A RIGHT ROYAL RUN

16 super runners ran 3km to Royal Victoria Park and were honoured to be joined by GoodGym royalty, Steph, our very own Lady Bath. We made the most of the early evening light to run the scenic route past the Theatre Royal, in and around Queens Square and stopped for sets of fantastically unsynchronised squats on the Royal Crescent lawn!

RUN FOR YOUR WORLD

Tonight’s task was a litter pick in the park focused around Earth Hour, a global campaign overseen by the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) to raise awareness of environmental issues. Earth Hour is this Saturday 30th March at 8:30pm-9:30pm (local time), join millions around the world to turn off the lights and speak up about why nature matters. https://www.earthhour.org/

YOU GOTTA REDUCE, RE-USE, RECYCLE

Our runners divided into task teams, we had the ‘rakers’ to target the sandpits and woodchipped areas around the play equipment, and some may have sampled some of the delights of the play equipment themselves!

Plus we had the ‘litter pickers’ who deftly cleaned around the perimeter fence, ducked under picnic benches and retreated into the undergrowth to retrieve rubbish.

Rob achieved legend status with the skaters who he managed to persuade to help him load up a big bag of litter from the Skate Park!

Once the light and temperature dropped we headed back to base for some stretching and reminders:

DATES FOR YOUR DIARY

This Thursday is our social activity, the Pub Quiz at St. James Wine Vaults (BA1 2TW) 8:00pm (for a 9:00pm quiz). Everyone welcome, hope to see you there. https://www.goodgym.org/happenings/pub-quiz-social

Next week’s Group Run task is clothes sorting and the clocks will have sprung forward so we’ll have the light on our side to run along the canal out to our hosts at the Nest Project: https://www.goodgym.org/happenings/organising-donated-baby-clothes-d801eea0-cbe3-4e1f-99b6-0335d387cab5

WELL DONE AND THANK YOU

Welcome and well done to Melanie on her first GoodGym Group Run, the first of many we hope. Thank you to Allie and Chris for back marking and to Nicola for the Run Report pun.
Well done all for a good run and job well done!

We had a rainy run out to Action on Hearing Loss in Twerton to do some much-needed gardening and weeding. We ran 7km in total and had a great workout. We always love going back and helping our host, Evan, and can't wait to go back again and help out some more!.

Well done ... GoodGym Bath!

After meeting inside the Leisure Centre in our usual space, I shared the latest running news. Emily and I represented GoodGym Bath at the Volunteering Community Awards held at the Guild Hall in Bath last week. We were nominated for 'Volunteer Team of the Year'. So well done and thank you for all of your hard work volunteering with GoodGym - that nomination only came through your hard work and effort.

Although we didn't win the award, we were very proud and thankful to be recognised with a nomination. We were also inspired after seeing so many fantastic individuals and teams rewarded for their tireless volunteering efforts in BANES. It was also great to see many of the partner organisations that we work with be recognised with awards (in particular, Bath City Farm and Carol from FoodCycle) and it's great to think that we are a small part of that too.

Evan-tually, we made it there!

Evan, our host for the night, welcomed us when we got to the task. Action on Hearing Loss is a shared living space for people with hearing difficulties. We regularly help Evan maintain the grounds on our Tuesday runs. It is important to make sure that the paths are clear and bushes are well kept to make sure that anyone with any impairments can safely walk around the grounds.

Last night we had two main tasks and we split into two teams.

Beleaf in yourself!

Emily lead one group to clear the area outside one of the main buildings. The runners used a variety of impressive gardening tools to trim hedges, control bushes and clear dead leaves from the path.

A weedy good bit of work!

I took the other half of our group to clear some weeds from the pavement and the flower bed areas around the back of the complex. This space will be used later in the year for the residents to grow flowers and vegetables, and its important to keep it maintained and clear.

Well done, in particular, to Chris for valiantly being in charge of taking the wheelbarrow down the muddy (and spooky) track through the trees to compost all of nthe weeds and leaves!

Thanks Evan!

At the end of the task Pascale taught us how to say "thank you" in sign language so we could thank Evan for his time. Thanks Evan! We shall return!

Thanks Chris, Emma and Pascale!

Thanks to Emily for backmarking on the way there and the way back, and thanks to Joe (the King of puns) for the pun this week! And a special thanks to Pascale for interpreting for us last night.

Upcoming runs

• Running the Bath Half? Emma has kindly volunteered to lead a weekend training run this Sunday.

Social Media

Please like/follow us on social media and share/retweet our content! We are on Facebook and Twitter. Organisations are already getting in contact with us through these platforms and this means we are securing more varied tasks for you to enjoy!

This week we delivered flyers for The Together Project to advertise their charity cèilidh. We delivered a whopping 550 flyers around Widcombe and Holloway. There were 16 of us in total and we ran 4.5km.

This was the first time this year we met outside the Leisure Centre because of the light evening and the mild weather. What a treat! I gave a short introduction to the task and Nicola, who founded and runs The Together Project, gave an overview of the work the charity does and more information about the cèilidh.

Charity cèilidh

A cèilidh, Nicola explained, is a form of Gaelic dancing where an instructor in the front leads the dance by announcing instructions. It is a really fun way to get people of all ages together and it is a great form of exercise.

The Together Project

The Together Project provides free veterinary care to cats and dogs owned by homeless and vulnerable people in Bath. The volunteers run a free clinic every two weeks at Julian House. This is a fantastic community resource that has massive benefits both for the pets and their owners. All proceeds of the cèilidh will go towards keeping the project running in Bath by providing vaccinations and medications for the animals.

Join the cèilidh!

The event is being held at St Mark's Community Centre in Widcombe on Saturday 9th March at 7pm. See more info here.

Cut us some slack!

The first part of our task was using scissors to cut up the flyers and get them into piles so we could hold them while we ran. There was some fantastic team work with some holding big blocks of paper and others cutting the flyers to A5 size.

Come fly-er with me, let's flyer-let's flyer awayyyyyyy!

We split into two groups for this flyering task. I lead a group of runners part of the way up Ralph Allen Drive. We flyered along the side roads and then went down Church Street to connect with Widcombe Hill. After delivering flyers along the hill and some of the shops on Widcombe Parade we then flyered along The Tyning - where we enjoyed some spectacular views across the city - and then finished our route with some houses on Great Pultney Road.

Catrin and the wild goose chase of '19!

Catrin got to the Leisure Centre a few minutes after we left and she valiantly chased us around the hills of Widcome to try and catch us up. After an evening of wild goose chasing, she managed to find us and we made sure that she had the honour of delivering our final flyer! Well done for your perseverance Catrin!

Fly(er)ing up those hills!

Emily lead another group of runners around the lower parts of Holloway and Bear Flat. The group snaked their way around the hilly roads at the heart of Widcombe to deliver flyers to the houses around there.

Thanks!

Thanks so much to Nicola for thinking of us and arranging for the flyers to be printed. We really enjoyed it and look forward to working with The Together Project again! Thanks enormously to Emily for volunteering to lead a group and thanks to Joe for the pun this week!

Upcoming runs

• On Thursday we are heading to St Jame's Wine Vaults for our monthly pub quiz. Sign up here!
• Running the Bath Half? We have an 18km training run this Sunday.
• Next week we are gardening at Action on Hearing Loss. Sign up here!

Social Media

Please like/follow us on social media and share/retweet our content! We are on Facebook and Twitter.

Organisations have already reached out to us using these platforms which means we can orgnaise more varied tasks for you to enjoy!