Last night in Wandsworth we said balls to the World Cup and England's first game, choosing instead to devote our time to helping out a community garden. What a lovely bunch of Monday marvels.

We even had a few great new runners for their very first GG experience - please give an huge cheer for Phil, Lucy, Arabella and Sarah. Welcome to the gang!

Yesterday a number of GoodGym runners took on the Adidas City Run to see how far they could run in an hour, with some excellent results. There were also huge PBs all round from Chris, Paul and Chi over the past week - fine work, gentlemen.

From Russia with (gardening) glove

After a quick warm up to get our muscles ready for the run ahead, we did a poll to find out our least loved food or drink. Liquorice and aniseed related horror such as ouzo topped the list, with fennel, cucumber and tomatoes, marzipan, and surprisingly, quavers, all making an appearance.

It was only a short run down to the community garden, so we mixed it up with a few conditioning exercises along the way, keeping the group together. Once we arrived at Doddington & Rollo Rooftop garden, a once derelict space on top of an old carpark that has been transformed into a blooming community garden, we found the volunteers waiting for us with a list of tasks.

It's a chard job, but somebody's got to do it

While the first group got stuck straight in with digging over the compost beds, one lucky lot got to pull up a load of chard and strip the plants of their delicious leaves - eating a fair bit along the way! There was also weeding to be done, and shifting heavy bags of compost, as well a plenty of digging. After half an hour of the usual winning combination of GG muscle and good cheer, we were done. Our reward was fresh fruit and herbs which we got to take away with us. Score!

It got a bit Messi

After a little jog over to Battersea Park, it was time for our fitness session, which started off with a plank challenge to the tune of ChaCha Slide. Don't be fooled by the perky lyrics, this wasn't an easy exercise, with several minutes of mountain climbers, plank holds and squat thrusts.

If that wasn't enough, it was on to a parlauf. In pairs we mixed up sprints and jogs in a competition to see who could complete the highest number of loops. This was tough, with only a short recovery time available between hard running, but it's a really good way to get a bit of speed work thrown into your workout.

We took the run home at a steady pace, tackling that last hill with some real power. A nice stretch later and we were done for the night. Well done team! Next week we're off to another different community garden where we'll have a list of jobs to cross off. Would be great to see you there! Sign up here for more Monday fun.

11 runners formed a well oiled machine last night in Ealing as we took on trimming and Transition Community Orchard, The Ealing Mile AND an abs blast workout, gosh I tired just thinking about it all!

A big welcome last night to Erika who joined us at GoodGym for the first time and also to tourists Hannah and Chi visiting Ealing GoodGym from Wandsworth and Haringey!

With lots of new faces in the group we got things started by getting to know everyone a little better and in honour of our task (where on previous visits we've been given magic beans to take away and grow) we decided this week to discuss out favourite legumes, a bit random even by my standards! We had everything from the humble chickpea through to the baked bean as well as a few confused 'what the hell is a legume?!' answers, now I'll know you all by your favourite pulses!

Raising Pulses

With the pulses raised verbally it was time to raise some physical pulses with a quick jog down to Wapole Park for a warm up round of squat, squat, goose. Think duck, duck, goose but with added squats and sprints and you've got the gist of it! Then a quick stop off to retrieve the tools needed for the job before a final wheelbarrow jog down to The Transition Garden where Grant was ready waiting for us with a couple of big trimming jobs in mind.

We had two mains jobs to tackle last night, taming the hedge surrounding the site and the ongoing task of keeping the brambles inside the wild area under control. Everyone quickly grabbed their weapon of choice and got snipping! The hedge received a much needed hair cut and we cleared a good few wheel barrows worth of brambles from the wild area too. Great work everyone! Transition is such a lovely local project and a big thank you to Grant for coming down to meet us last night, I'm sure we will be back again soon to help some more!

Just One Mile...

With the task behind us it was onto Lammas Park for the second installment of The Ealing Mile. Throughout the lighter months our Tuesday night routes often take us around Lammas Park which is the home of The Ealing Mile and within the park there are 100m markers to mark out the distance. It's a great place to do intervals and the mile is a fantastic opportunity to test your fitness. Here are the results from last night:

Chris 5:52

Chi 6:11

Lauriane 6:41

Michael 7:37

Carlos 7:40

Beth 7:41

Jenni 8:32

Amanda 8:34

Erika 10:19

Hannah 10:21

Well done to Chris who took 25 seconds of his last attempt, Lauriane who shaved off 11 seconds and Jenni who came in over a minute faster! We'll get in a couple more attempts before summer is out so keep your eyes peeled on the future tasks!

With the mile done and dusted you'd think we were spent for the evening but as part of his tourism Chi likes to treat his chosen group to an abs blast workout, who was I to argue?! We dropped off the tools and hit the floor for grueling round of core exercises before a final jog back to the start.

What a night!

We kicked off our Wednesday GoodGym last night with a historic moment - the first Hounslow 100 milestone! Ladies and gents of GoodGym, please put your many hands together for the red flash himself, Andy Cowan who has become a good deed centurion. Such commitment to doing good and getting fit is to be celebrated. So we did, with more doing good, more getting fit, and pub-cake. Way to go, Andy.

Not content with just one celebration, we also welcomed the lovely Hannah to her very first group run - go on, give her a cheer! - and had some great GoodGym tourism from Chi who was visiting us all the way from Haringey. Good to see you guys!

Our task last night was a new one, so after a warm up which featured a poll to find out our greatest sporting heroes (Nadal, Charlotte DuJardin, any woman rugby player, MO, Zatopek, Cathy Freeman and Tasha's Mr Bradley all featured) we excitedly set off on the short run to Cultivate London. After a happy half mile of running we got held up by a pesky train, which meant a little rest for some, and an intense few minutes of squats for others. That's the way the cookie crumbles, gang!

We soon arrived, and enjoyed a little talk from Rosie about Cultivate London - an innovative urban farm and social enterprise based across multiple derelict sites in West London. They train unemployed young people in landscaping and horticulture, and work to engage our community in food growing. They have a long term impact on the lives of young people and change the way Londoners think about their fresh produce and where it comes from.

We split into three groups - pallet breakers, nail removers, and woodchip baggers and set to work on these jobs, which looked a little easier than they actually were. That didn't stop the GG crew, and half an hour later, Michelle won her long fought battle against that last nail, there were several dozen bags filled to the brim with woodchip, and a woody pile of former pallet. Fantastic work.

After a speedy run back to base, it was time for a fitness session that was short but intense. It featured a slightly pedestrian game of ZipZapZop, before we got into the hard stuff. Six round of HIT later, we finished off with a fitness test designed to really work the core and upper body, and get that heart pumping. A few much-needed stretches later and we were done! It was great to see you pushing yourselves, that's the kind of effort that really ups fitness levels.

If you just can't get enough of GoodGym - and let's face it, who can? - then sign yourself up for tomorrow's social at the fabulous Waterman's. Every time we go to do a task at this independent arts charity we get tempted by the delicious aromas coming from their in-house Indian restaurant. This time we're going to skip the task, and head straight for the curry! Everybody welcome. Then, Saturday morning, several of the group will be doing Gunnersbury parkrun, joining Luis for his first ever parkrun. Good luck everyone!

Next week we're back to Ealing Baptist Church, where we have helped out before with their homeless shelter and foodbank, to sand down a lot of railings. Here's where you sign up for your Wednesday dose of fitness and goodness.

ps shout out to Adam for this week's punspiration!