The Rite of Spring = The right to frolic!

Wednesday Evening and back to normal, meeting at LeisureWorld. For this session, I suggested we put everything to a vote, but alas, the runners said they wanted to get 'fatigued' in other ways.

We welcomed back Fran, who joined our Easter Monday task, and Jo, who is famous by association as Fay's sister. It was good to see so many others back who we hadn't seen for a few weeks. The teachers were certainly refreshed after the Easter break, although worrying about upcoming GCSEs.

Tommy and Ian begged to do Tav's snake again, but as the run was a bit longer, and Tav wasn't here, we decided not to.

We made our way to the Cannons. We had been there previously to set up a movie night for the residents. This time we were tasked with planting up a planter. We arrived to 6 trowels and some Waitrose bags full of flowers and bulbs. Having planted many bulbs across Colchester Town Centre for Colchester in Bloom, we were a dab hand at this however, the soil was pretty solid.

First we had to remove the top layer of weeds, which Emily developed an efficient way of doing. Then we had to dig the soil over so that the roots would have somewhere to go. Next, David took charge of creative design with a few hints, such as the taller plants ought to go in the middle, so if they fall they fall onto the shorter plants, rather than onto the edge of the planter causing them to snap.

In just 15 minutes, we turned this planter from mud and soil, into an almost symmetrical masterpiece. In fact the lack of symmetry bothered me so much that Chris and Ian created a 'marker plant' in the form of some dried leaves to help.

We made our way back, and alongside abbeyfields we stopped for a new running drill. This one was called 'driving the thigh' and is focused on lifting your legs up, using your lower abdominals - trying to fight against the shuffling form that we sometimes develop. After working on this drill I showed the runners how to do leg raises to strengthen their lower abdominals to help with this part of their running form, but strangely nobody joined in.

As we made our way back through the town centre, we took advantage of the beautiful light by taking some fun photos, including one along the high street to get Jumbo in the background. Jumbo is our famous Victorian water tower that was named after an elephant, which may explain why I like it so much.

Next week, David and I are away, so they run will be lead by James Poole, who is trainer for Goodgym Redbridge. He will be leading you to your usual task at Colchester Foodbank.