As the legendary Heather Small once asked “What have you done today to make you feel proud?” Well Heather, we ran our socks off, bedecked ourselves in rainbows and raised awareness of Pride Cymru and the upcoming Pride weekend! ... We stepped out of the ordinary, we felt our soul ascending and you can't stop us now... Thanks for asking

The sun came storming back into Cardiff for this week’s GoodGym. It must have seen how many rainbows were present at Yr Hen Lyfrgell and figured we didn’t need any more! Everyone came in bright colours and like contestants on Rupaul’s Drag Race were happy to be painted in rainbows, and don leis, sashes and heart sunglasses. After tonight, there’s no way anyone in Cardiff doubts that GoodGymmers are a) stylish as hell, and b) support the amazing work that Pride Cymru does in promoting equality and supporting the LGBT community. A special mention to Lucy who looked fabulous, darling in her orange tutu and Hawaiian lei! And a high five to Ben who managed the 5k and burpees in luminous green swim shorts.

After getting dressed up and well into the Pride spirit thanks to Ben’s playlist, we headed out for the usual warm up and head count. We welcomed three new runners tonight! Epic! Huge hellos to:

*Mike *Dawn *Mark *Hannah.

Then, after our usual stretches we ran the short distance to Cardiff’s legendary LGBT club Pulse where we met the lovely Cath. Cath explained to us the important work that Pride Cymru do and their aims to make this year’s Cardiff Pride the biggest one yet. It’s hoped that with our help to leaflet and poster around the shops and cafes of Cardiff Bay, Pride will more than double their 14,000 person turnout from last year! If that isn’t a challenge, what is?! (Ben’s confidence in us is clearly mounting week by week!)

The Charities Objective: As a charity, our remit is to work for the promotion of the elimination of discrimination. Whether this be on the grounds of sexual orientation, gender, race, religion and ability. We work towards this through our annual celebration of equality and diversity at Pride Cymru - this is the event we were promoting -. (Historically known as Cardiff-Wales LGBT Mardi Gras) Find out more about this wonderful charity by visiting the following link: http://www.pridecymru.co.uk/about/

With bags full of posters, leaflets, and complimentary rainbow lanyards for everyone, we waved goodbye to Cath and headed down the bay. We managed to fit in some solid hill climbs and planks en route before regrouping in the busy Mermaid Quay. With the bars and restaurants full of drinkers and diners there was no shortage of potential targets for our ambitious aim! After a short division into teams of threes and fours, Ben sent us off in opposing directions to ensure we covered all corners of the bay with just 25 minutes to pass our hundreds of leaflets and poster as many walls and windows as possible

3,2,1 And GO!

Straight away, everyone stepped up and shook off their nerves, happily running up in and out of coffee shops and local restaurants to inform managers and customers of the upcoming Pride weekend and to beg for valuable wall-space for our colourful posters. Everyone was obviously dazzled by our wit, charm and excessive rainbows, as we had loads of luck! We managed to leave bundles of leaflets with Starbucks, Coffee Mania, Carluccis and Subway, and managed to get posters in the windows of Tesco and Juboraj Indian. Craig and I even managed a last minute dash to Ben and Jerry’s in the Red Dragon Centre who, being legendary supporters of LGBT issues, happily accepted a poster and let us leave a pile of flyers for their customers. Unfortunately for Craig they didn’t pick up on his monumental hints and he left coneless. Diddums.

Before long, we were back at the starting point, with empty hands and relaying lists of all the people and places we’d been and seen. We had done what we’d came to do! Just one quick photo under the equally colourful big wheel before Ben tempted us up the road with promises of burpees and push ups… Yay…

Time for a full body workout

And so, in front of unsuspecting walkers and cyclists, 20 sweaty, rainbow clad runners got down on their hands and knees and did an impressive five sets of push ups, burpees and squats. I think we all want to thank Michelle and Ali for the request, as although there were moments you probably feared for your popularity, by the end everyone was proud of their efforts -- and were keen to run that little bit faster back to avoid any more pit stops!

After some stunning sprint finishes and frankly mind-blowing yoga poses being thrown into the usually easy-peasy cool down routine, Ben thanked everyone for their efforts tonight and briefed everyone on next week’s run back to Global Gardens to revisit Poppy’s allotment. I then suggested that as many of us as possible arrange to go to Pride for a social. Tickets can be bought here: http://www.pridecymru.co.uk/tickets/ and further arrangements will be made on the GG Cardiff Facebook page. See you there!

Some cheeky well deserved post run drinks

After grabbing our bags and saying our goodbyes, quite a few of us headed to The Glassworks for our weekly recovery drink, and Lucy and Ben surprised me with a birthday card and cupcakes for my upcoming birthday! I’d like to take this opportunity to thank you all so much and say that it really means a lot to me. I’ve made some awesome friends in such a short amount of time, and coming to GoodGym every week has given me a reason to run and a reason to smile at times when that’s seemed like the hardest thing to do. Thank you all for that. And the cake. The cake was goooooood. (Not to forget that Ellen also had a birthday this week and was equally deserving of cake! Happy birthday Ellen!) Excellent running tonight guys. Keep coming back, and remember love is love is love is love.

The RunPunStiltskin award goes to Craig this week. Well done! Please enjoy this virtual award, take it absolutely everywhere with you and then please bring it back next week!

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