17 runners met at Wholefoods in Richmond tonight to enjoy the first Goodgym run of sunny September! News of marathons just completed (huge congratulations to Ercole) and 10ks on the horizon was shared (look out for a sea of goodgym red speeding through Kew Gardens soon!), briefing was done and we were set for a trip to Holly Lodge Centre... But not before a detour to Richmond Green where Mark put us through our paces: knees up, squats down, photo poses, planks and partner tag. He finished off (but didn’t beat us) with a Mexican wave of core strength and we were good(gym) to go!

Hands down, we got it beat! #goodgym #richmond #richmondgreen #warmup #plank #squats #games #fitness #volunteering pic.twitter.com/RdNCqfIFd9

— GoodGym Richmond (@GGRichmon) September 3, 2018

Getting around the core issue #fitness @goodgym @HollyLodgeCentr #running #warmup #richmondgreen pic.twitter.com/7sXnsbWSmb

— GoodGym Richmond (@GGRichmon) September 3, 2018

Our strong cores carried us on 4km through the streets of Richmond (and up a sneaky ‘steady’ hill at Queens Road) and into the park where we all basked in the September sun without stopping... we had good to be getting on with!

We were warmly welcomed at Holly Lodge by Anna and her daughter Izzy (who was helping out tonight). Holly Lodge is run by a very small team of 2 (Anna and her colleague Freya) and a large amount of volunteers doing brilliant work with the local community and supporting children with special educational needs and disabilities to learn about Richmond Park. We were fed, watered and armed with tools. The toilets were the next stop but no comfort breaks for us! Teams were formed and we taped, we papered and we painted in force!

Mark's time check wasn't so well received by some of our painters who didn't want to down tools until the toilet wall masterpieces were complete but the clock was ticking so a quick mop up of spillages, a squeeze in for a team photograph and we were off!

Welcome to Eva, Chris, and Anjana and well done on your first run with Goodgym Richmond! Thanks to Ercole for joining us from Waltham Forest GG and also huge congratulations for taking Goodgym Richmond in your stride after yesterday's marathon!

Next week we'll be helping clear the litter up Richmond Hill for the Council, sign up here