Twas a bit of a chilly one as our brave runners set out to complete 2 tasks.

First up, we had a small group, lead by Victoria, heading down the road to empty, move and refill a planter. GP Food Co op turn local surgery’s gardens into little allotment spaces where patients can grow and eat fruit and veg!

Words by Victoria:

Jonathan has been at the surgery for 20 years, and since the setup of the GP food Co-op, he’s pleased to see it’s having the desired effect. Fewer patients needing quite so many appointments, perhaps because of the healing power of nature and the great outdoors! The garden was in great shape and many residents and local green-fingered garden users walked by to say hello! We moved a planter to a sunnier spot in the garden ready for summer. It took some coordinated 1,2,3 lift (shuffle). We have it a spruce up with a litter pick too. Then were back to base to warm up.💥

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The rest of us split into 3 groups, spreading some leaflets about an event happening for Lambeth residents looking to gain EU settlement status. 👌

Lambeth-regular Paul said we saved him a day’s work at the council offices by delivering them to community centres, GP surgeries and leisure centres between Brixton and Streatham. With runs from 6k to 12k, we blitzed the running, and figured out where some of the mysterious venues were from a slightly cryptic map!

Nice one everyone and MASSIVE congrats to Pippa for her SPOTM 💩! 80 deeds, a 25 month mission streak 🔥 and a new 10k PB as of this weekend 🏁 A well deserved winner of various cosmetics samples, a chocolate brussel sprout, a piggy bank and a limited edition Star Wars pin badge! 🚀

And big up new runners Diane, Victor and Jessie for joining us!

See y'all next week for a little trip to Jubilee Primary School! Sign up here.

Despite a last minute cancellation, we had TWO tasks on offer.

Nicky lead the run to option one: ☝️

Our group of excellent group of GoodGymmers braved the cold to run to the beloved Remakery. After a quick introduction to the brilliant work they do there, reusing and upcycling materials into furniture/sculptures etc, our first challenge was to divide into three groups - one large, one medium, one small.

Two groups were sweeping and hoovering the woodwork workshops. Armed with a Henry Hoover and very attractive face masks, they quickly made a huge difference. The other group were moving large piles of wooden planks and sorting them into small, medium and large. They quickly got a system in place and GoodGym efficiency won again. On our way back to base, we did a quick meet and retreat fitness round Myatts Fields park. And then it was time to head home and warm up.

Good work everyone! - Nicky

The rest of us headed had a longer run to flyer for Brixton People’s Kitchen, actually nearer Vauxhall...

By day, it’s a cafe serving good value grub to locals. By night, it provides cooking workshops using food from supermarkets that would otherwise go to waste!

We split into 3 groups to cover 3 separate areas in the immediate vicinity. Unfortunately we couldn't get into the upper flat block levels... but hopefully those on the ground floor will spread the word to their neighbours! After a solid 20 minutes avoiding finger-biting dogs, we took a few beautiful posed photos and headed back.

Oh and there was even a lovely lit up heart. GoodGym's theme for the month is #GiveItHeart so that was nice :)

Cracking running guys!

And nice one Clem and Michael for joining us for your first ever GG run! 💥

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See y'all next week for another two tasks: Clearing out furniture at Brixton Rd Youth Centre and pulling up the rest of the ivy at the YELLOW QUBE. Also, it's pub week! 🍻 🍻 🍻

33 marvellous GoodGymers hit the pavements last night to run to Jubilee Primary School for a mystery task...

WOODEN you like to know!?

First we welcomed first timers Jen, Emma and Oscar to the gang and had a speedy warm up.

Steve lead a 4k route and the rest of us took the direct route to Jubilee where we were greeted by Juan. He had a big pile of wooden sticks/rods/planks hidden under a staircase which we awkwardly removed and took round to a shed - the kind of job we do so well!

So well that unfortunately by the time the splinter group had arrived, pretty much all the wood had been moved.

All that was left to do then was a serious HIIT sesh in the school hall. It was a hot one and everyone smashed it.

We then headed back for a well needed stretch.

Top work everyone!

Wooden it be nice...

...if you came along next week for some furniture removal at Brixton Road Youth Centre? You can sign up here.

17 WINTER WARRIORS were absolutely not winter worriers and braved the cold for some doing good and getting fit.

After spending a little too long sharing our best fancy dress costumes we've ever worn (Titanic feat. iceberg was one of many highlights), we welcomed new runner Sadie 👏, we had a quick warm up and hit the road.

We were met at Brixton Road Youth Centre by Sharon who provided MANY bags (last time we visited we exhausted her supply) for us to start clearing leaves around the building. We grabbed some rakes and brushes and got to work.

Leaf & Let Die

Andy (king of effiency - see gif) and Sean (master leaf kicker - see pic) had an incredible system going, creating long lines of leaves and then shoving them into the bags.

Do you want to leaf forever?

I thought the cold might have been getting too much for everyone but no! This hardy bunch just kept going and going. I forgot to count the bags again but it was A LOT of bags of leaves. These got placed outside the gate ready for the council to collect tomorrow.

DON'T STOP DE-LEAFING

Eventually we did have to leave(leaf). We ran back as a big group and finished off with a quick game of Rock, Paper, Scissors feat. bonus abs/thigh workout.

3, 2, 1, BAM. Nice one guys 👌

GG Lambeth had all guns blazing last night, smashing out a solid few k and blitzing a couple of tasks for Brixton Road Youth Centre.

Totally fresh to GoodGym we had Lucy, Raina, Anna and Nadia - WELCOME!

After a quick headcount we split into 2 groups - Nicky leading the long route and the rest of us heading direct.

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When we arrived, Sharon gave us the low down and showed us where the gear was kept.

We had two tasks:

🍂 Collecting leaves into bags

🛋 Shifting chairs from one lock-up to another

But the brains of GoodGym Lambeth decided on some extra bonus tasks to make the place look even better:

🥦Scraping up moss

🌱Pulling up weeds

And in fact everyone did such a good job that Sharon had to go and buy even more bags.

When all was bagged up, we took a quick snap and headed back for some truly scrumptious bakes from Katie and her killer brownies, Tim and his beautiful cinnamon swirls, Tom with a bakewell tart & some seriously excellent pastry and Freyja with some deeeeelicious cookies.

Nice one Lambeth! 🤙

I'm away for a few weeks but Nicky will be leading next week, with a run to help out at the lovely Agnes Riley Gardens - Sign up here!!

In the week that we celebrate GoodGym’s 10th birthday, 36 of Lambeth’s finest met inside Papa’s park ready to run and do good.

After welcoming a few new runners and giving temporary custody of the Lambeth good deed wings to Sam we marveled at how much good has been done since GoodGym started back in 2009 - over 165,000 good deeds in case you’re wondering.

With the introductions out of the way the first thing on the agenda was to get some pictures with the GoodGym flag so we all headed off to pose in front of David Bowie and the Ritzy and then split into two groups. A small group headed back to our base at Papa’s park to do some weeding and sweeping to give the place a bit more curb appeal. The other group headed up to Hillside Gardens hoping to also do some weeding but the failing light meant they unfortunately weren’t able to get the task done so had to turn around and head back. Luckily for them we had a freshly warmed bread and butter pudding waiting for them courtesy of Paul and we also enjoyed some tasty focaccia from Mira.

Happy birthday GoodGym!

See how they run.

33 absolute heroes including 5 first-GG-run heroes (nice one Jessica, Ileena, Camilla, Hannah and Rob) scurried off in two directions; some in search of the Portico gallery in West Norwood and others ran to the Ruskin Park Community Garden near Loughborough Junction.

A LITTLE BACKGROUND INFORMATION: The Portico is a hub of activity with art exhibitions, yoga classes and crafts workshops on offer, as well as being a storage facility for the amazing West Norwood Feast. RPCG is a space for locals to grow their own produce and learn how to do so.

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George and Nicky lead the run to the Portico and had this to say:

We ran through Brockwell park and up to the Portico Gallery, where John, the West Norwood Feast gang, Methuselah the cat, and an Ibizan Hound (new addition) were waiting to greet us.

We quickly got to work and separated tables that were fine, from those that needed various repairs, so that they could then be made ready for next month’s Feast. Half an hour later, with all tables sorted and neatly stacked, and with the Feast volunteers delighted with our work, we ran back down the hill to Brixton for a stretch.

POW💥

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The rest of us were at Ruskin Park for a serious amount of weeding - some rooting out the little weeds in the fruit cage and others finding zen in the upheaval of massive amounts of our familiar foe, bindweed.

After a cool 25 minutes we’d blitzed the place and headed off to find some grass for a game of Rock, Paper, Scissors (abs workout version). Tim liked it but said it needed a GoodGym theme (that’s your homework, Tim).

We ran back, fitting in some long wall-sits and squats (with bonus calf-raises 🐮)at some stubborn traffic lights and finished off sprinting our Home Stretch Strava Segment. Congrats Pippa and John - you won! 🎉 (Join our GG Strava club if you haven’t already.)

Nice one everyone - smashed it. 👊

Hope to see y’all next week for a trip to Brixton Windmill/Agnes Riley Gardens (and the pub). Sign up here.

There was some top running and good doing last night at GoodGym Lambeth with 36(!) runners turning out to visit Moorlands and Hillside Gardens for some woodchip spreading and weeding.

Big cheers to Lucy, Becca, Shauna, Freddie, Charlotte, Mac and Rachel for joining the gang!

After a quick intro including a quiet reminder that LAMBETH WON THE GOODGYM OLYMPICS🔥🎈🍾🤩🎉🎉🎉, we set off.

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Freya lead a smaller group to Moorlands park to create 2 paths out of woodchip:

After a little detour which was definitely, according to Freyja, all part of the plan, the group found Karen and were set to work creating not one but two paths from woodchip. There was a huge pile of woodchip to be moved, but with Team spade, Team Wheelbarrow , Team Bucket and Michael and John trimming the grass we had it done in no time! 💪😎👍

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And a bigger bunch of us ran 4k up Brixton Hill to Hillside Gardens to weed around the sports courts.

Lambeth Council have decided to limit their use of chemical weed killers 👏 so they deployed the next best thing: GOODGYM WEED KILLERS 😈

These were some big weeds and BIG WEEDS means BIG ROOTS so we raided the tool shed for implements capable of deep ground penetration. The GoodGym machine is a ruthless beast and in 30 minutes a serious chunk of weeds were uprooted and barrowed into a big white bag. Freddie even scaled a wall to get at some of them 😬(see pics).

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Next week we've got two tasks again! If you fancy a longer run, we're flyering for the Brixton People's Kitchen and we'll have a shorter one to Ruskin Park Community Garden. Sign up here!