12 GoodGymers help clear leaves and weeds from the historical moat at Bishop's Park

On a rather chilly and grey Saturday morning, 11 wonderful GoodGymers met in Bishop's Park to help weed Fulham Palace's historical moat. A few had joined following another big and busy, Fulham Palace parkrun which takes place every Saturday in Bishop's Park - it's FREE and all you need is a printed barcode if you'd like your time recorded, or you can volunteer and give everyone a cheer - as Cookie did fantastically on the final straight! I'd fully recommend getting involved, it's a brilliant way to start your weekend and you often see fellow GoodGymers in their red or black tees.

Three men in a moat?

To begin with, Rob, Chris and Matt joined me outside the Bishop's Garden Tea House and I thought it may have been a case of three men in a moat - pun sorted! 😄

However, it was as lovely to be joined by, Cookie, Morag (once she'd found us!) and 4 new GoodGymers. A brilliant mix of new and familar faces. A big welcome along to Eden, Shauna, Kathryn and Daniella for their first GoodGym session - hope you all enjoyed it!

Running...our moat of transportation

Following a short spiel on all things GoodGym and a headcount, we set off on a short warm-up (quite literally to warm-up!) loop of Bishop's Park. Along the way we paused for some jumping jacks and squats, for extra warmth! It wasn't long before we arrived at the moat bridge ready to meet Lucy, one of the volunteer coordinators for Fulham Palace Trust.

Lucy welcomed the group and gave a brief history of the moat. Fulham Palace's moat was nearly 1.4 km (0.87 mi) in length and was the largest domestic moated site in medieval England. The moat was filled in with builders' debris in the 1920s, and exists, underground, as an unbroken circuit. In 2010, an excavation began to uncover the historical moat, which you can now see either side of the moat bridge.

Our job today was to help the volunteers with the weeding, raking, and clearing of the leaves from the moat. We helped get all the tools and large bags down into the moat and gloved up, ready to get stuck in. Lucy gave a quick demostration of what we needed to be done and pointed out the 'pest' weed, bindweed, which needed to be kept separate from the bags of leaves and weeds that were going to be composted.

Lots of moativity

Most armed themselves with a rake and began raking the many, many leaves from the steep banks of the moat. Rob, Cookie, Chris and Danielle tackled one side of the moat, while Eden, Shauna, Kathryn, Matt and Morag tackled the other side. Amongst the leaf raking and gathering of leaf piles into the bags, there was lots of friendly chat, and comments of how much of treat it was to be doing a task in daylight and without any rain or wind!

It wasn't long before Chi and Helen arrived from their Richmond parkruns to add some extra pairs of helping hands, with Chi opting for the direct quick run down the steep bank instead of the steps the other side 🙈.

You've goat to be kidding!

Some tough and tricky to reach weeds brought the best 'mountain goat' impressions from our GoodGymers, while also providing an excellent lower body workout in maintaining your balance, and the challenge of making it back down again without slipping! With rakes ingeniously used as anchors, everyone made it look easy!

Cookie did some chopping of weeds at the very top of the bank, while both Kathryn and Matt glided smoothly up and down. A rogue weed was spotted by Helen who took on both the steep bank and tough weed with triumphant success. There's even photo evidence of Chi getting involved with some raking on the steep bank, a rare sight 😉.

Rake me up before you go-go!

In just 40 minutes, all the GoodGymers and other Fulham Palace volunteers had filled all the large bags to the brim with leaves and weeds for composting. You could now see the lovely green grass of the moat, now devoid of weeds, with the remaining leaves left in piles ready to be collected once the large bags had been emptied onto the compost.

Check out the difference...

Chi kindly took a couple of 'artistic' group shots next the moat bridge and from above. Everyone called it a day as all the bags had been filled. We helped gather in the tools before we headed over to the paved area by the Skate Bowl for some fun fitness games.

Off in squat pursuit!

To get the brain and body warmed-up before the fitness games we did some high knees, jumping jacks, spotty dogs and all successfully mastered the 'different moves for each number' challenge. We even had a couple of young kids keen to get involved!

We started off with the childhood classic duck, duck, goose in the form of squat, squat, goose! This proved to be slightly trickier than anticipated with a small and tight circle. However, lots of fun and laughs were had, and everyone managed to stay on their feet in some closely run battles!

We then split into two teams for a two-minute game of 'squatshot'. Team One (Team Down) v Team Two (Team Up), and the gusts of winds as the 'unofficial competitor', Team Sideways! Some interesting tactics and battles occurred with shot glasses quickly being up then down or vice versa (and the odd multiple shot turn!). It was a highly competitive game with Team Up emerging victorious, by quite some margin - definitely helped by having one extra person on their team! Awesome 'squatshot' work all!

We rocked the moat!

Thank you all very much for coming along and for all your efforts in the moat, what a start to the weekend!

It was absolutely fabulous to welcome some new faces to GoodGym, and we really hope you'll be able to make it back again soon.

Have a great rest of your weekend! 😊

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More about GoodGym

At GoodGym, 'we get fit and do good' in our communities. We do this in four main ways:

1. Group runs - these happen every Tuesday evening in Hammersmith & Fulham. We meet at the BetterGym in Hammersmith 6:45pm for a 7pm start. You can find all the details of the next run here. Hope to see you then!

2. Missions - one-off runs to an elderly and isolated person's house to help out with a job they can't manage themselves, for example, moving furniture, gardening, changing lightbulbs. If you're keen to get involved, you'll need to get mission verified, including a DBS check. More information here.

3. Coach runs - you get paired with an older person who may not see anybody else from day to day. You visit them weekly for a chat - not only is it a wonderful thing to do for somebody who is lonely, but you get an incentive to head out there for your run and you could form a pretty great friendship in the process.

4. Finally we have Community Missions - similar to a group run but everyone meets up at the task to support a local community organisation. For these you don't need to be DBS checked, everybody is welcome, and you don't even have to run there (although it adds to the fun if you do!). You can see all the community missions happening here.

If you have any questions, please drop me an email: bethn@goodgym.org.

It was double milestone magic in Hammersmith last night as we had not one but two amazing Goodgymers to celebrate! Please put your hands together for the brilliant

• Alice who reached a fantastic 50 good deals and earned herself a black tshirt - congratulations!

• Sarah whose boundless energy and commitment to doing good and fitness has resulted in 100 good deeds and her very own wings! Way to go Sarah.

Before we warmed up there was just time to mention that next week is a biggie for GoodGym because it's our birthday! We are a whole decade old, so, to celebrate, we're having a week of celebratory runs and a special #supersaturday of community missions. Keep an eye on all the good stuff that's happening in your area and get that party hat at the ready!

We also said a big

• well done to all those H&Fers who did Rough Runner at the weekend. You smashed that travelator !

After a warm up that saw us activate all those major muscle groups we use for running and get our heart rates up, we did a headcount and, in honour of the 50 and 100 milestones being reached that evening, asked what we'd like to achieve before we reached 100 years old. Goals included completing a half marathon, new PBs, buying a house and getting a girlfriend!

We set off for Flora Gardens Primary School - it was a short run (a big thank you to those who helped with the route for those more directionally challenged...) which we took at a good pace and we soon arrived to be welcomed by Jeanette, the school's business manager.

GoodGym H&F have been really active in helping this lovely school, and so were no strangers to last night's job, which was painting one of the rooms. It was a pretty small space though, so we split the group in half. The first group headed in to lay down plastics, and while wearing some pretty snazzy Grand Finalist tshirts, got stuck in to the painting.

Meanwhile, the second group took a gentle jog down to the park to do some speed drills. These exercises saw us think about pace and changing gear with our running and were pretty tough - well done team! After our minute's plank we headed back tot he school to swap over with the hardworking painters.

While they got stuck in with painting - luckily they had been left the high bits and tricky corners - the first group headed outside to the playground for fitness. We had decided that the park was getting a little too dark, so opted for a revised session of high intensity alternated with conditioning in the school premises, finished off with some short sprints and a plank, of course. Which group had it easier?!

After almost an hour at the school in total, the room was beautifully painted in gloss white, so we posed for a quick, quite cramped, photo and headed back to base for stretches.

Next week your ace trainer Beth will be back to lead one of the special week of 10th anniversary runs. Sign up here for all the details and to guarantee yourself more Tuesday fun and fitness.

Thanks for having me Hammersmith, always great to see you, keep up the amazing work!

We've had a lot of balmy weather systems come through on Tuesday evenings recently, but luckily tonight we had the perfect conditions for a run. It was great to be met with lots of GoodGym'ers in their red and black tees at the Better Gym, and really lovely to welcome along Morwenna and Mable for their first GoodGym H&F run - thank you for coming along, hope you enjoyed it!

Before we headed off on tonight's run we headed outside to our makeshift warm-up spot and begun with the round-up of this week's news...

The weekly news 📰...

1. Big Half 2020 - There are a limited number of £10 community entries for the Big Half in London on Sunday 1st March 2020. If you are interested in a £10 place, please drop me an email (or see the details in the weekly fitness email that I know you all read 😉).
2. Rough Runner - at Finsbury Park, on Saturday 7th September where you can volunteer on the Saturday for a free place on the Sunday!
3. GoodGym turns 10! - GoodGym will soon celebrate being 10 years old! We want to know what GoodGym means to you and your community, please have a look at this link as we’d love to hear your story. There's also a big party in central London on Thursday 12th of September! - hopefully you've received the email with the link to register, please drop me an email if not.

Come flyer with me, come flyer come flyer away

For today's task we were going to be handing out flyers for the wonderful Age UK H&F. Nicely warmed up with some skips, side-to-sides and fast feet we headed off on our short run to down to their Activity Centre on Greyhound Road. As ever, we paused en route for the weekly wall sit, with many mumours of "it's actually getting easier" heard!

Johnny's got the key, he's got the secret...

We all arrived at the Activity Centre and Johnny pulled the keys out of his pocket to unlock the door and allow us to enter. As everyone gathered in the main room Johnny appeared with a big box of flyers, of course with biscuits placed carefully on top!

The AGE old question, how many leaflets can GoodGym H&F flyer in one go?

Johnny explained all the services that Age UK H&F offer for the over 50s, these range from home cooked meals to physical activity classes to IT classes, led by the man himself. Part of the programme Johnny is heading up is getting those in the community more IT literate, and one side of the leaflet promoted this service. The other side of the leaflet was a call for volunteers as at present, there are only 2 volunteers.

Leaf'let out

With the challenge of 2,000 leaflets and a map of the surrounding streets to target infront of the team we decided it would be most efficient to split into two smaller teams. One led by Lucy (after we confirmed it wasn't a competition!) and the other by Johnny.

Fully leafleted up we headed outside for a quick team photo before heading down and around the surrounding streets.

Baptism of flyer

We haven't done much flyering recently in H&F, but both teams implemented the efficient 'flyer chain' down all the streets with perfection. After 40 minutes of flyering had covered a substantial amount of the surrounding streets. As both teams regrouped and headed back to the Activity Centre we realised we were two red shirts down...where were Eloise and Sarah?! After a couple of calls, they were located safely back at the Activity Centre...obviously smart thinking to ensure they got a headstart on the biscuits before the biscuit man, Johnny!

The great flyer of H&F

As everyone placed their remaining leaflets back in the big box it was amazing to see lots of empty space due the number of flyers that were handed out by the team, as Johnny fantastically summed up "we've made a big dent on the box of flyers".

Once everyone had filled their boots with juice, water and biscuits we headed over to the green opposite for a quick fitness session.

The team had attracted a particularly friendly dog who enjoyed a quick game of fetch with Rob and Lucy. However, the dog was less keen to get involved with tonight's fitness challenge, the old favourite, Sally Squats! 3mins 25seconds of squatting, what's not to love?!

As always the team dug deep and triumphantly finished. With quads burning we called it a night and headed off on a gentle run back to base for a cool down and stretch off. Brillant work tonight all!

Special shout outs to...📢🙌🏼

• Lucy for her parkrun PB at Gunnersbury on Saturday - her second PB in a row!!
• Elizabeth for volunteered bright and early on Sunday morning at the PrideRun10k.

Well done both 😊.

Next week we've got a Two Task Tuesday and you'll have a choice of tasks: heading up to the Nubian Life Resource Centre to help out at their Josiah Braithwaite Community Garden - we'll be helping out with some weeding and sweeping of their pathways OR 2) Heading up to Groundwork to lend a hand with transferring bags of soil to their new wooden raised beds. Sign up here. Have a lovely rest of your week. Hopefully see you next week!

After last week turned into a rather soggy affair, we were all very glad to see the sun shining once again on a Tuesday night and had the pleasure of welcoming along three new runners Lauren, Sam and Elisa and GoodGym tourist Charlotte to the group. Following a run-down of all the achievements from the team in the past week, including stellar performances from all who attended the GoodGym Olympics (and have the bruises to prove it) and to Helen and Steph who took part in the RideLondon100, not to mention casually saving someone’s life (Lucy!), Beth kicked off the evening’s activities with a thorough warm-up consisting of many of our favourite limbering-up techniques; crab-shuffles, lunges, shooing-the-chickens – you know the drill!

Nicely limbered up we headed off on our 2.5km run through the streets of Hammersmith and Shepherds Bush, with a quick stop for Beth’s all-time favourite torture method, wall-sits. It wasn't long before we arrived at Askam Court, where we were met by Mirko, one of the residents who tends to the garden throughout the year and who had called on the mighty GoodGym Hammersmith and Fulham once again for help. The 22-strong team, fuelled by biscuits and what just so happens to be my favourite chocolate (Lindt Lindor in case you're wondering, I know you were 😉) donned their gardening gloves and with the help of a few assorted tools, dug, weeded, chopped and bagged-up all the unwanted "invaders" to clear the patches ready for new plants.

Some of the team were tasked with detangling and removing a climbing vine which had sprawled across a flower bed and up a fence, a challenge which required both a delicate touch and brute strength in equal measure, while others were tasked with cutting away old debris to make way for baby Lamb’s Ears* (n’aww) hiding underneath. The age old proverb “many GoodGym hands make light work” was proved to be true yet again and it was amazing to see how much difference was made in such a short space of time. After a summer of gardening across the borough, despite everyone’s modest claims to the contrary, I’m starting to think that some people might be able to tell a weed from an actual plant!…

As usual, the task flew by and before we knew it Beth was giving us our 5 minute warning and herding the group together for our weekly group photos (one normal and one jazz hands) before we waved goodbye to the residents and embarked on our 2.5k run back to base. The group split into 3, giving people the chance to run at a speed that suited them. En route we came across a matteess that had been strewn across the pavement, in true GoodGym fashion within seconds it was safely propped up against the wall, and not long before we were all reunited for our cool-down stretch and de-brief.

*A type of plant with super-soft furry leaves, not actual lamb’s ears, no animals were harmed!

A BIG thank you to Catherine for a brilliant and entertaining run report!

This week's news...

1. This Thursday is the August GoodGym Social - all the details are here.
2. This Saturday (not Sunday as I may have said!) - help support London Frontrunners to put on their PrideRun 10km 2019! Volunteers are needed for the event set-up & baggage tent. Please sign up here.
3. This month's GoodGym Long Run is on the morning of Sunday 25th August, it is a tour of the Docklands area, followed by lunch. There are 3 distance options, 26km, 16km, 10km, all the details are here.

Next week's task is at Age UK H&F...and it's also our monthly social! Sign up here. Hopefully see you there! Have a lovely rest of your week and weekend!

Despite heavy showers earlier in the evening - and the prospect of more to come - 16 dedicated GoodGymers joined our weather-proof trainer, Beth, for our weekly Group Run.

Beth welcomed first-timers Sarah and Lucy and congratulated Johnny on completing his 150th good deed as a GG tourist the previous evening and his 200th parkrun at Kingston at the weekend. Well done Johnny!

As usual we started with a warm-up and some new exercises evoked quizzical looks from passers-by as we first hopped on one leg then later scurried sideways like crabs along the pavement. Nicely limbered up, we set off on the 1km run to our destination at Loris Gardens. This is a community garden which is regularly maintained through drop in gardening days organised by Hammersmith Community Garden Association, with GoodGymers providing some extra help a few times a year.

Splash and Dash

Happy that the rain was holding off for our run, we splashed through the puddles and weaved our way through pedestrians with Lucy back-marking so that no-one was left behind. Not everyone stayed dry, however, as a car drove at speed through a giant puddle creating a tidal wave that doused us just as we were passing 🌊.

Just another brick in the wall

Breaking our journey for the obligatory wall sit, we were soon at Loris Garden and getting kitted out with gardening gloves, trowels and weed forks which had been provided for us to use. Our task was to weed the brick path and brush sand into the gaps between the bricks. Everyone cracked on with the task and it was great to see our red t-shirts dotted along the path.

Sand and deliver

Despite the instructions on the paving sand saying to use it in dry conditions, we went ahead and applied it into the freshly-weeded path. And what a transformation! Sadly there was only half a bag of sand, so we didn’t get as much done as we would have liked, but at that point the weather intervened anyway.

Here comes the rain again

It got very dark. It rained. Hard.

Most sought shelter under the trees*. Johnny cleverly used a garden waste sack as an umbrella. Catherine donned a lovely polka-dot raincoat which appeared from nowhere! When the rain eased a little we hurriedly cleared away all the equipment and posed for a group photo before heading back to base. A vote on whether to go back directly or incorporate a 1k time trial was inconclusive, but as the rain stopped we decided to do the time trial anyway and gathered at the starting point on Brook Green.

Ready, steady, go!

With Strava and sports watches set, the faster runners sped off on the one-lap route around the Green. Others took a more leisurely pace, and some preferred a core workout rather than a run. That’s the beauty of GoodGym – you can do things at your own level. From there it was a short run back to base for some stretches and a well-earned pat on the back for braving the elements to complete yet another good deed.

A BIG thank you to Sarah for the wonderful run report!

This week's news...

1. The GoodGym Olympics is this Saturday at Parliament Hill Athletics Track, if you aren't signed up to compete definitely still come along and support! The events start at 1pm on Saturday. There's also a veg and cake competition! The post-GG Olympics party is at The Vine, details here. Everyone can also get involved with the 1km 'race' known as "The Nationwide race", details here.
2. Next Thursday (8th) is the August GoodGym Social - location TBC!

Next week we're heading back up to Askham Court to lend a hand to resident, Mirko with some gardening and weeding work. Sign up here.

*But the heavy downpour did not stop either Sarah or Jonathan who carried on weeding regardless!