17 GoodGym'ers ran 4km to help prepare Age UK H&F's garden area for their summer party

So just how many GoodGym’ers would be joining me tonight I thought as it bucketed it down at lunchtime... not only was there the possibility of a wet run, there was the return of love island...and despite all the pre-run chat I’m still not sure what a “bevvy” means?! The youth of today!

As always I needn't have worried as 16 other GoodGym'ers joined me tonight full of energy to run and do good. They're a lovely and hardy bunch in H&F!

It was lovely to welcome along Lucy for her first GoodGym run, and to our GoodGym Lambeth tourist (soon to be GoodGym H&F...) Victoria who recently completed her 200th good deed - epic, well done Vics!

Stacks of news!

Firstly, well done to Eloise and Matt who wombled their way around Wimbledon Common on a very muggy Sunday, and to Catriona who got a new parkrun PB!

1. GoodGym monthly social - this Thursday in Old Street, for all the details click here.
2. Weekend Community Missions - this Saturday Plogolution in King George's Park and Sunday SOS Challenge at White City Adventure Playground.
3. GoodGym x Bath Two Tunnels - please pay off any debts owed, sign up here and complete the spreadsheet here.
4. GoodGym Monthly Long Run - Led by Andy and I, 16/10km run options, for all the details click here.
5. GoodGym Olympics - entries are now open! Click here. Lots of event options! Deadline is Thursday 27th June at 23:59.

FINALLY, well done to Andrew and Helen on some brilliant double-deeding, both were on their second good deed of the day having joined 150 other volunteers at City Hall this morning for Team London and GoodGym's biggest run of the year #runtodogood2019 to help celebrate Volunteers' Week.

Sun for the road

Following a quick pulse raising warm up we headed off on our short run to tonight’s task at Age UK H&F. The sun was even beginning to appear through the clouds, what perfect weather for a run!

We headed along Fulham Palace Road weaving in and out of the pedestrians and Mo managed to time his run to perfection as we seamlessly joined up with him at the crossroads. As we turned up Greyhound Road we came across a nice flat wall, perfect for a wall sit - after parkrun on Saturday Lucy may have said to me that she’d really missed the wall sit these past two weeks and requested that we stop en route this week and complete one, so I ensured her request was granted*.

Ain't no party like an Age UK H&F party!

As we arrived at Age UK we were greeted by more red GG tees and the ever smiley and welcoming Volunteer Coodinator, Aileen and their Chief Executive, Dawn. As the group congregated and signed in, Aileen and Dawn first thanked the group for all that they do to help out before explaining that next week they are hosting their annual summer volunteer party in their garden, and everyone at GoodGym is invited! - please drop Johnny or I a message if you are able to go so they can get an idea of numbers.

In preparation for next week’s summer garden party, tonight the group were going to be helping to spruce the garden up. One of their volunteer gardeners, Jack asked the group to split into four equal teams and began delegating out the jobs to be done:

• Team A - tidy and sweep up all the cuttings
• Team B - wash down the garden furniture
• Team C and D - were to join forces and tackle the weedy patio area

Everyone gloved up and quickly got stuck into the jobs at hand, with Mo again on hand to take some wonderful candid snaps. Weeds were being pulled up at a rate of knots from in-between the patio cracks and lots of elbow grease plus soapy water was being applied to garden furniture.

As always the time quickly flew by, but in just 40 minutes the group had managed to transform the garden area: the tables were now gleaming white again, the cuttings were all bagged, the patio weeds were all removed and swept up - great job all! We called it a day and the teams began to pack away all the tools and stack all the full bin bags.

Oh, crumbs there's so many biscottis!

As a thank you for the groups hard work Aileen had kindly provided lots of biscuits, though as a certain Johnny Wren was busy putting his feet up in Italy, not because they were hobnobs, there seemed to be a lot more biscuits leftover than usual! Cheekily we decided to pose for our group photo with the biscuits as props to show Johnny all the treats that he was missing out on!

Everyone was squat amused

Before we headed off back to base there was time for a quick ‘Sally Squats’ leg workout. Catriona and I synchronised our phones to ensure a little more volume and we were off! For those that were wondering, in those 3mins 25 seconds, Sally goes up 30 times and down 30 times, so 30 squat reps! Did it feel like it?! It was also lovely to have all the Age UK volunteers get involved too! Squats all round - no one doing diddly squat...

I don't remember forgetting!

With quads burning we said our thankyous and goodbyes and headed off back to base. Clearly still in holiday mode and with no Alice G to help me remember to pick up my first aid kit, I had to make an unplanned u-turn halfway back and return back to fetch it. As I headed back Catriona kindly led the group safely back through Barons Court and Mo helped delivered the stretches and cool down. Thanks both!

Farewell Martynas!

Sadly, it was Martynas' last run as he has now moved up to Brent so we said our goodbyes and thanked him for all his hard work over the past year as part of GoodGym H&F. We'll miss you around Martynas! And thank you for the post-run treats.

Next week we're heading to Flora Gardens to paint, destroy some cupboards and help remove a fence, this will be followed by our monthly social. Sign up here. Awesome work tonight all. Have a great week, see you next week!

*Lucy actually just pointed out that the group hadn't done a wall sit in two weeks...