26 GoodGym runners came out in force this evening to run from Yr Hen Llyfrgell to St Monica's Primary School to help garden, sand and remove old paint from the fences

1 year on and GoodGym Cardiff is still going strong! Who would have imagined that it would have grown to be what it is today? We all met at Yr Hen Lyfrgell - The amazing venue that has been hosting us every Tuesday evening on a weekly basis since Tuesday 23rd May 2017 on our very first run. Once it was 6.30pm we headed outside. Ben gave a brief overview of the nights exciting events and then Councilor Susan Elsmore acknowledged the success of GoodGym Cardiff, reflecting on her meeting 3 years ago with the founder of GoodGym and recognising GoodGym as an amazing project that she wanted to be involved in bringing to Cardiff. Councilor Susan Elsmore also highlighted the different projects that the runners have helped in both Cardiff and the Vale and also reminded us of the memorable moments - Councilor Elsmore follows GoodGym Cardiff and Vale on Twitter so hears all about the good we do. A BIG thank you to Councilor Elsmore for coming down to GoodGym this evening.

Time to warm up, do our headcount and then get going -- but very quickly, what has been your favourite GoodGym moment to date?

It was then time to begin our run. We did our headcount and as per our usual standards, losing count and Ben almost missed out Ellen!!! - Oh BEN! Everyone stated their favourite GoodGym moment to date; Aimee mentioned about the GoodGym trip to Bath and wassailing. Lowri mentioned about the Snowdogathon and Angharad said that her favourite memory of GoodGym so far was running to her coach! We also welcomed Jenny who was running with GoodGym for the first time - WELCOME!! Tanya returned to GoodGym again this week after running with us for the first time last week and it was huge pleasure to welcome back Larry, who we have also missed greatly!

Time to run run runnnn!

We began our run to the task. It was a squat of fun and we did exercises which allowed the others to catch up. We also did Lunges, holding them until everyone got in the lunge position... which did mean there was some groans!

Welcome to St Monica's Primary School

Our Task organisers this evening were Abigail and Richard, the headteacher and deputy head respectively. They were both prepared for us with tasks and equipment at the ready! Richard led a group of Gardening enthusiasts to the school allotment known as 'The Table' and Abi orchestrated the other runners to sand outside benches and climbing equipment. Abi also allocated some runners to use wire brushes to clean old paint from the fences. Everything is always so organised which is fantastic! There we also biscuits and water too which everyone really appreciated.

Everyone worked hard at the task for 35 minutes. Darren had a couple of children throw some grass at him, however after some TLC from Ben he felt okay again to continue.

Stuart was quick to seize the opportunity to use the lawnmower, mowing the lawn and pretending he was Mow Farah and pretending he picked up the wrong bottle at drink stations.

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After completing the task we used the outside playground to play a game of 'Runner Runner come and get your PB'. This game is slightly different to British Bulldogs, and by that I mean not only does it have a different name as British Bulldogs which is a banned game at St Monica's Primary School, but other than tagging the person nobody gets spearhead tackled to the ground - phew!... Fortunately everyone heard the rules too and the game continued without incident.

"Thank you so much everyone - You've been incredible and you've made a massive difference in such a short space of time" Abi and Rich both said appreciative of our efforts

It was now time to run back, sadly, as we love helping out at St Monica's Primary School with Hollie filming us as we left. On the way back we did some planks and sprints which was unanimous good fun!

Again, a huge thank you to Councilor Susan Elsmore, Abigail, Rich and Hollie who all helped make the run tonight a success (Hollie was from the BBC and was doing some filming).

Get signed up to next week's run by clicking here!!

From me, a personal note to say thank you for everything you have done to make GoodGym Cardiff what it is today.

On a balmy evening in Cardiff, a smallish but perfectly formed group of great GoodGymmers ran over 6k to tidy up the grounds around the STAR Hub in Splott!

This week, our regular running crowd was greatly diminished by the absence of 9 runners who went to the Bucharest Running Festival over the weekend. Well done all who ran and joined in the festivities. Can't wait to hear more news of the races next week! Further good news is that our task numbers were buoyed up by 3 new faces: firstly by a guest from the east, Alex from GoodGym HQ. He was in Swansea looking into a possible new GoodGym there, and wanted to join us here in Cardiff for the group task. Great to meet you Alex, hope to see you again in South Wales soon! Secondly, forget Two-Drink Tuesday, it was Two-LACE Tuesday last night! A couple of our regular runners Pablo and Fiona brought along friends: welcome Emily and Tanya! Luckily I had two red laces on me to hand out - whew!

So after intros all around, and a quick but dynamic warm up, we headed out and made our way to the STAR Hub in Splott. We took a direct route to cover the 2 mile distance in time, which gave as a good opportunity to get in a steady run, with Charlotte and Fiona backmarking - thank you both! We've been to this Hub before, to wash windows in preparation for a royal visit a few months ago. But no royalty this time - just the staff and regulars who were happy to see us. We had a nice intro from Mike the manager on duty, who explained the relationship between the leisure facilities and Cardiff Council, and the work they do to get local children into sports and activities on site. Sounded right up our street, so we were keen to get on and get stuck in. Our task was to litter pick around the grounds of the centre, and we broke into teams of 2-3 and headed out into the fresh air. Before we started, we were alerted to the fact that because a school group had done this task just a week ago, there may not be a lot of litter around. But this is Cardiff where there always seems to be litter 😔. Indeed, our first piece of litter was right in the centre itself - a Penguin Bar wrapper right at my feet (not mine!) Later on, Fiona reminded me of that wrapper and provided the pun for the run: to P-P-Pick up a Penguin. If anyone needs a reminder, here is the reference to P-P-Pick up a Penguin! (Maybe before our time, right folks?)

All in all we collected 6 bags of rubbish - a fab job team GoodGym! Must be all that sunshine 🌞 We then headed back to base, had a good warm down and stretch, and some of us headed off to the local, for a cool drink. Not before we reminded everyone of the First Anniversary Run and Celebration Dinner next week !!!! It's going to be a good one, running to St Monica's Primary School in Cathays and then dinner afterwards at the Stable in town. Get signed up to both on the website and see you there!

Riddle for the Run: What has 6 wheels and flies?

Tonight was TTT, no not Turnips, Trifle and Tiramisu (TTT means - Two Task Tuesday!) and that meant helping out two amazing organisations was on the agenda... The Big Moose Coffee Co and St Monica's Primary School

We met at our usual meeting point at Yr Hen Lyfrgell and quickly split into two groups, Group 1, who headed to the Big Moose Coffee Co and Group 2, who headed to St Monica's Primary School

Helping out at the Big Moose Coffee Co - Run led by Ben

We headed off soon after Group 2 and made our way to Alexandra Gardens. On the way there we did our best attempt to write GoodGym using our bodies in front of the City Hall - *Try and guess which photo it is! *We passed by Sam on the way there who was helping out someone who was unwell on the high street. -Well done Sam, although your Strava didn't track it, you really went the extra mile tonight, we're proud to have you part of the GoodGym family x.

When we arrived to the Gardens we admired the beautiful blossom trees! They were Lush! We then got stuck into the fitness part of the session; we got into partners and alternated with our partners doing 0.33 mile sprint runs of the gardens which equated to a 1 mile run (So there was a rest in between sprints)!

After the fitness session our legs definitely felt they had a good workout! We then made our way to Big Moose with feelings of anticipation about the task that lie in waiting.

Welcome to the Big Moose Coffee Co!

As we arrived Jeff and Ian were there to greet us. Jeff set up Big Moose after his friend nicknamed Moose past away. He developed the Moose brand as a catalyst to leave the world in a better place by working with homeless charities, namely Llamau in the Cardiff area. Ian is the project manager for the Big Moose Coffee Co building.

Jeff explained to the runners that there was lots of wood and debris on the outside roof terrace that Big Moose needed our help clearing. Jeff didn't realise that these words were music to our ears and we couldn't wait to get stuck in and help out!

A massive chain was formed from the roof terrace to the van that was parked outside the Big Moose entrance. Bit by bit, "to me to you" style, all the off the rubbish from the roof terrace was being quickly packed into the van. Darren got pretty attached to some plastic trays that he found on the roof terrace and on 3 occasions after the plastic trays had been packed into the van Darrren requested them back one last time. Fiona was working on her squats as she passed items to the Lydia who was waiting on the stairs - It was all quite exciting!

After 30 minutes time was up and the task was complete! Group 2 met us before we left to join in the group photo and Jeff thanked us for our hard efforts.

Helping out at St Monica's Primary School - Run led by Mikey and Ellen

After splitting into two groups the we left those ‘too cool for school’. It was a direct route to meet up with the organisers at St. Monica’s School.

We stopped at a couple of lights which helped to regroup and rest, there were still weary legs after the Newport marathon and 10k so this was still a challenging run.

Once there we were escorted to the garden project, an old church that had been rejuvenated into a cafe project that has given the land to the school to use. It also has the children from the local school share memories with the elderly community once a week to produce dramatic re-enactments of their life stories.

We were shown the four patches that had been used previously an so the timer was started and the countdown began.... Time to fork n dig. It was all hands to work as old plants were removed and sods of earth broke down. The three groups changed attend and bonded, we discovered the plans were for the children to plant quick growing veg, beetroot, kale, lettuce, radish, salad leaves etc. They only have until the children broke up for holidays. Aimee became a local as she uttered the Welsh words ‘where too’, Emma spoke about the presentation she was doing and we all talked with happiness about what GoodGym do.

After 30 minutes of hard work and three tasking riddles from Ellen our time was up. We thanked our hosts and ran to meet up with the rest of the group.

A big thank you to both of the task organisers, The Big Moose Coffee Co and St Monica's Primary School for giving us a #ReasonToRun!

Tonight 17 fantabulous runners trotted off to the Samye Foundation Centre to help their ongoing renovation of 3 flats above the centre. We welcome one new face - hello Sophie! - one returning face - welcome back Andie! - and say goodbye to one departing face - adieu Tom at least for a little while - it was fun while it lasted!

Twist and Shout

So the group was headed up by a new leader tonight - little ol' me - with welcome assistance from Ben and Darren. Our warm up included an added twist: a side-stepping, hip-flexing, sashay movement which everyone appeared to like bar one runner who shall not be named (Sue), who promptly shouted she did not like it one bit! So we headed off towards the Samye, and on the way took advantage of the lighter evening to do some fittening work. Darren led us on a great timed out-and-back run up along the Taff, with runners pushing themselves a bit more than normal to go out as far as possible in 7 minutes, then turning around and heading back to the starting point. It will be interesting to see how far we get to next time.

Stuff of legends!

Once at the Samye, we were welcomed by Lorraine who was as jolly as ever, telling us of her exciting trip to Nepal recently. Then we got stuck in. The description of the task included 'moving stuff' and boy did we move a lot of 'stuff'!. Fridges were going upstairs, boxes were going downstairs, and on the way we passed microwaves, wall panels, curtain poles and carpet tiles going goodness knows where! Aimee, Lucy and Sophie stuck into painting the walls of the front flat, adorning themselves with the very flattering bin bags as usual - I swear that we use these so much, that GoodGym should come out with its own line of bin bag painting smocks! In the back room, Amy, Alice and Ewan got stuck into sorting out some old curtains to be recycled into further decor for the rooms. Still others put some elbow grease - or was it Danish oil? - into the new wooden kitchen counter tops! Although it was busy and crowded and noisy with 17 runners plus staff on site, we got a LOT done and it was really rewarding to see how the flats are shaping up over time, and how we've contributed to them. Legends - every one of you!

Did someone say Avocado?

What GoodGym Cardiff run would not end in food? Lorraine and her team very kindly made up sarnies with avocado in them, which went down a treat. After saying goodbye, we headed straight back to the start to warm down, hear the latest news of upcoming events, and part our separate ways. For some of us, this was to the usual watering hole for "Two-drink Tuesday" (non-alcoholic drinks included), and to enjoy some vegan cookies and Welsh cakes in celebration of me hitting my 50th good deed recently. I've enjoyed every one of them! (even though I may not have appeared to at the end of January).

Special thanks to Aimee for her gorgeous cookies, Lucy for the special badge, Ben and Darren for the support tonight, and to everyone else for being so kind and complimentary on my run leading. x

15 runners embarked on a GoodGym Cardiff adventure this evening… excited to burn off all those Easter eggs consumed over the Easter weekend!

There were lots of lovely faces this evening, including the infamous Tom Power and Nathan Swain. We also had some new people running with GoodGym for the first time… The A Team - Amy and Alice! It’s always great to have new runners come along and join in the fun!

Let’s warm up

After a quick warm up which consisted of cheering first time GoodGym runners, we were off on our way.

Fitness session first this week!

Ben led the way to the 1 mile sprint route; 2 laps and a bit around Alexandra Gardens. There were fantastic efforts all round. Here are the times people...

Mikey finished the mile sprint in 6:19.00; his name isn't below as he was our official course measurer so ran before everyone else!

• 1 – 06:24.13
• 2 – 06:25.58 (Nathan Swain)
• 3 – 07:01.85 (Darren Raz-nick)
• 4 – 07:09.70 (Tom Power)
• 5 – 07:36.39 (Lucy marsh)
• 6 – 7:56.61
• 7 – 8:27.08 (Ellen Perry)
• 8 - 8:47.01
• 9 – 9:02.69
• 10- 9:35.71
• 11 – 09:58.79
• 12 – 10:.01.30

Well done everyone for your INCREDIBLE mile sprint times!I haven’t put all names next to the finish times but post your name below if you want your name next to the time and I’ll add it. * With your training you can use your mile sprint time as a baseline for your training*

At St Monica’s Primary School (Where Nathan went to school when he was a boy!)

We arrived to St Monica’s Primary School feeling a great sense of achievement after our mile sprint. Nathan experienced nostalgia and thought about all of the times he spent playing kiss chase as a kid. Abi, the headteacher of St Monica’s Primary School, told us all about the wonderful St Monica’s Primary school and explained what tasks needed doing:

• 6 runners – “I need you to paint the outside railings silver”
• 9 runners – “I need you to help turn the front room into a music room, you’ll need to move all the furniture out of the front room to the outside of the building, bring all the music equipment from the room next door (including the MASSIVE piano) and then move all the furniture from the outside into the room next to the new music room” Without further ado all 15 runners got stuck in! Lifting, moving, painting, hammering… There was lots of noise, teamwork and many laughs!*

After 35 minutes of helping out the task was complete! We also had Abigail's daughters and partner helping out too :) - It was lovely to meet them as well. Abigail said a massive thanks and offered us some snacks and tea/coffee before we ran back home. We had a fantastic time and it's safe to say we can't wait to run their again

Riddle for the run

If you have 3 of these then you have 3, If you have 2 of these then you have 2, If you have one of these then you have none...

What is it? Post your answers below! (Answer is below too)

Time to warm down!

After what can be only described as a fantastic run we arrived back to Yr Hen Lyfrgell. The winner of the RunPunStiltskin award this week goes to Darren! Well done for coming up with the title of this week’s run report. Next week we will be running to help out our friends at the Samye Foundation Click here to get signed up!

Answer to riddle = Choices! - Well done if you got it

17 runners turned up to GoodGym tonight… absolutely enthusiastic about being able to run a whole GoodGym session in sunlight now the clocks have gone forward one hour.

A huge welcome to Ryan who joined us this week for his first ever GoodGym run and welcome back Ewan who returned to GoodGym for the second time – I am pleased we didn’t scare you off.

Warm up!

We did a rapid warm up which consisted of opening our gates, and closing them (to let the sheep in and out)… If this doesn't make sense, you have to be there!

What!? Two tasks this week?

Yes, there were two tasks this week.

• (1) Plogging around Grangetown - The ploggers consisted of; Ben, Lucy, Adam, Emma, Martin, Ellen Sue, Rachel and Pablo
• (2) Cleaning the windows at Grangetown Community Hyb and Litter picking their car park; Team consisted of; Mikey, Aimee, Ewan, Jo, Charlotte, Emma double barrel, Darren and Ryan.

During the plog Rachel found a broken speaker. We also found some graffiti and thought it was the perfect place to take a jumping photo!... The team at the Grangetown hyb had great fun trying to clean automatic doors that kept opening and closing. Oh yes, and Ellen picked up poo (But the safety briefing did advise against this).💩

After plogging for half an hour (and cleaning Grangetown Community Hyb) time was up! It was a plogging success and we all lost our plogging virginity… Nobody ever forgets their first plog…

On the way back we played ‘Squat, Squat, Goose’; a game that will soon takeover duck duck goose in the history books.

A massive well done to everyone who came along tonight. You definitely contributed to making Cardiff a more beautiful place.

We have now sprung into spring- Holla Holla! Temperatures are rising and we can finally ditch the 20 layers and 5 pairs of underwear (or is that just me?). The seasonal runners will soon be out of hibernation and joining in the weekly antics of GoodGym. I will soon be wearing shades, factor 15 suncream and money in my backpack to have a cheeky ice cream whilst out running.

The evening run started with the headcount and shouting out what your favourite thing is about Cardiff, with some runners saying it was Ben (The trainer of GoodGym Cardiff) – these sort of comments, although welcomed, do not get you out of doing sprint drills! Ewan also got a MASSIVE welcome, he was joining us for his first ever run with GoodGym - What an ABSOLUTE legend!. We also highlighted that it was Rachael's final run with GG Cardiff before she moves to London, sad :(, but we wish you good luck!

Choose your pace

We ran to the Global Gardens Project in two groups; Mikey led the SEXY runners and Ben led the speedy runners. On the way there we squatted, planked and used curbs to do step ups. The speedy runners got to hear Ben and Lewis’ duet of Gold by Spandau Ballet. Did you know that they actually both like to sing this song on Karaoke? – That’s something to look forward to at the next Christmas do!

Poppy we are here!!

This evening's task took us to the Global Gardens Project. The Global Gardens project is a fantastic organisation, run by Poppy Nicolls, which aims to create a growing space that supports community-based sharing of food and cultures.

GoodGym, here are your tasks:

Poppy challenged us to move soil into wheelbarrows and then spread it onto 4 separate garden beds. She also challenged us to arrange gardening boots into their pairs and hang them up in their respective numbers(They all had their own number), dig trenches around the new shed, pick up litter and finally clean the gardening tools after with water and oil.

Here are some of the antics:

• Lucy and Fliss were playing Boot Bingo whilst sorting the boots.

• Ewan was emersing himself into the task, arming himself with garden fork to move and turn soil.

• Lowri, Lydia and Rachael were all picking up litter and they managed to full a HUGE bag with litter.

• Mikey, Martin, Darren, Ellen and Aimee were all digging trenches. Ellen even found a lucky horseshoe… If she wins the lottery she will share the winnings with us all! 😊

• Jess, Sue, Emma, Rachael, Welsh Dave and Sue were all digging up soil, putting it into wheelbarrows and moving it to the garden beds. Sue requested a photo of herself doing the task, because the photos are always taken so well...!

SO MUCH GOT DONE

In just 30 minutes runners had managed to make a massive difference to the allotment, and this was in spite of the lack of natural light. Poppy was thrilled and she thanked everyone for their marvelous efforts... if it wasn't for everyone's muddy hands I'm sure she would have given everyone high 5's!

NEW GAME ALERT – Are you a lyrical genius

Ben introduced a new game to runners. He quoted them words from a song and runners had to guess the song and sing it. Give it a go… here are the lyrics…

To get away from your parents, You look so proud, Standing there with a frown and a cigarette, Posting pictures of yourself on the internet

Post your answer in the comments below and then click the lyrics for the answer.

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Time was up – Unfortunately! We absolutely love helping out Poppy at her allotment. She is so passionate about helping the community and we are really pleased to be able to help.

Now time to run back

We ran back via a route which is the final mile of the Cardiff Half Marathon. We also did sprint interval drills on the way back which were FUN FUN FUN! (Subject to opinion... but nobody complained :)... or their shortness of breath meant they weren't able to - I'll take it as a compliment though!)

When we arrived back we warmed down and said our goodbyes to Rachael Kretsis, who will be moving to London for pastures new. She will be sorely missed and I speak on behalf of everyone at GoodGym Cardiff when I say it has been a pleasure running with you.

Well done to The Razzle Dazzle Machine who receives the RunPunStiltSkin award this week!!! (He came up with the title of the run report.)

Do you think your charity/community project could benefit from a group of runners running to help out? Email us: Bena@GoodGym.org or complete the following form: https://goo.gl/forms/cge2OGtgsVJgGjAA2