London's community half marathon went red this year! 🔥

A huge congratulations to the oodles of GoodGym folk who caught well-earned happy mornings under a hot-hot-hot late summer sun ☺️

It was the biggest joy seeing you all!

Please send me your photos (!) and I will pop them up here (alexmurtough@goodgym.org) ❤️

We kicked things off at Old Spike and somehow managed to dodge the heavy rain as we made our way over to Old Alleynian Rugby Club. We had three newbies with us—Roland, Kamil, and Olga—great to have them along for their first Southwark Group Run!

Ian met us at the club and set us up with some weeding and patching up the pitches with seed. Once the hard work was done, we got our reward: a game of touch rugby. Ian then fueled us up with winegums before our run back.

After that, it was back to Old Spike and straight on to Brick Brewery for a well-earned drink and a good catch-up.

It was raining last Wednesday, but by 6pm, the rain had cleared, just in time for our group run! Meeting at Old Spike were Mikhail, David, Nelly, Daryl, Nathan and Isaac. We were also joined by newbie Eva. After a quick warm-up and an ice breaker ("What is your favourite fruit?" in celebration of National Peach Day), we set off for a new task, at Lordship Lane Estate.

Meeting at the task were Anna and Maria who were there already by the time we arrived. Liam arrived later - a familiar and friendly face from the past - welcome back! Also there to help were some volunteers from the estate.

The task owner, Lizzie gave us a warm welcome and quickly put us to work. We helped with a wide range of tasks: raking, weeding, tidying, planting and even harvesting. By the end, the garden was looking a lot tidier. We'd filled multiple bags full of litter and weeds. And a date sorted for returning next month!

We ran back to Peckham, with a small detour up Dawson's hill for the sunset. And then to the pub. Great job all!

On a warm summer evening, we set off from Old Spike and made our way—running the 5.5 km (with a little unplanned detour) to Blackfriars Estate. It was a long group run, but the sense of pride when we arrived made every step worth it.

There, we were warmly welcomed by Corin and got straight to work, shifting heavy bags of soil to clear space for the final stages of their landscaping project. It was serious, sweaty lifting, but as a team we got the job done.

With the task complete, we made the return journey to Old Spike—tired, but with that satisfying feeling of a mission accomplished.