A tremendous time was had at GoodGym Cardiff tonight! 20 brave runners showed up, and with shoes on their feet, legs pumped and hands ready for painting and planting, nothing was going to get in their way.

Runners came in their numbers to GoodGym tonight… just like flies to… I mean bees to honey. They were all keen to get fit, do good and see one another - A week apart is just too long!

As the clock struck 6.30pm it was time to get warmed up. We headed outside and started with our headcount and shared our most favourite word! Here are a few from the list:

• Utility by Nathan
• Wicked by Emma
• Awesome by Adam
• Bubble by Louise
• Tenacious by Aimee
• Serendipity by Ben
• Elocution by Lucy
• Chicken by Rachel
• Contrafibularities by Martin
• Discombobulate by Darren
• Apothecary by Su
• Haberdashery by Mikey

Martin has been challenged to use his favourite word in the next research article he writes :) - Excited face- .

After the warm up and headcount we split into two groups. The speedy group, led by Ben, and the sexy runners, led by the sexy man himself, Mikey! Lucy egged on both Rhian and Louise to run with the speedy group and then we were on our way. Mikey led a direct route to the Samye Foundation and Ben took a longer route which took the most scenic route of Cardiff which included the infamous and world renown Chippy Lane – A place people have eaten more times than they can remember! Kudos to Laura and Pablo for running with us again for a second time and Louise and Rhian for really challenging yourself tonight in the speedy group.

Welcome to the Samye Foundation GoodGym Cardiff

A warm welcome awaited us at the Samye Foundation, and after hearing about the wonderful goings on at the centre we couldn’t wait to get stuck in!

Teams a go go

Runners got into three teams. One team went to the top of the Samye Foundation building and began painting and sanding the walls and skirting boards. The other team laid soil and began planting ferns, all part of the instalments to create wonderful outdoor garden. The final team potted pants with fresh soil at the entrance to the centre.

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Riddly Diddly Fiddly Doo, I have a riddle for you! – A toughy this week

*A man is looking at a photograph of someone. His friend asks who it is. The man replies, 'Brothers and sisters, I have none. But that man's father is my father's son'. Who is in the photograph? *

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With the riddle set in the last 10 minutes brains were now as active as movement as all runners were eager to get the task finished and work out the riddle at the same time!

Goodness gracious GoodGym!

Lorraine could not believe how much was done in such a short space of time- 30 minutes!. The garden patch was now ready for the next stage of development and immense progress has been made on the renovations to the top of the building.

Afterwards we ran back, stopping to allow everyone to regroup and finishing by reflecting on the evening’s run.

The RunPunStiltSkin award goes to Darren and Mikey... Well done! Jess made a blooming awesome suggestion and I have a feeling the competition for the RunPunStiltSkin award is going to increase in weeks to come!

Goodgym the VEST a runner can get

Thankfully Lucy turned up nice and early tonight and Mikey could get changed, whilst away she completed DBS checks and welcomed our newest runner, CROESO to LAURA.

With our newest run leaders hurriedly joining us from the train station we extended our warm up of drills and chats, Strava's and route ready we set off. As one team, we ran to the traffic lights before we then split, the faster group taking to the hill to meet Cardiff's 'Magic Roundabout' at the top. Then squats until the rest of the group joined up. With Valentines around the corner tonight was all about togetherness.

Can you feel the love?

So off we went for the final push until we were met with the honk of a horn from a driver for VEST, the Voluntary Emergency Service Transport Community. After being welcomed by Caroline, and an introduction to the great work that they do we got ready to work. VEST is a wonderful group that helps elderly, isolated and disabled people get around the City and Vale of Glamorgan by supporting independence. What an inVESTment in the community, we can certainly get on board with this task

Van you clean it?

Splitting into groups to take on the buses, from hosing to scrubbing, brushing and window cleaning, mopping and even mop dancing..... special shout out to Su. We were then joined by the very special quality controller to check on our standard of work, Alfie the dog.

We're getting distracted now.....

with just 5 minutes left we all attacked the last vehicle, whilst still being hosed down. We just don't care about getting wet in Wales....And so the task was complete, the usual group photo and we were ready to head off into the night. Pondering a question or two, what's the best pancake filling? Will we get back in time for pancakes? And can we decide between pancakes and the Tuesday drink?

Time for a warm down, stretch out and we were done.

Diolch yn fawr Cariad

Now for a sing song

At VEST today, GoodGym runners cleaned the dirt away, Now it looks as though we want to stay, Oh, we believe in VEST today.

Suddenly there’s only half the time there used to be, And there’s a shadow hanging over me, At VEST today, Mikey got mouthy.

He just wouldn’t go, And we know, it’s his job to stay, Did we do something wrong, When we cleaned for VEST today?

At VEST today cleaning was such a fun game to play, Now we’re drinking in our hide away, GoodGym had fun at VEST today.

Why'd we have to go? Well we know, we couldn’t stay, We’ll be back before too long, As we long for VEST today.

Next week in the Goodgym Cardiff crew......we will be running to the wonderful SAMYE foundation, a regular of ours, you can sign up here SAMYE 20th Feb

And the question of the week, Ben I'm going out there and preparing this one for the warm up. What's your favourite word? Well done to BEN for taking the very sought after RunPunStiltSkin award. And Ellen and Darren, your suggestions helped to inspire the report, you're all winners to me!