A hot-and-happy group headed back to the lovely Glasshouse community centre on the Parkview Estate this evening to complete the painting and decorating of this beautiful communal space.

Setting the tone

Catherine, our meditation teacher and task owner, started the task with five minutes of mindfulness meditation to set the tone for the evening. A subtle shift in the usual frenzied GG pace made for a pleasant change, as the temperature gauge showed no sign of shifting below thirty degrees. No slapping the emulsion on this evening – it was all about focusing on the smaller, harder-to-reach areas with patience and precision, and some lovely teamwork.

Teamwork in tough conditions

Well done to everyone who embraced the task with the usual diligence and care. Teams were confined to small, very hot spaces and worked as industriously as usual – Bryon even managed to take two minutes out to seize the opportunity to touch up the lettering on his very well worn GG t-shirt.

Cultivating kindness

At 7.55pm brushes and rollers were set down and we proceeded to regroup in our circle for this week’s loving kindness meditation: the metta bhavana practice, to give it its proper name. As Catherine guided us through the five stages, the only noise that could be heard was the whir of the much-appreciated ceiling fans. A relaxed group of runners then gathered for our goodbye pics, before heading back to the hotel at various paces.

Thanks – and welcome

Thanks to Becky J for back-marking, Chris for leading the run on the way there, and for leading the speedy pace back. Thank you to Danny for the idea and inspiration for tonight’s pun.

And a big, warm, GG welcome to our new runners this evening: Rosel, Veronika, and Alice – thank you for getting to grips with everything so quickly, all that hard work and for being such great additions to the team. Please do come and run with us again soon!

Next week: Pilates for Runners

Next week, we’re watering and gardening at Meath before our Pilates for Runners class, a session that focuses on key core (often neglected) muscles, that should help improve running and prevent fatigue. Don’t miss out – sign up now.

And Save the Date: September 2nd is GG Tower Hamlets Pub Quiz Night!

...And another date to get in your diary is our next pub quiz night, as requested and planned by your terrific Task Force! We’re heading back to The Coborn on September 2nd for a night of trivia, roast and beers. All are welcome – details and sign up are here.

No spectator sports for us tonight

It was a respectable group of 18 who shunned the TV for some tyre-painting and mulch-moving on a beautifully balmy June evening. And thank goodness as a two-task evening requires many pairs of able hands. We left an air-conditioned hotel room, complete with England game on the screen, for a brief warm up before heading our separate ways...

A two-task evening

Leanne led the Hollybush crew over to Margaret at Hollybush Gardens, where a big pile of mulch and multiple wheelbarrows awaited. It was a workout heavy on the lower body, lats and obliques as the team shovelled mulch and even formed a wheelbarrow relay to get the task done in double-time.

Meanwhile, over at Weavers, the bulk of the team were moving, stacking and painting tyres to form a fabulous-looking tyre ‘fence’ on the go-kart track. Meanwhile Heidi planted new pot plants in a brightly coloured wheelbarrow – her finished work was quite the jolly affair. Our very grateful task owner Alex supplied much appreciated post-task snacks and water – perfect fuel for the subsequent Metaburn workout that the team went onto complete in Weavers Fields.

Monday’s Metaburn

The team went on to work even harder at tonight’s workout – a top-to-toe affair that covered plyometric squats, lateral lunges, plank jacks, single-leg side planks and the ferocious, old-skool Pilates Leg Pull Back. Well done everyone for bashing out lots of beautifully executed reps on already weary limbs.

Back to base – on time

And so we headed back to base on time (for once… You heard it here first) where the team patiently went through their post-run stretches before heading inside to our room to catch the last few minutes of the game.

Thank you’s, welcome’s (and apologies…)

Thank you to you all for a really busy, industrious evening. Massive thank you’s tonight to task force memberLeanne for task pre-planning, beautiful pics and report contribution; leading the team to Hollybush, and back-marking. Thank you to Becky for backmarking and for being her usual, brilliant addition to the task force team, arriving early and welcoming new runners AND for this week’s lovely pun. Thank you to Dave for navigating and leading the run to Weavers with me, and to task force member Bryon for co-navigating and leading the return run.

And massive apology to Keri who followed (my) incorrect Hollybush location info and rather than give up, made her way to Weavers instead –thank you for your patience and perseverance.

A massive GG welcome to Rajand Sam who joined us tonight for their first run. It was great to have you on board – thanks for all the hard work and for your phenomenal fitness efforts in our post-task workout. I really hope you join us again soon.

And so to next week...

Talking of which, next week we’re back to Meath Gardens, for more canal-action, helping to get those young trees off to a great start for the summer, and we’ll be popping to Mother Kelly’s for a quick drink after too. Don’t miss out – sign up here. I can’t WAIT to do it all again then.

Until then, have a great week.

A terrific turnout

A great Tower Hamlets turnout saw us heading punctually off to the beautiful Meath Gardens this evening for an evening of weeding, planting, carrying, wheeling and watering.

Our task owners for the evening, Julia, Joanna and Tunde from Friends of Meath Gardens, were exceptionally well prepared – this was project management like no other.

And so to work...

Teams were soon despatched to clear the areas around the new trees, so the trees were ready to be watered, while other teams headed to the canal to fill oversized buckets and wheel them back on trolleys (or carry, in some cases). Further gardening teams were assembled to tend to borders in need of weeding and plant newly donated shrubs.

So efficient were the runners, Tunde was soon having to dart off and find additional buckets. Joanna quickly stepped in with trowels & gloves and redirected the displaced runners to a nearby border while they waited for more water vessels.

A Good Gym-er without a task needs fixing quick. No wild flower-spotting and enjoying a break for these runners – they like to be busy like no other.

Back to base - at race pace

All too soon it was 8.15 and time to assemble for the group pic. Then we headed back to base at 3 different running speeds: thanks to Becky and Dave for heading up the 8-minute mile lead and navigating the route back; Laura and Izzy for the 9-minute mile pace and task force member Leanne for back-marking, both there and back, and leading us back at an 11-minute mile pace.

Tarmac-toning

On arrival back at base, the team took the news very well that not only were we going to perform some seated stretches on the tarmac, we were also going to squeeze in the Boxer’s Crunch and Captain’s Chair – so our cores didn’t feel left out after all the upper body work of the evening obviously.

And then we headed back to the hotel pretty much bang on 8.30…hurrah!

Well done...and welcome

And so to this week’s other thank you’s and welcome’s… Thanks to Bryon for leading the route out with me and co-navigating (and not even waiting to be asked about navigation); task force members Leanne, Bryon, Sarah and Becky, for being so hands-on, as always: early and available to our new runners, and, along with Becky G, helping to make our Olympic dream take shape and become reality…

And welcome to Ignatius, Ellie, Briony and Ellen, whose first run it was. Thank you for all your hard work, for learning all the ropes so very quickly, and for becoming part of the team so effortlessly. I really hope you’ll join us again soon.

We're a two-task run next week...

Next week it’s a two-task week: we’re needed at Hollybush and Weavers - two, great, fun outdoor tasks, doubling up as a good little workout again, no doubt, so do sign up here.

And, I for one just can’t WAIT to do it all again then.

Have a wonderful week in the meantime!

Love your neighbourhood? You bet.

A large group of energetic runners, keen to do their bit for de-littering their borough, made their way to beautiful Victoria Park, to join the Council’s fourth borough-wide Big Clean Up, part of its ‘Love Your Neighbourhood’ campaign.

We were met by Richard, our task owner for the evening, and Mark, from Veolia, who wasted no time in dispatching us to the four most needed corners of the area, after kitting us all out with hi-vis jackets, litter-pickers and gloves, after our extensive health and sfatey briefing.

Festival goodies

As usual the Good Gym-ers covered an extensive area, heading deep into the park only satisfied as their bin liners began to really fill up. Post-festival litter was in abundance: a rather- well-hidden pack of Guinness was found under a bush, along with several strange looking vials and some er… undergarments. Thank goodness for litter pickers. As usual, the runners were loathe to be pulled away from the work: “Come on, come on, you’re late back”, prompted the response, “But there are so many cigarette butts.” This sums up Monday night runs for me.

Masterclass: Catch Becky and Core Lucky Dip

Before we knew it, we were saying farewell to Richard and his team and heading to the wooden canoe, the area that was to be our fitness playground for the next 15 minutes. Tonight we were playing “Chase Becky.” Becky headed out for a lap of the park with a 10-second lead, then Bryon headed up the team to catch her, before everyone raced back to the wooden canoe to play Core Lucky Dip. First and last runners picked a number between 1-7 from a delightful list of exercises.Thanks to Yesh for unknowingly picking the two-toe-touch plank; Sarah for the butterfly crunch and Leanne for the speed-skater-squat-on-steroids. Yesh then headed the chase back out of the park.

…And so to the thankyou’s

What a very busy evening. Thank you’s in abundance tonight! Thank you to Bryon, such a terrific task force member, for leading both the run to the task, the chase for Becky and for behind-the-scenes planning.

Thank you to Becky for being a brilliantly fast and fun real life greyhound hare, and to Yesh for an impromptu last minute sprint.

Thank you to Leanne and Domitille for back-marking, and to Sarah and Leanne, our brilliant task force members, for welcoming our first-time runners, and to Gabrielle for much-needed delegating, and organising the start of the run, following an unanticipated DBS delay.

Welcome to new runners Eszter and Karris - well done on a busy, and big workout, night for your first run. We’d love to see you again soon.

It was a mega-blast tonight! Thank you all so much: for your ideas and input; for being such fun, for being such determined litter-pickers, for working so hard at your fitness…The list is endless, as always. I just can’t WAIT to do it all again next week: sign up for water-carrying at Meath Gardens - AKA The Human Chain Task - here.

*Apologies for the limited photos from tonight’s run – an unprompted, mid-task, IOS update meant we’ve just got before and after pics this week.

It was an eager team that set out for the Royal London tonight. After being very patient with tonight's extensive task-briefing, the Tower Hamlets crew flew down the mile-long route to the hospital where our delighted and excited task owner, Nancy, was meeting us, along with colleagues Richard and Marufa.

Numerous tasks

This was our first time at the Royal London Hospital where we were booked in for a variety of different tasks.

David headed up the postering team, tasked with putting up information posters on as many of the hospital's 14 floors as the team could manage in the short time available.

Becky headed up the gardening team, whose job it was to weed, litter-pick, and generally tidy up as much of the hospital's designated green space as possible.

Issmaeel had the job of leading the walking-route-planning team, a key task that involved planning a hospital-based walking route as part of the End PJ Paralysis campaign ("For patients over the age of 80, a week in bed can lead to 10 years of muscle ageing, 1.5 kg of muscle loss, and may lead to increased dependency and demotivation. Mobilising (moving) has been shown to reduce falls, improve patient experience and reduce length of stay by up to 1.5 days.")

Leanne and Miranda has the task of spray-painting wheelchairs for the trauma ward, which proved to be one of the trickier tasks...

Our 45 minutes in the hospital flew by, and before we knew it we were congregating for our goodbye pics. It seemed no sooner had we arrived, than we were heading back through the revolving doors, returning to the hustle and bustle of Whitechapel Road, where we soon picked up the pace following tonight's speedy pacer Danny as fast as we could manage back to base.

New faces!

We were a group of 26 tonight = it was a joy to have both new and familiar faces in the team. Hello, and welcome, to new GG Stockport trainer, Lisa , who joined us on a busy night, and who stayed smiling, and unfazed throughout the whole evening, and lent a hand continually to all the teams.

Hello and welcome too, to Christie and Clare, not new to GG, but new to Tower Hamlets. Thanks for the hard work, so many smiles, and really hope to see you again soon. And welcome too to Insiyah who joined us for her first GG run - it was lovely to have you on board, thanks for all that hard work, and please come and run with us again soon.

And a big UK GG welcome to Colin , who was visiting us from Canada! What a treat for us, and well done for all your work.

...And to the thank-you's

And so to the thankyou's which seem to grow each week. Thank you to David , for being on board with last minute planning and for heading up the postering team. Thank you to task force member Becky for tonight's stats, heading up the gardening team, and for welcoming new runners and Lisa, and being such a warm and welcoming face of GG.

Thanks toDannyfor being our speedy pacer back to the hotel.

Thank you to task force member Leanne, for brilliant backmarking as usual, and more behind-the-scenes planning with me, and a massive thank you to Issmaeel, for bundles of behind-the-scenes planning (this started middle of last week for poor Issmaeel) with his insider knowledge, and for heading up the walking route team.

Thank you to Polly and Si, who we left in the hospital briefing Nancy on the team's brilliant walking work. That's above and beyond, and I was very proud of what you achieved. And I can't WAIT to do it all again next week...

SPEAKING OF NEXT WEEK...

...Moving on to next week, come and work off Royal-Wedding-party-calories on Monday! We’re staying local at Cranbrook Community Garden to help the team get ready for their big Open Day, before heading to beautiful Meath Gardens for a special Ab Attack workout. Sign-up is here.

...And don't forget the GoodGym Olympics on June 30th!

…And don’t forget the GoodGym Olympics on June 30th. A description of the events you can enter is here, while event info and sign-up is here. The deadline for signing up for an event is June 3rd.

Do come and join in the Olympic fun - whether you fancy a speedy Summertime sprint or just spectating & sandwich-eating, there’ll be something for everyone. And I’d love to hear from anyone interested in designing our flag and torch!