Bottoms up to a new year!

If we weren’t already confused enough about the day of the week after all of the festive bank holidays, what did Mark decide to do? Yes, throw us a starter session on a Saturday. Same location, same trainer, same wonderful bunch of people (with a few new faces too!) - don’t be surprised if we all wake up tomorrow thinking it’s Wednesday...

We welcomed runners from far and wide (Dave, who had clocked an incredible parkrun PB this morning - were you on roller blades?! and Rafal), and newcomers too: welcome to Jo, Taki and Zita - and extra well done for making your first group run on a freezing January afternoon! As well as PBs, we heard about Parkrun PWs that had been achieved and about forthcoming community missions tomorrow and next Saturday - take a look at the Richmond and Kingston group run listings, and remember that you don’t need to be mission verified for these.

And then to the warm up. Oh how we’d missed Mark’s specials over the past couple of weeks. Lots of lunges, a fair few squats, star jumps and then a game of “copy the plank cat” - we definitely caught the eye of many passers-by, with some even joining us for part of it. Unfortunately we lost them before the run began - but they were greeted with random shouts from us of “join us on Tuesdays”, “welcome, come and join in!”.

We split into groups of runners and walkers, taking different routes but both making it to the church on time. The church were very grateful to have recently had heating installed, but this had required the carpet tiles to be lifted and they had become a trip hazard once they’d been put back. Our mission, which we chose to accept in the warmth of the church, was to tape down the tiles that were loose or creating a trip hazard, helping to make the place much safer. Would we (tape) measure up to this one?

Rather than sensibly thinking out how to do this beforehand, we divided into triads and each adopted a different plan of tape attack. We removed tiles, laid down tape, peeled back the other side of the tape (harder than it sounds!) and replaced the tile. For the most part this worked, but there were some moments of tape and tile tension; tiles not being aligned, needing to remove a row of tiles to realign them all over again, more trip hazards being created. On our hands and knees, lying down or squatting for the majority of the task (and the warm-up, come to think of it), this really was a case of bottoms up for our first task of the year!

Goodness starts from the ground up! #goodgym #running #volunteering #kingston #startersession #JanuaryChallenge #stjohnskingston pic.twitter.com/yZGXrRe6GI

— GoodGym Kingston-upon-Thames (@GoodGymKingston) January 5, 2019

Then came TAPE GATE!

We ran out of tape!! What a sticky situation! So it became a real case of tape it and leave it - and then use the luminous orange tape to tape over the surface if some trip hazards remained.

We’re looking forward to returning to finish the job. And after hearing all about wine tasting evenings (scotch tape on the rocks?) and quizzes, there’s definitely potential for some “community mission come socials” in the pipeline!

After a brisk walk/run back, we were reunited back at Guildhall and stretched. Thanks Mark for fitting in my favourite stretch!

Awesome work everyone on a fantastic starter session - and well done to Taki, Zita and Jo on your first good deeds, we hope to see you all again soon!