Not even the coldest day of the year and actual snow on the ground could stop 11 GoodGym runners turning up to do good in Ealing.

*News Roundup

The GG Ealing team is doing very well in the January challenge with 91 good deeds and 1007 kms clocked up so far - keep up the hard work!

GoodGym has some £10 community entry places for the Big Half happening in London on Sunday 10th March. If you're interested please email bighalf@goodgym.org. Deadline for applications is Wednesday 30th January. Names will be drawn at random from those who want a place. It's a great race, and very well organised, so if you're after a good half marathon, whether it be your first or if you're chasing that PB, then why not give it a go.

Snow stopping us

After delaying the inevitable as long as we could, we braved the cold and stepped outside to warm up with some dynamic exercises including power skips, side steps and heel flicks, doing our best to ignore the white stuff falling from the sky. Instead, with our heart rates up, we talked about our fave things to spread on toast. Top of the rankings was an undisputed winner - peanut butter - but other contenders included butter, jam and, love it or hate it, marmite.

With the prospect of hot toast to look forward to, we set off in the direction of St Mary's Church, where Steve was waiting for us with a big shed to empty. Tentatively we braved the icy streets, a little like Bambi in trainers. Thankfully we all made it without any slips or trips to find Michael and Chris there waiting for us to get started with the job. There was a little wrong turn taken (blame the newbie...me) but we eventually found the shed in question.

Our job was to remove all the rubbish there so that Steve could get access to the blower. Don't know what a blower is? You're not alone. But at GoodGym, every day is a school day! Turns out that the massive bit of kit used to be used to blow air into the organ in the church. So there you go. Unfortunately, there was so much stuff cluttering up the shed that it was inaccessible, so we got stuck straight into moving everything into the garage round the corner.

After 20 minutes of hard work the place was looking much tidier, the blower was in clear sight, and the shed had been given a very thorough clean. Not only that but the tangled hosepipe had been returned to its former glory, a rather nice St Mary's sign had been uncovered (beautifully modelled in the pics above) and not a single spider had been spotted. This, we were reliably informed, was because they were all hibernating. We also decided to believe this was true.

A quick jog over to the alley next to the church provided us with the perfect place to knock out a few conditioning exercises interspersed with sprints - an effective way to boost endurance, strengthen to prevent injury, and to keep warm!

All that was left was a run back to base, a few stretches, and the prospect of a nice hot cuppa. Great work everybody! Thanks so much for welcoming me in Ealing. Next week Olivia will be back for her considerably warmer-then-here holiday, and you can sign up for the excellent sounding run here!

Happy 50th good deed to Steph!

We began last night by congratulating Steph on her 50th good deed, the special thing is that’s she’s completed them ALL in Ealing and has been a big part of GoodGym in the borough! Winner of best Halloween fancy dress two years running, Steph is always a delight to run with and to have at the tasks. She always gets stuck in and gives every task her all, no questions asked. She never complains even when we’re planking on a muddy field in the winter or doing a mucky job, you can guarantee Steph will turn up with a smile! We feel very lucky to have her and can’t wait to see her rocking that special 50 black tee very soon!

After a quick news round up, a warm up and a chat about favourite crisp flavours (Steph’s choice!) we began our run out towards Hanwell ready to help The William Hobbayne Charity scrub up for their quiz event happening this weekend.

The William Hobbayne Charity was founded in 1484 and is the oldest charity in the UK. It was set up to help support those in need in Hanwell and continues to deliver that promise to this day. Last night it was our turn to help them in return of all the wonderful things they do for the community.

We met June from the charity along with one of the trustees at The William Hobbayne Centre where there were lots of plates to wash, cutlery to wrap in napkins and table cloths to be ironed. With a small kitchen to work in and a big group last night we split into two groups with half completing a fitness session while the others worked and then swapping half way.

Plank while the irons hot!

With one group washing plates and ironing I put the other group through their paces with a quick blast abs session with high five sit ups, planks and pilates 100’s. The centre had a lovely warm hall for us to use so no planking in the mud for us this week! Swapping half way means everyone got a chance to do the task and get a good fitness session in too, winner!

We finished with June explaining a little bit more about all the great things the charity does in the area and it was wonderful to hear all the ways in which it engages in the community and helps those in need. We feel very honoured to be able to help them and be a part of it all!

With a run back separating us from the pub and cake we dashed off back to the start as quickly as possible to collect our baked goods and headed for our celebratory pints! We raised a glass to Steph and to everyone else for all the great things you do every week, cheers everyone!

A few things to note coming up this week:

• Community missions galore on Saturday and first up it’s the ‘We love Horsenden Hill volunteer day’ on Saturday morning. Come anytime between 10am-2pm and just stay as long as you can.

• We’ve helped them set up for Saturday but William Hobbayne have two slots they could do with some more help with on the actual day of the event. First slot is 2-3pm helping them put out tables and chairs and the second slot is 8-9pm helping them serve food and clear up. Sign up if you can!

• Sunday you can also get your volunteering fix by signing up to help at the Adidas City Run Fulham 10km you get a host of rewards like free t-shirts and half price race entry so it's definitely worth it if you're free. Sign up is by midday today so be quick!

That's all for this week, see you next time!

Another lovely sunny evening in Ealing saw 15 of us head to Walpole Walled Garden to take on a variety of garden tasks to help this wonderful local space!

No new faces this week but lots of second timers which was lovely to see. We started by doing a round of truth or lie, one true thing we were up to this coming bank holiday and one false. Some of us were very inventive with our fibs but everyone sounds like they have very exciting plans for the long weekend!

Off on our run we went and this week we looped around the park for a bit more mileage before the task, last weeks run was rather short so it’s good to mix up the distances!

Vanessa was prepped and ready to go when we arrived back in Walpole and had a good mix of jobs for us to complete for the evening within the walled garden area. We split ourself into teams and got stuck in!

• Team Watering - Jenni, Sam & Amanda
• Team Trimming - Rachael, Shan, Phill & Charlotte
• Team Potting - Chris, Callum, Steph, Sonia & Michael
• Team Digging - Sam & Bec

Now which team would you choose…

Well unlucky for Jenni, Sam and Amanda they definitely drew the short straw! You’d think watering is like a nice little job well not when you throw comfrey tea into the mix, the smell is definitely something that will stick with us all for a while. Every time any of them came near with their watering can you knew about it! Well done for sucking it up and getting the job done guys!

The rest of us had a fairly smooth ride for the evening (except for a little shock from some frogs hiding in the overgrowth!) all working efficiently in our teams to get all the jobs done! Time flew by and working until the bitter end left us just enough time to pack up and do a round of sally squats and planks in the park before jogging the short few minutes back to base.

The nights are definitely drawing in now and it’s getting dark as we say our goodbyes so hopefully catch you all again very soon while we still have the light evenings!

Another lovely sunny evening in Ealing saw 16 runners take it to church to help St. Mellitus with a little outdoor maintenance. We were joined by newcomer Amanda and we also had lots of milestones with Harvey completing his 10th good deed and both Michelle and Shan completing number 15!

We were met in the church by vicar Stu who explained a little bit about how the church works in the community not only to bring services but to support lots of local activities. He was really grateful that we could come down to help get on top of some of the overgrown areas outside!

We split ourselves into three teams over the site with a mixture of hacking away at thorny overgrowth, litter picking, wedding and hedge trimming.

Stu gave us his blessing to go to town with the cutting and the group did not hold back, filling three huge garden waste sacks and leaving the site looking much more tamed! As the church is next to a busy road and bus stop unfortunately it tends to gather quite a bit of rubbish but our trusty litter pickers collected it all up filling a good few bin bags!

*The location did mean we got a few looks as we worked, we weren’t sure what people thought of us and did wonder whether they thought we’d been naughty and were on community service! Hopefully the array of GoodGym t-shirts on show last night set them straight though! *

All in all a great nights work!

A jog back to base through the parks left us only 5 minutes to spare for the fitness session, the perfect amount of time for Sally to come out and play! We played the song with the option of sally squats, sally planks or sally tricep dips. Some of us mixed it up with myself and Steph really regretting the decision to switch to planks from squats half way through. Feedback was that the tricep dips were a killer too, a great way to round off the nights events!

Hope to see you all next Tuesday :)

With a smaller group than the last time we visited The Ealing Food Bank ( which was a record breaking run back in January! ) last night we had 11 awesome runners come out to lend a hand sorting, shifting and cleaning down at this vital community resource. We also had one new runner Rachel join us so a big welcome to her!

Is it spring yet...

With the chilly weather still lurking around (come on spring, get your act together!) we started with a quick warm up with a few exercises (which made you all look ridiculous!) but I promise they are all legitimate running drills! And then we were off into the night to do some good.

We arrived to meet Hilary who had a list of jobs for us to complete which included a lot of shifting and resorting as well as weighing donations and a clean up too. We quickly sorted ourselves into small teams across each task get everything covered in the time we had. Everyone got straight down to it and stuck in with their assigned missions and it was clear this would be a smooth operation...

Creating a rice breaker...

And then a crash! I knew it had to be Michael... A little mishap with shifting the rice donations resulted in a bit of a breakage but luckily it was just the storage containers and it didn't leave us with a big clean up operation!

Once everyone was settled into their jobs myself and Larissa popped around the corner to help with a secondary task for the evening at the local night shelter to see if they needed a hand with anything for the evening. We've been visiting at this pop up winter night shelter for the last few weeks alongside our other tasks to lend a hand where they need it and next week is their last night for the year so we'll be back one more time!

Light work was made of all the jobs on the list and once we returned from the shelter to regroup we were ready to head for home. The first of us to arrive back made use of the time with some core exercises and squats before welcoming in the last runners for some stretches.

Lastly just a quick thank you to Michael for back marking the run and being second in command on the task. Michael is a vital asset to our GoodGym group and is on the taskforce for Ealing, something lots of you are keen to be involved with which is great to see! If you're wondering how you can be involved just ask me at the next group run!

Happy Running!

A last minute change of plan won't stop us!

Last night's task was a very last minute call around to all the previous places we'd had the pleasure of helping in hope there was something we could do! Unfortunately our task for Cultivate London that was scheduled for last night was curtailed by our contact being very unwell, get well soon Rosie! Luckily we have a few more dates booked in to help her at the DIG site in April ( sign up nice and early here! ) so we'll still get to go and help later on!

With a welcome shift in weather from last weeks Narnia like run we had a HUGE 21 runners out last night with two new members joining us for the first time. A Big welcome to Harriet and Victoria

This week we were back to two tasks as we sent a small sub team off again to help at The Ealing Churches Winter Night Shelter. This week taskforce member Jenni led Michelle, Tony and Clare down, so thank you guys for volunteering to be on the smaller run!

We started off with a quick group huddle to discuss to route and to come clean about the fact I wouldn't in fact be running this evening... I felt incredibly guilty but a few niggles meant I didn't want to risk a run last night so instead I was lead bike for proceedings! A few warm up drills saw us nicely warmed up and we were off!

With Michael C backmarking for us we all arrived safely to Hanwell Community Centre with Shan & Michael K ready in waiting for us to get started. The team at the centre were sure they had some bits we would help with when we were left without a task at the last minute, so thanks to them for accommodating us with short notice last night!

We were working across the site doing a bit of cleaning, sweeping and tidying. There was a good mix of things to do, window cleaning and prop sorting were the key tasks, everyone was particularly excited about the group picture that would come of all the great props in the basement we were helping to organise.

What a PROPosition!

With it being the first Tuesday of the month (our dedicated social night!) minds soon turned to the pub so we wrapped things up and headed back to base and complete the run/cycle back to meet the other team. Finishing up nicely with a little leg busting round of exercises we were finished for the evening. Lovely to see so many in the pub afterwards and Jenni and I were happy to be able to share some biscuits we were gifted from a mission a few weeks ago!

Next week the lovely Ana of GoodGym Hounslow and Wandsworth will be covering while I am taking care of some business in Barcelona... it's a lovely spring cleaning task at a local church and it's a new venue we've not visited before so let's show them what we're made of and get stuck in, sign up here!

See you in a couple of weeks!

We stacked up the good deeds and the shelves last night as 27 AMAZING runners came out to help at Ealing Food Bank. This included 9 lovely new additions with Sophie, Aurelia, Jane, Vicky, Chris J, Chris B, Gemma, Perrine & Mohand all kicking off the new year in style by beginning their GoodGym journey. Welcome everyone!

You butter believe it!

With everyone full of beans (and in some cases peanut butter) and ready to raise their pulses (literally) we started with a quick warm up and fitness session on Haven Green. We began with some simple drills before turning up the tempo with some running circle drills before seeing how far our legs could curry us to the task.

A lot of the group had bought donations down with them to give on the night but fortuNUTely the many jars of peanut butter we had for offering hadn’t weighed us down too much and we made it to the task ready and raring to go! We were met by the lovely Hillary who after the initial shock of the number of us gave us lots of different tasks to do around the warehouse! With such a large turnout we were crammed in like sardines and soon it was a feeding frenzy of shelf stacking, food sorting and cleaning in every aisle.

The time soon came to make like a banana and split and we headed back to base for a quick stretch and debrief on the nights events.

Hopefully the extra puns littered throughout the report have whet your appetite and given you food for thought for next time when you could have your pun in lights on the report.

A special mention to Michael Kidd this week for leading the run and helping co-orindate the task, also his 99th good deed with GoodGym so next time we get to present him with the BIG 100 T-SHIRT!

As always a massive thank you to everyone who came tonight and hopefully see you all next time!

Third time's a charm.

After our last two planned tasks for the night had got scuppered, we finally had a task no one could cancel. We had a bulk of leaflets left over from a previous week that still needed delivering. These flyers were helping promote Wand's Project that provides support for people affected by the Grenfell Disaster. Gladys at Wand was quick to think on her feet just hours before we were due to meet and asked us to visit the Charecroft and Edward Wood Estates.

Let the festivities commence

There was a festive fancy dress theme for the evening. Ellie worn some fairy lights around her head and Jason had a very striking outfit (see the photos). After getting a group photo in front of the Christmas tree we set off towards Charecroft estate.

We almost couldn’t get into the buildings at first because the don’t allow people in to drop flyers. However once the security guard had heard about the project he was very impressed and allowed us in.

Then with flyers the spare we headed over the Edward Wood Estate, where we managed to deliver throughout Stebbing house .

After that it was once round Shepherd's Bush park before heading back to base. There Jason was crowned best ‘fancy' dressed and was rewarded with a edible Santa trophy. We had a big Secret Santa swap and Justine got the perfect present... a head torch (that will help make the pavements be a bit less treacherous for her knees..).

Festive fun and farewells

There was more festive fun afterwards when we went on to Bill's for a lovely Christmas dinner// December Social. There were crackers, bad jokes and tasty food. Plus, and farewell speech for Will who was moving back up North. Will has been coming regularly to Goodgym Hammersmith and Fulham since he moved to London in April. He’s been a fantastic addition to the gang and will be greatly missed. Make sure you give him a cheer when he comes back for the London Marathon.