With the sky turning orange, a sprightly 26 runners ran through Ladywell towards Crofton Park, to help out at Beecroft Garden School, covering 5km along the way.

Thanks this week to Oli, for our clever title pun, good work!

Ah, it's good to be back. Thank you to Lucy for looking after everyone last week, while I had a break, sounds like you had fun :)

In my absence, some new people came along, so I had lots of new names and faces to learn, along with those who joined us for the very first time tonight. Lewisham Love to you all, especially Olivia and Clare, who made their GoodGym debut.

On a mission

Before our group runs, I like to check up on what everyone has been doing and there have been an impressive number of missions and coach runs happening in the past week. Well done to Oli and Clare, who took on their first ever missions, taking us into the 190s with our mission tally, isn't that just incredible?! If you're wondering what all the fuss is about, have a read about what missions involve, here. You just need to bring some ID along for me to check, then do some online training to prepare you to go out and help people who might be feeling a little isolated, easy.

Our little warm-up saw us jumping, running, hi-fiving and shoulder rolling, before we headed out towards Ladywell with Bradley back-marking, making sure we didn't leave anyone behind. At Beecroft Garden we were met by Gemma, who enthusiastically told us all about the various jobs that needed doing. With so many people, it took us a few minutes to organise ourselves, before some smaller groups set off to take on:

• lifting, shifting and delivering bags of sand (heavy work and somewhat chain-gang-like, hence the title!)

• weeding and tidying in various raised beds across the playground

• digging away the soil behind where the sensory space will go

• transporting this soil to the bed near the gate, to be spread and raked

• watering the plants

Does it mattock what it's called?!

I busied myself by moving between the various spaces, taking photos, keeping an eye on time and making sure nobody took out their neighbours with a pickaxe swing (I must add here that we actually had both a pickaxe and a mattock, very important detail Helen). As ever, we found time flying by and were soon gathering up tools, wheelbarrows and weeds and enjoying the healthy hospitality on offer (thank you!). If we can all remember to bring head-torches, we might manage another trip here before it gets too dark.

Those who know me well, know that I like to make use of Hilly Fields when we're over this way, so off we went, to take on the winding hill that we usually run down at parkrun. This time we worked in pairs, taking it in turns to run up hard and steady down. There was an air of disbelief when I said how many times, but you all did brilliantly! On Saturday, our lovely parkrun at Hilly Fields will be celebrating its sixth birthday! This means a chance to run it in the opposite direction and, of course, all the cake :)

Next week we will revisit the 'secret' garden that is Luxmore, where we will do some planting, sign up and join in here. On Sunday there is an opportunity to grab another good deed to add to your collection, by joining in a community mission, spreading the word about a Twilight Walk to raise funds for St Christopher's Hospice.

See you soon!

21 runners ran 3km to sand and paint the railings at St Mary's church

Lewisham News

• A big hello to Sarah, Zeina, Jill and Holly who joined us for their first group run tonight. The first of many a good deed! Give them a cheer!

• Next week Adele will be back and taking the group 5 km to Beecroft Garden School. Sign up here.

• It's nearly cross country season! Mud, running, hills and happy people. What more could you want? There's one race a month - 6km for women, 8km for men. It works out at £1 a race if you come to all of them PLUS tons of glory! Register for the GoodGym RaceTeam to take part.

• James and Veronica just reached a whopping 50 good deeds! What an amazing achievement, click through to their profiles to give them a cheer.

Painting the town black

While Adele's kayaking and swimming in Lanzarote (no rest for the wicked), I took the helm at Lewisham for the evening. It was a 3km run overall which meant plenty of time for a fitness session afterwards! More on that later...

Lewisham has been to St Mary's to help sort out their railings on three separate occasions plus a community mission and we're only just over halfway done! As soon as we got there we had paints all ready and set out and split into groups - mostly painting and some sanding. We were rewarded for our hard work with biscuits and juice! They are so grateful for our work they invited us to their 1100th birthday party on Sunday 23rd September. There'll be all kinds of fun happening!

After finishing up and enjoying refreshments we bid farewell to our hosts and headed off to Ladywell Park where we set up for some fun. We gathered in a circle and one by one picked an exercise for the group to do whilst we ran to a tree and back - will you choose a difficult exercise and run slowly or will you be nice? This is the question! After lots of planking, squatting, lunging and more we did one more sprint and headed back to base at an easy pace.

A great evening of work team, thank you for having me!

Lucy J