyers to hand out, so off we went on our merry way down Garrett Lane, posting our flyers as we went. We said goodbye to a few runners who elected to get public transport back for the last section of the run, while the rest of us made it up the ‘undulating’ road to the BAC.

With 11k under our belt, all that was left was a stretch and a nice pat on the back. Next week we have a shortish run to a beautiful community garden with lovely views over the city. You can sign up for it here. See you then for another Monday evening making Wandsworth better and getting fitter!

Tonight we truly Mondayed the Monday out of Monday. It all began, as all good Monday evenings do, at the Battersea Arts Centre to say hello to faces familiar and spanking new ones too. Welcome to the lovely new running legends that are Amy, Emma and Oli.

It had been a bumper week for racers – must’ve been the sun – and we said a huge well done to Sarah and Matthew who both ran, and to Joanna who nailed her very first park run. You guys! Ben not only smashed the Brighton marathon this weekend but also tops our distance leader board with Berit and Sophie chasing not far behind. It’s always good to give as well as receive so well done to Matthew for doing both with cheers.

Thanks Vicki for our CoRUNdrum even from sunny Australia (well done on your park run in Melbourne!). Where in London are there not one but two statues of Mahatma Gandhi? We were stumped. So the best thing to do was to set off for our task at the Bridge Church and community centre. They had 500 – FIVE HUNDRED – leaflets for their upcoming Easter festival that they needed dispersing throughout Battersea, and who did they call? GoodGym Wandsworth of course. We divided ourselves into groups of four, and tackled different areas of the estates around the centre. We were done in record time – some teams even climbing 20 storeys, from which, says Jack, there was a pretty beautiful view. There was even a spot of ‘hide from the trainer’ going on from naughty group Sarah, Dave, Jessie and Sarah – which would have been successful if Sarah was not hiding behind a see through bike shed in neon orange. You scamps!

We caught our breath and then set off for the beautiful Battersea Park for what was set to be one muthableeper of a fitness session. Following some requests, we were going to give the infamous Bleep Test a go. Used by the military and other badass organisations to test the toughest of the tough’s fitness levels, the test uses a series of beeps which grow closer and closer together. The idea is to get to the 20m line before the beep goes. Man, was it tough. Everyone did incredibly well, and, as Luke points out, the Police ask you reach level 6 to pass their test – you are all fit enough to join the boys (and girls) in blue. Ello ello ello! Special shout outs go to Sophie and Rachel as last ladies sprinting, and to Roshan and Dan for getting to an amazing level TWELVE. Seriously impressive, Wandsworth.

It would have been a shame to waste the last rays of the setting sun, so after a vote we chose a bit of core work over hill sprints, and finished the night with an abs blast. We reached peak excitement when a little dog decided we looked like a lot of fun and ran over to say hello. I know these words appear a little too regularly in our run reports but…GoodGym mascot? Sadly we couldn’t quite fit him in our rucksack.

The speedy group set off ahead of the sexy group, and doubled back on themselves half way back, so we all finished up back at the BAC around the same time. For the first week ever nobody cracked the CoRUNdrum – it was Tavistock Square, obvs.

Next week we DO have an Easter run, and we’ll be taking the train part of the way, before having a little Easter social to compare the size of the eggs the Easter Runny has brought us. Sign up here, kids:

https://www.goodgym.org/happenings/digging-a-trench-at-our-local-primary-school

It was the first run of Summer last night for GG Wandsworth, and we sure made the most of it. Not only that, but we are now set to become the stars of the silver screen that we all knew we were destined to become, as we had guests Ben and Holly there to film us throughout the evening. Action!

We had some new athletes to welcome to our merry band tonight- hello Jamie, Holly, Baz and James! Alos, welcome to your first Wandsworth run, [Alex] (https://www.goodgym.org/runners/alex-brown-accbd6d9-5534-4f50-85ad-7dab12ff159c] - give them all a cheer, why don’t you, they’re pretty awesome.

Well done to Jamie and Matthew for doing park runs, you superstars. If you haven’t done a park run yet, then you need to get on that. They are weekly 5k timed runs across London which are free, sociable and brilliant for charting your inevitable progress. The closest ones to us in Wandsworth are Tooting, Fulham Palace (although that is cancelled this week), Brockwell, Wimbledon, Richmond….you have so many to choose from. Why not try a little bit of park run tourism?

HEROES this week. Ooh, you are an amazing lot. Hat tip to Matthew for both giving and receiving the most cheers along with Jack. Running machine Sarah clocked up most miles as she continues to smash her marathon training, while David topped the table for good deeds done.

It was still light when we set off, which we all agreed was pretty marvellous. All the better for the camera to catch our moves on the tarmac – although camera man Ben did show us up by running pretty easily not only with his equipment but in jeans. Someone get that man a red tshirt, quick. With almost two miles under our belt we arrive at Balham Baptist Church where we were met by Pastor Jim, ready with a van to load up with junk from the basement. We pulled our favourite GG Wandsworth move, and formed a HUMAN CHAIN through the community hall from basement to van and off we went. Last time we did this we uncovered some incredible stuff. This time we did not find any mannequins or kitchen sinks, but a few pairs of oars and a radiator did make their way along the chain.

Van loaded, we waved goodbye to Jim with promises that we’ll be back to finish the job soon, and weaved our way to Clapham Common, trying to make friends with the other running groups on their evening run. We got some waves back, but have come to conclusion that GG is the most friendly bunch of runners you’d hope to meet. Keep spreading that GG word! Parking ourselves on the common in the dying light of day, we set about our fitness session. The group split itself into five lots of seven people, each doing either a squat hold, plank, lunges or mountain climbers in the time it took for one group to run across the common and back. It was tough going but as usual team Wandsworth rinsed those drills. Great job everyone.

We divided into two teams to run the last short stretch back to the BAC – speedy and sexy. Of course, we’re all simultaneously both of those things, but for the purposes of the run, we had to choose just one. Team speedy pipped it to the post on this occasion – possibly because team sexy were taken on a slightly longer route. Soz. Stretching it out, there were quite a few of you who solved this week’s CoRUNdrum (courtesy of lovely Vicki) knowing that Europe’s largest Chicken Cottage is indeed in Tooting – but the crown falls to Roshan who cracked it first. If you’ve got a good old head scratcher that you want to put to the group as our weekly CoRUNdrum, just come and let me know!

Next week we’ve (fingers crossed) got a great new project. We’re helping local group Food For All distribute free food to those in Wandsworth who need it most. Sign up here:

https://www.goodgym.org/happenings/distributing-food-to-the-isolated

ps as soon as I receive our cinematic debut, I’ll send it over. Maybe we should have a red carpet premiere at the BAC?

Could you hear us last night? Around 7pm, a big cheer from south-west London? Thought so. That was the moment we realised we had set a Wandsworth record! With no less than 41 wonderful runners, it was our biggest run yet. GO GOODGYM. You are all running legends, every single one of you.

There has been some seriously good running recently, a lot of saintly do-gooding, and a bucket-load of lovely news. So here goes.

• A huge well done to you amazing Larmer Tree runners who smashed a tough old trail course. Check out the race team page to find out when the next race is happening. https://www.goodgym.org/race-team • As an extra Monday night bonus we welcomed the lovey new Cardiff trainer Ben to the group last night. GG Cardiff will be kicking off in May, and with ultra-runner and trainer extraordinaire Ben running the show it’s sure to be a huge success. If you fancy a bit of GG tourism, I hear Cardiff has no less than 1518 hours of sunshine during an average year. So there you go. • The marvellous Luke, David and Ben all sped round the Reading half marathon course which was a tough and hilly old job. Well done to those speedsters – give them a cheer, why don’t you? • We had a fantastic lot of lovely new runners to join the group this week. One of the best parts of the weekly run is getting to welcome new faces, we love it! So please all raise your glasses for Sara, Julia, Mat, Ed, Lauren, Ella, Alyx and Holly. Wandsworth, throw a cheer their way, they’ve earned it! And while you’re at it, say a big GG hello to Shanice, Alice and Kike from Lambeth and Islington, who were visiting us for the day! Lovely to have you. • Finally, our HEROES. Whoop whoop, Luke, you ran the furthest. Hurrah David, you are topping the good deed tables and getting the most cheers! Toot toot, Matthew, you are making everyone feel good by giving the most cheers! If YOU want to see where you rank on the heroes board, have a shufti here: https://www.goodgym.org/heroes?area=wandsworth

Phew. With all this do-gooding, fast-running, cheer-giving, high-fiving fun out the way, we were off on our run. With a last minute cancellation (boooo) we had a quick swerve, and headed not for church deep cleaning, but for compost bed filling instead at our lovely local primary school. Luckily (said Ella and Sam) it was still a short run, so off we trotted down the hill, a blaze of red tshirts and happiness.

We were met by Barry, the most cheerful and characterful caretaker you could hope to meet, and set about forming a bucket chain to fill up the empty raised beds. bucket chain bucket chain bucket chain came the chant, which I’m sure the neighbours really loved.

With the beds filled and the buckets chained, we sprinted round the corner for a fun fitness session, kicking off with ‘fish and chips’. It’s fair, I think, to say this worked with varying levels of success but there were still a few burpees being knocked out across the field. We then made a huge circle, with individual runners deciding on what exercise the group had to do while they sprinted to a nearby tree and back. Then came British Bulldog. Always contentious, always competitive, always a huge amount of fun. And this week there was, despite a big effort and a minimal low-level violence, one clear and outright winner. Step forward Dan, and receive your crown. Nice running! Finally we finished off with a squat-off, to see the mighty Jack outlast us all.

Session done, we set off in two groups back to the BAC for some stretches, but not without a good old hill sprint to end the night. And everybody knows that Wandsworth hearts hill sprints. Thinking about technique – positive backwards arm drive, high chest, straight back, light toes and relaxed shoulders – everybody bossed that hill. Way to go.

While we were stretching it out, there was only time left for the CoRUNdrum, courtesy of the lovely Vicki, who we missed this week. St Paul’s was the tallest structure in London until 1962 when which building broke its record? Give Matt a cheer, for the clever lad knew it was the BT Tower in record time!

Brilliant running everyone. Next week we’re off to Balham to form a human chain to clear junk out of a community hall basement. Last time we found a 6ft crucifix and Jen’s new friend Manfred the mannequin. Sign up here to find out what treasures we unearth next….

https://www.goodgym.org/happenings/run-to-clear-junk-37fd428c-f5bc-4f3c-a7dd-daf6598de797