Last night was all about destruction; demolishing the remains of a dilapidated allotment space and a brutal game of Rock, Paper, Scissors.

After a quick briefing, including many a safety warning, we had a speedy warm up and set off to Lee Samuel House, a sheltered housing block, just a few hundred metres from Papa's Park.

Tom took a group on a 4k jaunt and the rest of us took a spiralling route round the houses. We all ran past David Bowie's birthplace but alas, we had no idea which house it was...!

When we arrived, Mandy from Notting Hill Genesis gave us the lowdown on the garden and how it was going to be transformed into a far nicer allotment, with raised beds and levelled ground so the residents could grow their own food.

The task ahead was a big one.

It was a huge space with a monumental amount of wood, metal, trellis, plant pots, canes, tyres, netting, planks, the walls of a childrens playhouse, pallets, bed frames, plastic, bricks, a frog, foam, carpet, rope, multiple large spiders, rods, crates etc. etc. etc. and a whole lot of weeds to avoid. And all this needed dismantling and sorting into piles.

With nothing but our hands and some gardening gloves we set to work. Everyone split themselves between different sections of the garden, working together to decide how best to break everything apart. As soon as one structure was taken down, we'd find something else underneath which needed dismantling. Wood was held together by stubborn nails, netting was wrapped around weeds and wooden planks seemed to have merged with the ground...

But there was nothing than could stop the undeniable force that is GoodGym Lambeth from getting the job done.

When everything was piled up, we took a quick group snap of our efforts and headed back to PAPA's. We had time for a quick game of rock, paper, scissors (lose - you sprint to the fence and back, win - you do a squat or a wall sit) and a nice long stretch to finish off.

Amazing work everybody, and nice to see some new faces to Lambeth! 👏👏👏 to Lucy and Julia who joined us for their first ever GoodGym run!

Next week it's a nice long run to the Portico Gallery in West Norwood! See you then. ✌️

It was a most lovely summers evening and lots of new runners plus some regulars too were all gathered at Papa's Park. We were ready to do some running and also to help out our community at the same time.

We celebrated Sylvie's 50th good deed with party poppers and then headed off for a warm up. We did a nice 'getting to know you' round where people had a good chat and made new friends. Then we were off down Brixton Road to the lovely Kennington park. Our last visit to the park helped them regain their Green Flag status so we all felt happy and a bit smug about that. There's never time off in this park though, oh no!

The bindweed needed some serious un-binding, the roses needed dead heading - luckily our petal-identifier in Chief Lucy was there to point out what was a leaf and what was a petal and what was alive and what was dead and therefore needed heading.

This is a petal! Said Lucy very helpfully

Rebecca and Kiro took to giving the shrubbery a haircut and we can all thank Kiro's mum for giving him a lesson in not leaving the cuttings on top as they go all brown and look ugly.

A crack team of litter pickers filled many bags with all kinds of wonder, including some bubble blowers, a party horn and a driver's license next to a particularly large and empty bottle of vodka.

It's a much more sophisticated drinker in the park these days, mused Steve as he collected thrown away craft beer cans

Some others watered the trees that were in need of a big drink. It was all a big effort and we got lots done.

With that we headed over to a leafy area and did some walk out planks before heading back to base for some stretches. Thanks Lambeth!

You'd never have guessed the football and tennis were over because we had a MEGA group this week of 37 excellent people. Hooray!

That's good as we had two tasks to be getting on with.

The first group headed up to the Portico Gallery - 4km there and a longer run on the way back through the lovely park. Tom Benson tells us everything!:

We did a crack job of washing down a load of walls with sugar soap. John claimed it's one of the most underrated things and if he were Prime Minster he would make sure it got the recognition it deserved and also to bin Boris as well.

Sugar soap is one of the most underrated things! Said John

In 20 mins we had stripped the room and hallway and lathered the walls in some lovely sugar soap ready for the painting to begin. As always John was on good form and thanked us kindly. As we done good we took the scenic route home by taking a detour in London's finest park, Brockwell and then came back for some good stretches.

The second group headed through the park both ways to the magical South London Botanical Institute. This tiny oasis of botanical wonder is hidden near Tulse Hill. They have recently had some renovation work done and had moved all of their boxes of old pressed flowers and seeds upstairs. Our job was to form a human GoodGym chain and bring them back down again. Once complete, we had a look around the garden, which features poisonous plants, plants used for dye and all kinds of other wonders. We also looked at some of the dried flowers, which were collected 100 years ago! They have a lovely programme of events and it is certainly worth checking them out.

After some planks and lunges in the park, we did some stretches and then went to the pub for a well earned pint.

Sometimes the tasks we have at GoodGym, while always helpful to local community organisations, are less strenuous, and sometimes we get tasks which get our heart rates up and working those muscles. Last night was definitely the latter, with not one but two different jobs that required some serious GoodGym power.

But first we welcomed some lovely new runners to the group - everybody please give a big cheer for Holly and Polly who joined us for their very first group run last night!

After a few quick hellos it was off to the basketball court to do our warm up, which featured some manic whistleblowing, side steps, heel flicks and power skipping. With our heart rate up, there was just time for a headcount and a roundup of all the nice things that had happened to us in the last week. There had been some international travel, some personal milestones and more than one good ice cream eaten - what a happy few days!

With Katie feeling poorly (get well soon Katie!) it was George leading the group on a longer run to Clapham Common. This lovely 2.5k run each way has been a regular feature of Lambeth's group runs this summer, and what a brilliant job you've been doing helping to create a wildflower meadow in this lovely space. Last night was no exception, with the crew giving the place a good water and digging over, and also getting a massively good work out at the same time thanks to some hard ground! Sadly this was our final run to the common for this job, but the task owners said that the work you guys have been doing was 'instrumental' in the project.

"They did a little thank you speech for us at the end because we've been involved throughout and provided so much man power" said Alice

Nice work team!

Meanwhile, the second group had set off on a shorter run to the Grove Adventure Playground near Loughborough Junction for a number of jobs at this epically fun spot - which much to our delight featured a climbing wall and adventure playground. Sadly, this space is threatened with closure by the council, but a group of volunteers have taken on the task of tidying up the place so it can be used again for supervised play by kids who don't have access to safe outside space. What a brilliant initiative.

With Freya tackling the huuuge mowing job, there were also a massive pile of branches to saw up, and an even more massive pile of wood chip to spread at the base of the slide. It was action stations almost immediately and half an hour later the place was looking a lot more friendly. Check out the before and after shots! There was even a few minutes left for a little go on the colourful climbing wall.

After a speedy run back with only a tiny diversion (whoops) we got back to the basketball court and the two groups were reunited (...and it felt so good). We just had time to squeeze in a little tabata (TAbata? TaBATa? who knows) before calling it a night. The idea of this session is that you raise your heart rate high enough that you continue to burn calories after you've stopped exercising, while increasing your aerobic endurance levels at the same time. Suffice to say it's a tough work out, but innumerable frog jumps, power squats, plank jumps, burpees and high knees later, we were done. Well done gang.

Next week the lovely John Hunter will be leading you on what promises to be an ace group run to help out the bees before lovely Katie is back from her travels the week after. Thanks for having me Lambeth, it was great to see you!

Pun Reference for the confused.

A small group last night after regulars Stania and Tom called in ill and stuck at work resepctably, meaning we postponed our very first GG Bromley social until next week.

BUT Sarah and Molly and Simon were keen to get back to Scadbury Park once more. We managed the 5.5k surprisingly quickly and had plenty of time to carry on shifting twigs, logs, branches, sticks and what felt like entire trees at times. Now THIS is a serious workout. Some were so heavy the only way to shift them was to roll them like some possessed Scottish strongman.

Upper body fully exhausted and a respectable pile of logs shifted we headed over to the car park for some standing start/reaction/acceleration practice. One of the pair holds a tennis ball while the other has to react and catch it before it bounces twice. Full description here.

Some decent efforts recorded, but we could do better surely? A little bit of practice with top standing start tips:

• Get opposite leg and arm forwards
• Bulk of weight over lead leg
• Focus gaze ahead

Then we ahead another go, and... it works! Coaching actually works! Both Molly and Sarah significantly improved the distance from which they could react to a falling tennis ball and run and catch it before it bounced twice. Now that's something to stick on your CV.

A couple of longer sprints focussing on helicopters, hotplates and elbowing (you had to be there) and we were done before another super-speedy journey home.

Social is on next week, so get yourself down, do some good, get some fit and get some grub.

See you then,
Simon