The threat of Storm Ciaran didn't dampen our spirits (or our bodies) this evening and we managed to get a lot of work done before dashing home to take to our beds.

Dr Jack met us to pass on Karen's plans for tidying the garden area, and bagged himself his first good deed in the process - head to his profile to give him a cheer!

We trimmed hedges, pulled up weeds and swept up leaves in the small fenced garden and the narrow beds in front of the surgery to make the area look neater and more welcoming for local residents and patients. One local resident spotted us from her window and popped over to have a chat, expressing an interest in helping with the garden upkeep, which was lovely.

Hopefully in the spring we'll be able to help with planting some new shrubs to really bring the outside of the surgery to life.

Leeds GG set the challenge (https://www.goodgym.org/happenings/goodgym-48-hour-virtual-relay):

"A Virtual Relay with "laps" of 10km with a handover by Whatsapp to the next runner. How many km can your GG team do in 48hrs over the May Bank Holiday weekend?"

Even though Portsmouth GG didn't host this event we had such an amazing weekend I felt we needed to capture it for prosperity as it was so epic for so many of us.

The top mentions go to Samantha for being the team captain, organising us so well and getting a pancake and coffee fueled 10km PB; Tony for covering a massive 50km; to Jen for smashing her furthest ever distance by 6km with a double lap 20km in the dark; to Chrissy for maintaining social distancing policy with her 2m baton (where can I get one?); to Jo for recruiting Jack and Jon for some fast night legs, Duncan and Lucy also for last minute fast night stints (maybe judged too fast by the early runners with the dawn starts pulled even earlier!); Maura for running at the perfect pace to spot an albino squirrel which made the local news; Angela for welcoming the sun up each morning; for Rosina who inspired us constantly this month with a marathon over May in her back garden for Miles for Mind and cheered us all the way; Judy for GiGi the team mascot and bringing the laughter and last but by no means least to Val who took full advantage of the rule "once the last competitor is on the "track" before 12:00 it doesn't matter when they finish but their lap will count" with a great paced walk (aided by an ice-lolly serving cheering team) to bring our team total to a whopping 500km in 48hrs! (That's the same as Portsmouth to Darlington!). It also put us 3rd out of 6 teams, but to be honest I think we were all so pleased with what we had achieved we didn't care where we came.

The overwhelming consensus of all involved was how infectious the team spirit, enthusiasm, pre-lap nerves, competitiveness (to the other teams but not each other!), support with non-stop, massive cheering and words of encouragement when self-doubt crept in (how far did I say I would run???), impromptu artitistic baton (toilet roll tube!) jazzing up and just how unbelievably nail biting this was - best live sport we have seen (glued to our Whatsapp) in months (maybe years!?!)! Everyone ran faster than they predicted including those in the middle of the night and the peak of the midday sun (and it was a HOT weekend with big beach crowds to dodge around) and several people discovered a love for running at a different time of the day than our habitual.

From everyone that participated a massive thank you to all that organised, helped, cheered and also competed - yet another event to make us so proud and joyful to be part of Goodgym Portsmouth! Final words from our final baton carrier "It's not usually possible for me to take part in races so this was really a wonderful treat even though it was a blooming hot day!... I bloody LOVE the inclusivity of GoodGym"!