On a fresh Bank Holiday Monday, 16 runners covered 3km to help out at Luxmore Gardens.

What a great turn out for a Bank Holiday, these people know how to wrap up a long weekend! A very big welcome and all our Lewisham Love this week go to Sarah and Rob, who joined us for their very first GoodGym group runs.

It was a busy weekend of volunteering, with some of our regulars up at Hilly Fields parkrun to help with the pacing, then nine of us were over at St Mary's Church in Lewisham to continue painting the railings that we started last summer. It was freezing cold, but we kept ourselves warm by chatting, sanding, painting, more chatting (and the cups of tea and biscuits provided by Marion really helped). You can read all about this community mission in Oli's run report. A shout out must go to Marta, who attended four missions over the weekend and tonight's group run, that's some impressive volunteering!

The top news item this week has to be Oli's 50th good deed. Oli joined us for the first time last May, when we were at the Hither Green Scouts, painting the walls. I knew from the start that we would get along, with his awesome ability to come up with puns and his willingness to share them (once again he has given us tonight's title pun and others in this report!). Well done Oli, here's to many more Mondays in Lewisham!

Prince announces arrival... of the garden tools

A big thank you goes once again to Kim, for leading our runners to the task, with Emma being a super back-marker, keeping us safe along the Lewisham Way. We arrived promptly at Luxmore Gardens and some of us helped to collect tools, while others got stuck straight in to the weeding. We carried on where we left off the other week, pulling out weeds and grass from where they weren't wanted, creating little mounds along the path. It turns out Mary is pretty knowledgeable about these things and became our go-to gardener for answers to the 'is this a weed or isn't it?' question.

Weed have you back every week!

It wasn't long before Jacqueline had found her first piece of treasure (I'm thinking she could open a museum with all the quirky things she finds) and Vic told us about her 20-mile recce of a potential race route (yes, 20 miles before a group run task!). Across the park smaller groups covered different borders, some using spades, some with trowels and some with their bare hands. We were joined at one point by a lovely and unusual-looking cat, so some weeds may have been overlooked. We made sure our furry friend wasn't scooped up in the piles of weeds being placed in the wheelbarrow, before tipping everything into a newly-formed compost heap. As everyone stepped back to see just how much had been achieved, I busily put out cones for a quick fitness session. It's interesting what happens when you divide the group into two teams...so competitive!

Thinking outside the box-squats

Back at Glass Mill, we stretched, congratulated Oli, ate lemon cake and looked forward to next week. On Sunday there is a chance to head into the Wilderness to help fix the outdoor kitchen roof. You can find out more here (thank you to Caireen for organising). On Monday we will run a bit further, to help in the garden at Seniors. There will be a number of jobs to choose from and a run of around 7km in total (with an awesome view en route).

Some of our runners will be joining the GoodGym Race Team in Sofia over the weekend, to race over various distances and enjoy a massive get-together. Good luck to all of you and we look forward to hearing all about it!