After April went rogue this year apparently forgetting all about April showers, May decided to kick off with a few bank holiday downpours and blustery spring winds. So, it was perhaps not surprising that some of our team turned up sporting fashionable thermals and a foldaway cagoule (or hot water bottle). But as the early evening sun beat down gloriously on Richmond Green and Mark had us contorting ourselves into yoga inspired stretches that tourists actually felt motivated to catch on camera, we were all feeling quite rosy cheeked by the end of our warm up. It really was perfect weather for a few sun salutations before we headed off on a fast run to our old friend, ETNA community centre in St Margarets.

On our way to the task we experienced high tide for the first time and had to change our route...

"The tide was high but GoodGym moved on!"

Once there, we wheeled out the green bin, whipped on our gardening gloves and got stuck about those pesky, persistent weeds. There was some lengthy debate about one particular plant that seemed to be thriving most vigorously – weed or flower, we pondered? If there isn’t already an app to answer such questions, then we’ve identified an opportunity for any budding app developers - ‘weed’ find it most helpful!

Not content with just one good deed, Mark also tasked us to drop some leaflets before heading back to base. He challenged us to focus on Richmond Hill (cause we all love running up hills). ‘I’ll follow you up there,’ he called out as we split off into teams. We found him back at base with lots of lovely photos of Richmond taken from the top of the hill but all notably empty of red shirts. Somehow, we all ran out of leaflets before we got to the hill…don’t know how that happened, Mark.

Cool down time saw us hanging off chairs, bike stands and trees all in the name of finding that muscle stretch bliss point. Mark is nothing if not creative when it comes to stretching.

Tonight we welcomed Lauren for her first run and also Graham, a regular GoodGymer at Islington who is doing a tour of every GoodGym in London and who was by far the fastest leafleteer this GoodGymer has ever seen (years of doing paper rounds apparently good training for leaflet dropping). Also welcome back to Ellen on her second run, already looking dapper in her red t-shirt.

In other news, there is still time to sign up to the Richmond Running Festival which takes place in Kew Gardens in September – 5k, 10k and half marathon distances available. The link to sign up is on the GoodGym website.

Thank you Graham for the pun!