22 fantastic runners came out this cold and blustery evening , ran 4.4 k and helped paint the hall in Trefoil Lodge so that it can be enjoyed more by the girls scouts and other community groups that use it. Amazing work!

A very warm welcome to Howard, Molly and S who joined us for the first time! You did a brilliant job running and doing well with us! Lets give them a big cheer! Also fantastic to have a GG tourist with us- David joined us from Bristol. It was great to have you along and we hope to see you again next time you are in the area!

We started the evening with a a bit of a fashion-show in the Phoenix, showing off some very cool looking meggings and leggings! Wow guys, you've gone full out. I feel I got to up my own game a little here! Once the leggings were showed off and the welcome speech done we moved outside for a dynamic warm-up session. A few new animal was introduced to accompany the chickens this evening and there were some great high knees and heal flicks.

Warmed up and ready to run we set off towards our task location. The run took us up and down some of Exeter’s many hills (you got to love hills living in Devon right!?) and this evening we also had the great pleasure of tackling some flooded paths... Despite the rain, the wet ground and the wind there was so much chatting and laughing going on. Thank you Sarah for back-marking, making sure no-one got left behind.

On arrival to Trefoil Lodge, the HQ for the scouts in the area, we were welcomed by Paula who showed us what to do and which walls to paint. As we were a big group we sent 4 runners off to paint the toilets in great green shade, 15 runners stayed in the main room, painting all 4 walls, and 3 runners took it in turns to come outside for some extra fitness- Sally squats and some jogging around the block. This is how we get fit by doing good! Yay!

22 runners working for 45 minutes add up to 16.5 hours of work and you could really tell!

It was amazing how much we got done. The toilets had a complete new coat of paint, all 4 walls in the hall were also completed. Well done team!

On the return run we stopped at one of our favorite circuit training spots, the Millenium Bridge, and smashed the following stations:

• Squat jumps
• Mountain climbing
• Lunges with upper body twist
• Sprinting over the Millenium Bridge and back

Fantastic effort everyone! That was a lot of running and doing good for one single evening!

Back at the Phoenix we carried out some important stretches and had a little chat about whats happening next:

• This weekend we have the Hammeldown race. Good luck to everyone running!

• Next week we have another great task coming up! We are running to Franklyn Hospital and planting wildflowers for wellbeing! Sign up here to join, we’d love to have you with us!

A few of us then gathered in the Phoenix for some refreshments (including Swedish cinemon buns) and to say goodbye to Ellie who will be leaving us to move to London. I am sure you will find an awesome GG group to join up there. Good luck and please come and see us every time you're back in Exeter!

To finish off with I have to say that there is no better way to forget about the relentless rainy and stormy weather than being out together with our GG community, running and doing good! I ALWAYS leave our sessions with a big smile on my face and I hope you all do too! Have a great week till I see you all again!

25 (YES 25!!) incredible runners ran 4 k to help re-decorate the Parish Room in St Davids Church. This room is used for a soup kitchen and other charity work. What a great task for us get stuck in with!

Awesome to have Isabella, Pazzy, Anna, Lexi, Oliver and Thomas with us for the first time. It was great to have you with us and we hope you come back soon again!

GETTING FIT

We started our evening with a dynamic warm up session outside the Phoenix, playing a round of "Simon Says" involving a lot of high knees, lunges and star jumps. Warmed up and ready we set off towards out task location. It was a nice crisp evening, so much nicer than the stormy and icy weather we have had lately and it felt amazing to stretch our legs out! As always we re-grouped at regular intervals so that no-one got left behind. These stops are also perfect opportunities for squat challenges. LOVE IT!

The task owners very kindly let us use the church for our fitness session and it felt a real treat to do a core session on soft carpet rather than on wet grass or hard concrete! We did 10 different types of sit-ups and planks held for 30 seconds each, followed by Eminem's core challenge. GREAT WORK GUYS!

Don't think we ever thought we'd be doing a core session in a church! The things you get to experience with the GoodGym hey!

On the return run we took a new route again to make the run a bit longer. Such great effort, such lovely red faces when we returned to our base. You guys smashed it!

DOING GOOD

Good things come in three right! This was our third evening of working at St David's Church and everyone knew exactly what they were doing by now. We got stuck in straight away and worked hard for 45 minutes paining the doors, the ceiling and the walls.

What a fantastic end result! A complete transformation of the Parish Room! Ceiling, walls, cupboards are now sparkling white instead of dark orange. Check out the before and after photos, you just won’t believe it!

It has been amazing to have an indoor task this dark and blustery time of the year and it has also been FANTASTIC to have such good turn-out for the runs! Over three weeks 61 runners have been involved with re-decorating the Parish room, giving it a make-over so that the charities that use it can enjoy it more. BRILLIANT STUFF!

SHOUT OUTS

Big thank you to Nic who back marked. Such an important job!

Lovely to have so many great runners with us from the Exeter Uni's Cool Running Society. Thank you Emma for making this happen!

A special shout out to Helen who travels really far to join us every Tuesday evening! Such dedication!

Thank you to the lovely task owners at St Davids Church have let us use the church for our fitness sessions, away from the rain, and this evening also treated us to some amazing homemade cakes and biscuits.

A BIG shout out to every single one of you who came along with so much energy and such great attitude! You all did something amazing, you got fit whilst doing good! yay! Can't wait to see you all next week!

NEXT UP

Next week we will be running a total of 4 k to Newtown and Pennsylvania to do some leafleting for Ride On. We will do some little fitness challenges along the way and make this important task lot’s of fun! Sign up here and join us!

Don't forget to check the website for Community Missions. We got some great ones coming up!

21 FANTASTIC runners ran 3 k to help Clifton Albert Residence Association digging up a large flower bed and litter picking, all part of reclaiming alleys in Newtown from antisocial behavior. Welcome Andy, Pippa and Daniel who joined us for the first time. We loved having you with us and hope you come back again soon!

Getting Fit

We started our evening with a thorough warm up session, engaging all major muscle groups and getting our bodies ready to run. The run was was 3 k in total and we re-grouped at regular intervals so that no-one got left behind. We made the most of the re-grouping by giving our legs a proper work out with a variety of lunges, squats and great tap work. The evening was surprisingly mild and we were so lucky that the rain that had poured down for day on end finally had stopped. A perfect evening for our group run!

On the return run we stopped in Princess Hay for a fitness session. Santa had brought our group some early gifts, two step ladders, and we had lots of fun doing agility training with them! We had two teams going off for different drills (quick steps, sidewards running, hop scotch and more) and the runners who were waiting to go carried out a variety of strengthening exercises (lunges, squats, triceps dips, press ups and mountain climbing). It was fantastic to see everyone give it all they had! In the end some faces shone an even brighter red than our GG t-shirts - a true testament to how hard you worked. ABSOLUTELY BRILLIANT! YOU GUYS SMASHED IT!

Doing Good

In Newtown we met Alison and Ray, members of Clifton Albert Residents Association. They are a very new association that work to reclaim alleys from antisocial behavior, help wildlife and undertake green measures. All great stuff! Our task involved digging up a large flower bed, bagging up weeds and grass and doing a litter pick in the area.

It was quite hard work getting some of the weeds and brambles out of the ground. It might have felt like we were never gonna dig it all up but we totally did! It was amazing to see how much we got done in 45 minutes! A huge area was cleared and we filled at least 25 bin liners with weeds, grass and brambles. The litter picking team did really well too! The best pick was probably a penny. Such brilliant work everyone!

21 of us working for 45 minutes adds up to 15.5 hours work! It just goes to show that many hands really do make light work!

Our lovely task owners brought us tea and biscuits that we refueled with half way through the task. Very nice! It was also fantastic to hear all the chatting, laughing and even singing going on whilst we were working! This is exactly what the GoodGym is all about: getting fit, doing good, connecting with each other and having lots and lots fun! True GoodGym love all around!

Shout Outs

• Thank you Helen who back marked! Such an important job!
• Thank you Pete for helping out with the photos!
• Again, fantastic to have Andy, Pippa and Daniel with us for the first time!
• Amazing work Lucy R and Ellie persevering with the litter pick! In the end you filled a whole bin liner with litter!
• Holly and Sophie we loved the singing and hope for some more in the future!
• A HUGE SHOUT OUT to every single one of you! You came out in the dark and blustery evening, you ran, you worked really hard at the task and got so much done and you totally smashed the fitness session too! You are my superhero GG team!
• Big thank you to the Westbank for making the GoodGym possible in our area and for the Phoenix for providing us with such a good starting point!

Next week

Next week we are heading to a new area with our group! We will distribute Whipton and Beacon Heath News, a community magazine. It will be a great 5.5 k run, plus a bit more jogging here and there when we deliver the magazine. Sign up here, we would love to have you along!

Dates for the Diary

December 8th, we have our long distane trail run on Dartmoor. This is our first training run and it's so exciting. Sign up here if you’d like to come along. There are still a few places left.

December 15th, we have the Haldon Jingle Bell Run in the morning and Christmas knees up in the afternoon and evening. It would be amazing to see you all there!

No group runs on December 24th and 31st. Instead we will do an extra few weekend sessions in January. First group run next year will be on January 7th.

Bonfire night was celebrated in style by 17 runners who ran 4 k to help Newtown Community Preschool improve both their indoor and outdoor areas. A very warm welcome to Ellie who joined us for the first time. Lovely to have you with us, we hope you enjoyed it and will come back soon for more doing good and getting fit!

We started the evening with a warm-up session outside the Phoenix. We walked and jogged around in circles, doing different movements when certain numbers were shouted out. We obviously also let our chickens out (long story) and some other dynamic stretches.

Warmed up and ready to run we set off towards the preschool. We re-grouped at regular intervals so that no-one got left behind and we made the most of these stops to work on our glutes and quads with lots of squat and lunge variations. We also managed to fit in a few press-ups to improve upper body strength. Big thank you to Lisa who back marked, such an important job!

When we arrived to the preschool we were welcomed by Debbie, who very efficiently showed us what to do. She had written up a big board with jobs that needed doing and we got stuck in straight away with the following:

• Bagging up soil
• Moving pallets
• Moving wooden poles
• Bagging up leaves and old apples
• Sanding down gateposts
• Cleaning
• Putting filler into holes
• Sweeping steps and alley
• Taking down a netball post
• Removing trunking
• Fix fabric up to ceiling
• Cleaning out the gutters in the play area

Can you believe we ticked of every single job on the list! AMAZING WORK EVERYONE! 17 of us working for 45 minutes is equivalent of nearly 13 hours of work and it really showed!

The children will love seeing their outdoor play area looking so nice and tidy tomorrow!

On the return run we picked up the pace a little. We also found the most amazing looking hill.. It was too good to miss so we smashed out some brilliant hill sprints to really get our heart rate going! Fantastic effort guys!

Finally, we finished of with a fitness session, focusing on core exercises. Strong core is so important, it keeps you in the right position even when you get tired at the end of your runs and makes you well balanced as runners. We did 10 different types of core exercises and I think everyones favorite was the Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes Plank! You even got to hear you run trainer sing to that one.. something that doesn't happen very often! As it was a celebration evening we also did a round of Squat, Squat, Goose. You just never get too old for party games! Even better when they make you fit, right?

Back at the Phoenix we carried out some static stretches, acknowledges what we had achieved both in terms of improving our own fitness and in terms of the work we had done for the preschool. We also talked about our Christmas race, the Haldon Jingle Bell Run. It will be great to go together as a group! The more the merrier! After stretching some of us gathered in the Phoenix for some drinks, a perfect way to end the night!

SHOUT OUTS

HUGE SHOUT OUT to every single one of you for coming out tonight and being so cheerful, so full of energy, for working so hard at the task and for just being such an awesome group! I can't think of a better way to celebrate bonfire night than to have been out doing good with you guys!

Thank you Holly for the run pun. I am so grateful for the help with this!

Congratulations to Florence who came second lady in Sidmouth 10 k run last Sunday. Fantastic work!

Good luck to Pete and Florence who are carrying out the first mission run in our area this weekend! Amazing stuff!

Thank you to the Westbank for making the GoodGym possible in our area and to the Phoenix for providing us with such an excellent starting point!

NEXT WEEK

The run next week is 5 k in total and will take us to Exwick for the first time! Exciting to do good in a new area! We will distribute Exwick news, a community magazine in which ideas and events for the area can be shared. This is usually done by just one or two people so by turning up in a big group we will make a huge difference! Sign up here to join!

Remember to bring a head torch and reflective clothing/bands if you have them. Please also wear some layers so that you don't get cold whilst working at the task.