24 Illuminated Hackney GoodGymers ran 6k to Abney Park Cemetery to clear vegetation and fill graves!!

After a successful weekend of racing for Team Hackney with amazing performances from Rich and Ros in the Richmond Runfest Half marathon the group was on great spirts and couldn't wait to meet some GoodGym newbies!

Knowing that the darkness was descending quickly and that we had one of our longer runs we got going sharpish!! Navigating our way through the back streets towards Stoke Newington we even had the pleasure of a ride by from Paul the Camden trainer (if you are still feeling fresh why not try out Camden tonight? Just make sure you come back to Hackney next week!). Keeping the crew together was made easier than normal with the amazing poor run of luck we had with the lights! I would like to think it was the ghosts of Abney Park Cemetery just making it a bit darker to add a little fear for the grave task ahead!

After a strong 3k run we arrived to meet Tom where we grabbed a wheel barrow donned a head touch (if we had one) and got to work! Great to have the unmistakable Hackney Coach Runner Rep Andreana back in the fold and reminded us all why we had missed her much when she abandoned the wheel barrow after 100m as it was going to slow her down and went for the single shovel of earth sprints method (for a little while anyway) in its place.

We created a few great working pods with shovelers making huge digging dents in the huge pile of woodchip loading up the wheel barrows before the pushers doing a running loop tipping the woodchip into the Sunken graves before looping back around and loading up again! We also had a few runners on vegetation clearing, especially excited were Lucy and Annie who got to clear logs from a grave site while searching for frogs!

After 30 minutes of great work helping one of London's Magnificent 7 cemeteries we had done a top job moving a huge 2 tonnes of wood chip and soil, clearing 50 logs from over grown graves and petted a couple of frogs. This helped to keep the levels of the sunken graves up and ensuring the park remains amazing and beautiful.

After a big thank you from Tom, we set off on our way back to base picking up the pace for the 3k run back. Great running performances from everyone, great to see the fitness improving from our consistent regular runners!

A series our static stretches and a silent round of applause finished off a fun evening!

It was a fond farewell to ** Kevin and Kirsty** who have been great Hackney GoodGymers but Kirsty is moving away to take over the world while Kevin is going to using is volunteering time for a new project. Thank you for all your hard work and enthusiasm, you will both me missed!! Hopefully you will come and see us again soon.

Next week we return to Abney Park for some gravel path creation! Wheelbarrows will be in full force again as we build a path using special gravel which stays firm through the winter months. Please sign up here. If you have one or are thinking of buying one a Head torch would be pretty useful thing to bring.

Until next time

Smooth shovelling

Joel

15 super GoodGymers ran 5k to Gillet Square to wash down and hose down the amazing oversized adventure kids play equipment.

A super sweaty night in H Town saw the Crew begin with a huge congratulations for a number of Weekend Running PB's before setting out on a moving dynamic warm up as we lunged, skipping and leg swung across London Fields.

We navigated 2k through the Hackney backstreets and down Ridley Road market to outdoor energy hub of Hackney, Gillett Square! We were met by Hoola hoopers, skate boarders, as well as many interested onlookers. We grabbed the key to the container and got to work, unloading the massive kids play equipment and carrying it 100 meters to the hose pipe. Special big up to Kyla for not only running to the shop to get cleaning stuff but amazingly sourcing buckets to aid us hugely in the scrubbing endeavours. With ** Hadrien's** Herculean efforts to carry the kit over to the rest of the team and Eva's expert hosing the rest of the Team got busy scrubbing the kit down using the patterned Team Hackney production line method!

The kit was being washed, rinsed and stacked at a serious pace much to the appreciation of the Gillett Square onlookers, in 30 minutes we had completed the cleaning of 25 huge pieces of kit and we just had time to restack the kit back in the container before heading.

On the feel GoodGym high we decided to throw in some more Fitness Fun on the way back to base, so we took a detour to DeBeauvoir square to run in circles! Splitting into relay teams we fed our legs all the speed they wanted to with some excellent half and full laps of the urban track. 5 minutes of continuous Rep, Rest and Repeat saw us earn a steady trot back to base to take the total running up to a fantastic 5k for the evening.

A few static stretches and a Balletic spin saw us finish off a top session!!

Look forward to seeing you all again next week! Please sign up here as we take on an epic physical task on the Gascoyne Estate community garden!

Also a big call to everyone who is available on Saturday to come to the GoodGym/Parkrun partnership launch at Mile End Parkrun! All the info and sign up to the task is here. If you are a bit tight on time but fancy a Saturday morning run why not come along and just run the Parkrun?? Be great to see you there especially if you are GoodGym T-Shirted up!

Spinning Smooth

Joel

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On a beautiful warm summers evening 23 amazing GoodGymers ran 4K to the FoodGrowers Group on the Rhodes Estate to transport and lay over a tonne of mulch/compost as well as water the life back into 48 fruit trees on Queensbridge Road.

The evening started with a huge welcome to our new GoodGymers and some GoodGym tourists tasting the Team Hackney flavour for the first time!! 👏🏾👏🏽👏🏻👏🏿 The big announcement of the week was the new Parkrun/GoodGym partnership which will launch on the 10th of September at and after MileEnd Parkrun. If you fancy a timed 5k then a dose of GoodGym Goodness sign up here as an added incentive I hear the trainer for the GoodDeed is amazing!!😀😉

We took off to get our muscles activated and joints mobilised on a quick pulse raiser to the council buildings where we burst into a dynamic warm up and a series of balance developing and muscle strengthening lower body exercises including a dose of some Plyometric fun as we bounced our way to success. After this headed of on the the rest of the 2k run to The Rhodes Estate in Dalston to meet Amy. With a little panic when I couldn't find her all was good again so to celebrate we burst into some relay action to keep up the tempo!! A few sprints, some skips and a trail of walking lunges had up ready for some carrying action!

Splitting into 2 groups we had the waterers and the mulchers! Not to mention the diggers. Forming a slick action line to dug the soil into bags, boxes and wheelbarrows before speedily carrying/pushing them about 150 meters to the fruit trees on Queensbridge road! While the waterers did there thing filling wheelbarrow after wheelbarrow with water and expertly watering the trees. With a super sprint finish we managed to water and mulch 48 fruit trees to the exact tune of 1.5 tonnes of mulch and 150 gallons of water!! Great job team ⚡️⚡️💪🏽💪🏾💪🏼💪🏻🔥🔥.

As we were running a little late we had a shorter than normal options for the first race back to base so we ran a staggered race with the runners wishing to run a faster starting later and later then chasing the pack down with every stride!! Needless to say it was an epic battle all the way back with 2 disappointing exceptions, Nico and Rich the super speedsters decided to take a short cut to ensure victory was there's. We have seen this behaviour from Rich before but leading is Nico astray to is highly disappointing!! Lucky you don't don't educate the people of the future (oh my wait)).

A series of static stretches and ballet pirouette finished off a great session!

Next week we are off to Gillett Square to help maintain their amazing kids adventure play equipment!! Be amazing if you could come along sign up here.

A huge good luck to everyone running their goal running performances this weekend know we have a few Super speedy parkruns and a debut 10k over the weekend!! If you fancy joining the GoodGym race team to get money off race entries and an amazing Race Team Vest take a look and sign up here.

An early heads up that we will unfortunately be saying goodbye to Kirsty in a few weeks as she moves up North for a new and amazing new job😢😢 in tradition we will be heading out for drinks and food to say goodbye on the 20th of September. Be great if you could come along to our combined monthly social and leaving drinks/eat after the group run.

Have a top week,

Technically Smooth

Joel

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