After a busy weekend which included a Community Mission, the (very muddy) Speke Hall 10km and a Mission to help an elderly person, an unexpectedly large crowd of 23 runners showed up for another evening of getting fit while doing good. They just can't get enough!

The Friends of Everton Park are one of our favourite groups to help out but park-based tasks in the dark are not easy so this was to be our final visit of 2019. After a bit of an around the houses run to Everton Community Garden (I wasn't really lost, promise!) to meet Dan and pick up the tools, the team sprung into action. In a sea of head torches and guided by our new portable flood lights, the team lopped away at a dodgy species of tree saplings which were expected to damage the ecology of the park.

Within half an hour, nearly all of the offending saplings had been cut down and pilled up in the car park ready for collection. Given the dark and chilly conditions, this was a truly bold effort by Team Liverpool.

Big up to Emma and Yan who not only ran the Speke Hall 10km race yesterday but also completed a Mission that afternoon AND still showed up for this week's Group Run = fierce!

After the task, while some of the team slowly returned the loppers, the rest of us stayed warm with a few laps of the basketball court. With the whole group back, it was too cold to do the strengthening and conditioning I'd planned and so we played a giant game of tig instead. Yes it was good fun BUT don't be fooled into thinking there was no fitness element to this game; the team were soon side-stepping and testing their range of movements and giving it bursts of power. They were all panting after just a few minutes playing.

Apart from our usual LOOOOONG traffic light breaks, we made great time on the return leg. All in all, an excellent evening - well done folks.

Next week is a slightly longer run and another dark task so head torches at the ready please AND BRING GLOVES. Find out more and sign-up here. And don't forget about this Sunday's spooky Community Mission.

P.S. Kudos to Tim who put forward the pun title 'Char Grilled Lopper', which admittedly is genius.... but sadly it was vetoed by Chef Nibbs who declared that you would never char grill a lobster! But then what does she know, she's vegan ;)