Spirits were high tonight as we continued our excellent start to 2026 with another great turnout. Ed, clearly struggling from over-indulging at weekend, just about remembered what to do for the group run intro as we celebrated all those that had helped out at another hugely successful York Community Woodland parkrun, especially run director Michael 💪

I'm not being held responsible for a load of wet trainers - Ruth

After numbering off and much debate about whether the river path was open, Rich led out a small walking group, whilst Ed led the main group backmarked by Vicky and Babs. There was a little bit of confusion when we arrived as Ed and task owner Nicola hadn't agreed exactly where we would be meeting at Millennium Fields, so we gambled on a light in the distance belonging to Nicola and not a dog walker.

I was never sure whether I was supposed to be the bird or the bee - Rich

Fortunately the gamble paid off and we were soon being led down to an area that we had worked on previously where apparently the bird and bee seeds had been hugely successful. Cue some interesting conversations about the birds and bees and even bears!

Meanwhile a small splinter group featuring Jane, Daniel, Kit and Jamie got to work turning over the compost bays that have been a bit of a staple of good gym millennium fields tasks over the years. This time with the added challenge of just having 2 spades between them.

Another group armed with trowels got to work on the bee bank although I'm not entirely sure exactly what it was they were doing, but i was informed by Abi that it was very good for a particular type of butterfly 🦋

Once enough seeds were sown it was then time for a quick fitness session involving running around and getting into different sized groups depending on the number that Ed shouted out. There's still some confusion over exactly how many people were at the session tonight with every number seemingly dividing well enough to not leave anyone without a group 🤔

A hardy bunch of GG Yorkies assembled to help out the annual Brass Monkey half marathon race once again. Various roles were covered including marshalling and manning the water stations. One not so hardy GG-er (me) was nice and dry as I was on baggage duty for the first time and it was great fun! There were several GG folk running and lots of familiar faces from other local running clubs. Well done to everyone for doing a great job out in the rain this morning - your support was very much appreciated by all the runners.

Our second group run of 2026 saw a whopping 33 people turn up and do some good in their local community. Tonight we welcomed Carys and Rohail who were joining us for the first time. Give them both a big cheer 🎉.

There was plenty more to celebrate as we cheered all those that took part in the Round Sheffield Run, and the crazy folk that ticked off another square on the january bingo card by running/walking or cycling their age at the weekend. We were also able to award the December GGer of the month to Matt who has been pretty much an ever-present at group runs since joining us last year as well as putting in some ridiculous mileage and some very impressive running achievements recently. Well done Matt 💪

Finally we presented Michael with the cape of good deeds for completing his 200th task with GoodGym. What an absolute legend 🏆

It was then off to Millennium Fields with a quick pause for a round of tricep dips and press-ups before arriving at the task. We were greeted by Maeve who got a round of applause for her excellent demonstration of how to invert the soil, before letting us loose with spades. With tools somewhat limited due to the excellent numbers, the GGers doubled up on spades with Martin and Stef on tarp duties (which seemed like a very relaxed job 😎)

Meanwhile a smaller group of 6 headed over to the compost bays to turn them over. I'm fairly sure we've turned over the same compost many times before, but it kept them busy at least!

With the soil inversion in full flow, some GGers were keen to know the What3Words location of the area they were working on so that they could see the progress of the wildflowers later in the year. Nick's slap/epic/deeply being the most memorable location!

There were the usual burying Mitch shenanigans, and we also had some very impressive dance moves from Steve and Leanne to help trample down the wildflower seeds. Then it was time for a group photo before our fitness session

Tonight featured a variation of wink murder with exercises instead of dying! The person in the middle had the task of working out which person in the circle was in charge of the exercises that everyone else was copying. Turns out it was harder than it looked, with Paul Kelly taking several attempts to work out that Ruth was the culprit!

It was then back to the Ackhorne via a quick sprint along one of our strava segments. Fortunately there was the reward of some well deserved cake at the end!

Despite the pouring rain all day and the original task being cancelled, we still had 19 hardy goodgymers turn out for the last group run of 2025!

We are very grateful to Laura for stepping in last minute and finding us a wide array of jobs at Holgate Community Garden. We had budlea cutters, compost shifters, leaf sweepers and woodchip weeders.

We soon rattled through the jobs then ended with some Christmas themed tag, where you had to sing a line from a Christmas song to release the tagged reindeer/snowman/holly/santa.

It was then back to base led by Pete and thats it for this year... except the party on Friday!