Hmmm you must be thinking what on earth did GoodGym Norwich get up to this evening...

... well continue to read and you'll find out.

It was our last Group Run of 2018 and what an unbelievable year it has been, I can't wait for the exciting community groups and projects we'll help out in 2019.

Laurence was making his 1st GoodGym appearance so a big welcome!

Tonight's task was to visit The Feed to make mince pies (now you get the pun yeah?) which they are selling at an event tomorrow.

Katy and Calum led the runners so myself and fellow cold/cough victim Sandra could walk... get your violins out for us.

Lucy greeted us there and explained the process. Each runner washed their hands and then off to their stations they went, which included greasing trays, making pastry shapes, DEEP filling the pies with mince meat, putting the lids on (look out for the photo of the GoodGym mince pies), preparing the boxes, loading the boxes with mince pies, dusting them with icing sugar, putting allergen details in the boxes and labelling them also. You never probably thought there was such a process to it

After the mince pies were put in the oven, most of the gang were left taskless, what could they possibly do? Light Bulb Moment - they could go and run up Gas Hill and back again... so off they went with sheer excitement and 15 mins later they returned with beaming smiles on their faces.

At this point the mince pies were cooking thick and fast (not related to the pun). We managed to get more boxed up and after having a taster of them (I have to say they were bl00dy delicious!) we headed back to The Forum and Katy led the stretches.

Thanks again for an awesome 2018.

For those of you I won't see at the Community Mission on Wednesday, have a Merry Christmas and see you in 2019.

pun credit goes to Darren Watkins

When we start hitting the winter months, GoodGym becomes more challenging - it's dark, cold, tasks are more difficult to come by, people are less motivated in the normal world... but NOT in the GoodGym Norwich world. We had another incredible 33 runners this evening, which still amazes me the dedication everyone puts in.

It was our 75th Group Run tonight and we're going as strong as ever.

Leanne and Raven were doing their 1st good deeds and Neil his 1st in Norwich after moving up from Bristol where he'd previously been to GoodGym.

Cheska was completing her 10th good deed and Calum his 50th good deed, which also fell on his 27th birthday.

Katy collected in the remaining donations for the Norwich Foodbank, which she is kindly taking in tomorrow.

We visited the Oxfam shop on Magdalen Street again as they needed our help as it's a busy time of year for donations and they rely on volunteers like us.

The main task was to sort through all the Men's clothes donations which required: bags of clothes to be brought through to the shop floor, sorting them into item type, sorting them into size order, the hangers to have the correct size tag added, the clothes labelled up with price and size, clothes over a certain price to be security tagged and then all items to be placed on the shop floor displays. Basically there was a lot to do!

Before a blink of an eye we had a production line going on and everyone was getting stuck in.

5-6 GoodGymers were also cleaning the shop floor, being a hard surface and wet time if year, the floors get dirty very easily.

We managed 50 minutes at the task, which equates to about 27 hours of volunteering time! As we got to the end of the time, the task owner asked us not to bring any more bags of clothes out... the shock on his face when we said we'd got through them all! We don't waste any time for sure.

After the very satisfying task, we headed back to base via a run up Grapes Hill, which everyone got up very quickly this week!

Then it was time for the pub afterwards for a well deserved social.

Next week we're visiting the Norwich Foodbank, there may be 2 tasks next week so what this space.

I'd been looking forward to this task for ages, it's one we'd not done for over a year and is for such a great cause. Being able to help knowing how many have to rely on the Norwich Foodbank to be able to eat (something which we often take for granted) is very rewarding.

Elizabeth was one her 50th good deed tonight and ironically her 1st ever good deed was when we visited the Norwich Foodbank previously. Kev had got her a variety of banners to pin to her for the run - check out the photos!

3 new runners joined us this evening so a big welcome to Kerrie, Ross and Claire.

Bill was back runner.

After the warm-up (which is even more crucial this time of year now the colder weather has come in) we made our way on the 2-mile jog to the task. It was a good pace this week so great to see everyone progressing with their running. Each week more and more people are signing up to races.

One the way their it was like watching a firework display while running as it was bonfire night and various parts of the city were lit up by fireworks.

On arrival, Keith greeted us and explained what the tasks were. Most of it was to sort through cans of beans and soup to put in date order for next year. They'd just had the autumn harvest so lots of products were in stock at the moment. A small group were then weighing in newly donated items.

After we finished 30 minutes later, Keith explained how this saved him half a week's worth a work, something that does really help an organisation run by a small group of volunteers.

We took a slightly longer route home so everyone could open their legs up a bit on Earlham Road.

Yet another good deed done and thank you all for being involved with GoodGym.

Next week we're visiting Eaton Park.

So this is the first full group run report I'm having a go at writing - with Hitch sitting at my elbow watching me like a hawk and prodding me when I get bits wrong!

Our scheduled task got cancelled but Oxfam saved the day by coming up with a great task for us to get stuck in to. Having had a refurb recently with new flooring, the Oxfam shop was in need of a really good dust and hoovering.

Tonight we welcomed a new runner Chris. We also had some good deed milestones with Sam completing her 25th and both Robert and Len hitting their half centuries - goodness 50 good deeds each is really impressive! We also had some race successes over the weekend with Mish, Robert and Rosie T all getting 10k PBs! After a stiff warm up on the Forum steps (someone remarked that Hitch had clearly had a bad day to put us through that) we headed off to Oxfam where Emma greeted us with an action plan to help organise our task. We were therefore able to get stuck in and down to the hard work straightaway. We split into 4 groups working in each corner of the shop - with Hitch checking on our ability to hunt out the fluff and seeing which handbags he preferred. After 40 minutes we made our way back to the Forum - going via the Walk to do a sprint race. A few of us foolishly thought that was the fitness bit of the evening sorted but little did we know just what a bad day Hitch had clearly had as he then got really mean back at the Forum. Box jumps, bear crawls and sprints to City Hall steps followed by 4 minutes of tabata (as Hitch said, this is what it's like when you arrive in Hell...) A few red faces later and we almost forgave him when he remembered the Quality Street hiding in his rucksack. Next week we'll be making the City clean by having a litter pick.

** we'll leave you to work out which one was Hitch's and which one was Katy's verdict...

Often as it does on a Monday, it rained most of the day but cleared by time GoodGym was ready to do good for the community of Norwich.

We were visiting Silver Road Community Centre to do some painting, a nice little 1.5km journey each way... well the journey back was a little longer as you'll read about further down.

3 runners were on their 1st GoodGym outings so a welcome to Rae, Alice and Holly.

Liz and Liam were doing their 10th good deeds and Stephen doing his 25th good deed!

After doing the warm-up inside this week we embarked on our shortish journey to Silver Road where Julie welcomed us. Bobby and Cheska met us there (Bobby had brought cakes as it was his birthday last week). There were 2 rooms that needed painting so the group split up and took the necessary tools to each room and got straight on with the job and before long the rooms were transformed. Apart from a couple of minor spillages I think we kept everything pretty tidy!

I went to go to the toilet and there's Liam sitting on the toilet while painting the walls, may I just add his pants were pulled up... he wasn't multitasking haha.

Once the painting was finished, we indulged on some of Bobby's cakes and at this point I broke the news that we weren't heading straight back to The Forum mwahahaha. We were taking a detour back via running UP Grapes Hill before finishing the session with a sprint in Chapelfield Gardens.

After some stretches a few of us went to the pub for a drink and some food.

Next week we're visiting the Oxfam.