HAPPY NEW YEAR GOODGYM WANDSWORTH!

We really started off 2019 with a bang - no less than 46 amazing runners ran 5k, smashed out a whole range of jobs for a community garden, and took on a tough fitness session all in the name of getting fit and doing good.

The January Challenge!

As some of you know, every year we take part in the January challenge. This is a bit of (friendly!) competition between GoodGym areas to see who can rack up the most good deeds and distance in the gloomiest month of the year - it's a really good motivation when it's a bit dark and cold outside. This year our goal is a biggie! We have no less than 220 good deeds to reach, and a whopping 3000 kilometres. We can do it! Just make sure you're connected to Strava so all your training miles are counted, and come along to as many group runs and missions as you can squeeze in - everything counts towards our target. Go team!

Well done to everybody who did races and parkruns over the festive season - don't forgt there is a parkrun every Saturday morning at 9am. It's a free, timed 5k and a great way to get fitter, improve your times and also to meet up with your GG buddies - wear your red tshirt with pride!

Need for Speed

After a quick intro and catch up in the BAC we headed outside for our warm up which got our muscles ready for the run ahead. We also found out about eachother's resolutions for 2019. There were a happy number of running and GoodGym goals (hurrah!) as well as promises to cut down on plastic, drink more, drink less, remain fabulous, eat less meat and read more books. You are an inspiring bunch!

Our task tonight was at Doddington and Rollo rooftop garden, a space which has been transformed from a neglected multistorey roof into an amazing community garden for local residents to grow their own fruit and veg. So after a stead run down there, stopping only briefly for some conditioning reps, we arrived to find the volunteers waiting for us with a list of jobs.

Tasks included cutting back vines, weeding, shifting heavy pots, sorting compost, turning over soil and we quickly divided up into teams to tackle them. It was incredibly seeing you all work so hard - looking round the garden is was a buzz of activity and so impressive to see what a big team of people can achieve in half an hour. That work would have taken the volunteers a significant chunk of time, so well done for making such a difference.

Tools down, we jogged over to Battersea Park for our fitness session. We kicked off the first one of 2019 with everybody's favourite/worst challenge - Sally Squats. This is a serious bit of thigh-burning conditioning, and we all found ourselves how blimming long Sally was going to be up and and down - was it the extended version? Was it on a loop? Finally it came to the end with everybody gritting their teeth and nobody giving up. If hat wasn't enough we then did a total body workout circuit, which sadly (I can tell you were devastated) had to be cut short because we ran out of time.

After a speedy run back to our starting point we paused at the bottom of the hill at the BAC for a final tough sprint before Danny kindly led us though our much needed stretches. What a brilliant way to kick off the year, team. Next week we're back doing the same and edging ever closer to reaching our January target! Hope to see you - until then, happy running!

It was the very last run of the year in Wandsworth last night, and there was singing, the 12 days of Fitmas, and not one but two cakes! What a way to see out the year...

It was also a time for us to look back at what we've achieved together. We have clocked up a colossal 4473 good deeds so far - next year is going to be a huge one for us as we hit our 5000th good deed!

Things you got to snow

It was the first run for Lou and for Anneka last night - give them some festive cheer, GoodGym!

Our first run back next year is on the 7th January, can't wait to see you all there ready for work off all that Christmas pud!

Absolutely delighted that on our very last run of the year, our lovely Jordan hit his 100th good deed! What an extraordinary amount of doing good across the borough and beyond, time spent making other peoples' lives better, and an innumerable number of squats and sprints! Well done Jordan!

Let's make it rein

Tonight we had a special one off run following the fun we had last year. We love to support Paul's Cancer Support Centre, an amazing organisation near Clapham Junction that provides support for anybody living with cancer, offering alternative therapies, counseling and advice to everybody. It's an incredible place that is vital for communities, so tonight's task was a running and caroling session to raise as much money as we could for them.

So after a quick run through to prep our angelic voices, and a warm up where we made like athletic Christmas puds, angels, Christmas trees and Rudolph, we set off for our first stop. Paul's Cancer Support has a good relationship with Asda, so it was just a short jog down to kick off. There were no first performance nerves from us though, as we got started with Jingle Bells before a rather fine rendition of Silent Night, even if we do say so ourselves.

We did a few more belters, before moving off to Clapham Junction, where we were enthusiastically supported (conducted) by a lovely older lady waiting for her bus, which was much more encouraging that the competitive man we encountered at our next stop outside the pub. Undeterred, we ran up to Clapham Common, where we finished off the night with some lovely harmonising and a rousing rendition of We Wish You A Merry Christmas! Watch this space to find out how much we raised last night...

All that was left of our festive run was a fitness session on the common, where we got competitive with a game of The 12 Days of Fitmas. It was a very tight call, but after one team had to repeat 12 skaters for the upteenth time, it was Team Warrior that pipped it to the post and were rewarded with cheers and chocolate.

One myrrh for the road

After a speedy run back to base, it was just time to stretch it out before we headed over to the Four Thieves for our final social of the year, and to eat cake.

If you want to relive our tuneful endeavours last night, check out the video here - sounding very nice GoodGym!

It's been a huge pleasure to run with you this year Wandsworth - you make Mondays brilliant. Thank you for all your amazing efforts this year to make your borough and beyond a better place to live. Here's the 2019 and all the good deeds and fitness it will bring! Wishing you ALL the most wonderful end to the year xxx

With the penultimate run of the year and two tasks ahead of us, we were feeling decidedly Christmassy in Wandsworth last night !

We kicked off the night with a bumper news session...

If you're free on Friday and can sign up for this mission on Friday for the amazing Evolve housing charity, please do as soon as poss! The organisers need eight people for the mission to go ahead and will cancel it if they can't get that.

Next week is our last run of the year but we're back on the 7th January for our first run - perfect for shaking off those January blues and any vestiges of a NYE hangover. We'll also be doing a starter session, so let your friends know if they wouldn't like to find out more about GoodGym!

Remember all those bulbs we planted for the Kambala Cares project? They're having a Christmas party on the estate, complete with local choirs and mulled wine, and we've been invited! Check out the details here.

We had to bid a tearful farewell to Alyx who is leaving us for new adventures in NZ! She's been a big part of the GG family, and we'll miss her. Thanks for all your amazing efforts and enthusiasm over the last two years Alyx! Come back to visit please!

Two Task Monday

It was a biggie last night, with two tasks to choose from. The first was a shorter run down to the Venue Community centre to various jobs at this local centre, and the other was a longer run to a family refuge centre in Balham to do a painting and weeding job.

So after a warm up and a discussion on our favourite veggie meals, we divided up into two groups, with Alyx (who might have thought she'd get a night off on her final run for a while with us) taking one half on the longer run.

The Venue group made it down to the centre in very quick time....perhaps a bit too quick as the task owner hadn't turned up yet! But after a quick call while Helen led the group through a few exercises and our weekly plank minute, we got our instructions, and started by taking compostable waste over to the local community garden. On returning, we knocked out a few less fun jobs, such as clearing rubbish and cleaning, before moving onto the creative bit - decorating the community centre! The decorating methods were pretty inventive - from some lovely tinsel garlanding, to some trolley-based arranging ("I've never been so tall" said Beth!) - but very effective. We left the place looking very festive, and jogged over to Battersea Park to do some competitive fitness. Dividing up into groups, everybody had a turn in choosing the exercise (including dancing like a fairy? Apparently this worked our ABCs...!) before sprinting, with one team just pipping the other to the post - but not by much. Excellent effort guys!

Over to Alyx to hear what the guys who ran down to the family refuge centre got up to:

After a long but steady run, we arrived at the house ready for action and were greeted, welcomed in and shown our task. One of the bright yellow rooms was to be painted yellow, plus there was some weeding to be done outside! We took it in turns painting and doing 1 minute planks, so despite the long run we still all got in an abs workout too. After just 30 minutes we had weeded an area of the garden, laid down some wood chip and painted an entire room - many hands sure do make light work! We ran back to the BAC to meet Ana and the rest of the team for some stretches.

Next week it's our final run of the year! (sniffle). But don't worry, we are really going to go out with a bang. Sign up here for a very festive running and caroling task in support of a local cancer centre, a very Christmassy fitness session and then our very last social of the year in the Four Thieves across the road. See you then for a Christmas cracker of a run!

With a backdrop of pretty colours in the sky and the smell of bonfires in the air, it was a cracking good group run in Wandsworth last night.

News, lovely news

So much good stuff to report on before our run! Here's a little roundup:

It was our very own Mr Christopher O'Driscoll's 50th good deed last night. That is a massive lot of gardening for elderly people, painting, shifting and lifting for community projects, and who knows how many miles covered! Give him a cheer next time you see him in his spanking new black tshirt for he is a GoodGym star.

Don't forget our Tooting parkrun takeover on the 17th November. We need as many eager beaver helpers as possible! There are a range of jobs to do and I'll be putting out the spreadsheet soon - sign up using the link above in the meantime.

Alyx told us about a great run she is leading soon from King's College. This women only run will be to the Fawcett Society, the UK’s leading charity campaigning for gender equality and women’s rights, to sort and pack sanitary products, to be distributed to women via a charity that tackles period poverty. Sign up here

Don't forget it is the monthly social on Thursday - sign up here for more fun, puns and all things GoodGym!

Please give Peter, Alex and Andy a huge cheer - they came for their first group run last night! A huge welcome to the group.

After that bumper crop of news we headed outside to do our warm up, before running the 3k to our amazing task for the evening. But first, we did a poll on all things Bonfire Night - top of the pops came fireworks in our list of fav things about the night, then came bonfires (handily), all the goof food and hot alcohol, sparklers, hot baths and friends. Aaah.

After a nice steady run over to our task, accompanied by the whistle and pops of Wandsworth fireworks, we arrived at the Oasis Adventure playground charity. This is an amazing organisation that supports local kids, many of whom have disabilities. Oasis Play provides innovative and inclusive outdoor play and learning opportunities that enable disabled and non-disabled children and young people to lead happy, fulfilled lives and play positive roles in the community. It also has one of the areas most bonkers and brilliant play areas, and we had to stop ourselves getting stuck in for a good old clamber over all the fun stuff there.

We were met by David, who gave us a little background on the organisation and its history (and is well placed to do so after over 20 years at the charity!), and who had prepared tools ready for our big job that evening. Our task was to dig out a big area ready for swings and other play equipment. It was hard work - and a great upper body workout - but after just 40 minutes of work, the difference was huge. Check out the photos to see the massive hole we dug!

After all that digging we didn't have a huge amount of time left, but just enough to stop for a few minutes on the way home and knock out a quick but verrry intense tabata session. Nice frogging everyone.

Sweaty but happy we arrived back at the BAC for stretching - next week we're back to Leonard Cheshire disability charity to give them a hand with various jobs (including a wash down of those mobility buses, so wrap up warm!) . Sign up here for more Monday fun, good deeds and fitness.

Some excellent news to start off our Monday evening yesterday - give yourself a big round of applause GoodGym Wandsworth for raising a huge £77 from our cake sale after the run a couple of weeks ago for Paul's Cancer Support Centre. Amazing job!

There was also some great running this weekend, from parkruns all around the country and some great PBs. A special mention to Steph for running her first ever 10k - way to go!

Don't forget we're doing the Tooting Common parkrun takeover on 17th November - loads of roles up for grabs, including marshalls, pacing, token collector, tail walker and more. Sign up here to let us know you're coming!

Light bulb moments

After our warm up last night, we did a quick survey to find out which one tip we'd give a tourist visiting London for the first time - getting on a boat, seeing the Shard, doing the parks, and coming on a GoodGym run - before heading to our task.

Our job last night was for the amazing Kambala Cares project. This award winning residents' association improve life for local people of the Kambala Estate, creating strong links in the community, supporting local businesses, charitable organisations and community projects and taking isolated residents on trips. They are a non-profit organisation, run solely by volunteers who are committed to supporting the local community, and we were happy to lend a hand to clear raised beds and plant bulbs for spring.

After a short run down there we met with Donna, the chairperson of the organisation, and other local residents waiting with tools, gloves, and a whole trolley full of bulbs! Straight away we got into teams, and while one group swept and cleared leaves, the other groups got on with the digging and planting. Half an hour passed and we were still working on our first lot of beds so after a nearly unanimous vote to forego the fitness session (I won't take it personally, honest!) we carried on with the task and realised that the digging in itself was enough of a workout! Even after the extra time, we realised we were not going to get it all done, so agreed with the lovely Donna that we'd come back next week to finish the job!

After a quick run back to base with Andrew and John leading, there was just time for a few stretches. Next week I'm on my hols so excellent Lambeth trainer Katie will be leading you guys back to the estate to plant some more bulbs. You can sign up here for another night of GoodGym fun - and for those of you worrying (and I know you are) - I will let Katie know you had to do without a fitness session last night and see if she'll put a special double lot on for you next Monday!

13 festive GoodGymers ran 6.5k to Pimlico to decorate for the Open Age Christmas Fair!

Definitely a speedy crew tonight!! Flying South towards the river lead by Anil it was great to be joined by some GoodGym first timers and a few new faces to Westminster!!

We were so fast in fact that we beat Angela from Open Age charity to the community centre. A few nervous minutes pasted by she arrived to let us loose on the Christmas decorations!!

Three big bags of decorations along with plentiful supplies of sticky tape to hand we left our creative energy flow as we brought a lot of sparkle to the community centre!!

The decorations are for Open Age’s Christmas Craft fair which helps to raise funds to keep some of the craft activities going through the year.

Sticking high and low, detangling the maze of Christmas lights, bells were ringing, tinsel was expertly hung at ultra precise angles and Christmas confetti was going everywhere!!

30 minutes of Christmas artistic brilliance later and the community hall has been transformed!!

With Angela super impressed with our efforts we bounced off into the night!! With a spring in our step we dominated a slightly longer route back to base and powered our way through Green Park with 600 metres of scorching pace!! Before we got back, stretched out and headed home! In my case with Callum’s phone 🙈🙈🙈🙈!!

Thanks for coming along and hopefully my criminal ways will Not put you off next week to St Andrews Youth Club.

Smooth Running

Joel

12 Westminster GoodGymers ran 7k and moved 9k and delivered 375 leaflets to promote a Bone health course for Open Age charity.

We had a special guest this evening as new GoodGym Kings College London trainer Alyx joined us to take part of the session.

After a tip top introduction from Alix we headed out towards Marylebone fully loaded with flyers! Once we reached the area where the course will take place we split into two groups. Taking a side of the road each we used the leap frogged delivery method and powered our way North. A ** Maverick** squad delivered with care free abandon down the right hand side of each Street often nipping off just to scare me! While the left lane deliverers stuck to the script and gave me an easier time spotting them!

Picking up the running pace as we past Marylebone station and hit over drive on the roads west of Regents Park finishing off almost all the leaflets in 35 skilful minutes!

Given our location it seemed like a plan to go for a 3k loop around the Outer Circle of Regents Park! Although it did feel like an awful lot of other people had had the same idea and Frieze Art fair was also just closing we managed to zip around in no time ramping up the pace towards the end!

A little jaunt down Harley Street brought as back to base perfectly on time where Alyx Stretched is out before we headed off into the night with a top evenings GoodGym action under our belts!

Thanks for coming and hope to see you all next week for our visit to One Big Family homeless charity to make their food for the food run to Westminsters homeless community.

Smooth Running

Joel