And by GG we mean GirlGym this time. It was Elaine’s turn to lead our nine all-female runners tonight in Richmond on a chilly evening whilst Mark’s away on a (31 degree!) holiday. Still, the cold weather couldn’t stop us from getting out there.

We had a quick warm up (and we really did need it!) outside Wholefoods before heading off up past the Richmond shops and over Richmond Bridge. From there we took a left and fell into a nice brisk pace along the dark riverside path around Marble Hill Park with our head torches lighting the way. As we rejoined the road in Twickenham, we headed back towards Richmond and over Richmond Bridge for a second time before arriving at our task.

Tonight we were back at one of our regular task-givers at the Vineyard Community Centre in Richmond, who run several services for those in need within the local borough. On arrival Desiree offered us some lemony water as she told us about the amazing things they do as an organisation and the help they provide to so many people. Luckily the generosity of the local community and staff at the Vineyard means that they are able to offer some incredible help to people in need. One of these services is providing showers, clothes and food for those who are homeless or struggling, and tonight’s task was to sort through toiletry and sock donations and separate them into categories so that they can distribute them easily to the centre users.

Within minutes we had separate piles of shampoo, conditioner, body wash, toothpaste, combs, and socks, ready for the Vineyard to give out freely to centre visitors. It seems a lot of the donors are frequent flyers, so there were also lots of eye masks, ear plugs and pens, too!

Before we knew it time was up, and after a couple of quick photos we went back into the cold night for a very short distance back to Wholefoods. We then realised that for some reason we all turned down the free cakes, much to Kate and Sundara’s disappointment! Sorry guys, you shouldn’t have been so polite!

Thanks, Desiree, for having us (again), and thanks, Elaine, for leading us on our run tonight. Fingers crossed for some warmer temperatures next Monday.

Welcome to new runner, Louisa, we hope you enjoyed your first run with GoodGym Richmond this evening.

Thanks for a great report, Laura! Two quick bits of news to add on: we're off to the pub on the 9th of April after our run (The Shaftesbury on Kew Road), details are on the GoodGym website - pop it in your diaries! And Kate mentioned that Camden GoodGym are doing another BIG task on the 28th of March - they're looking for 50 people to participate. Kate signed up last time and it sounded brilliant. So if you fancy something a bit different and an opportunity to meet lots of GG runners from different areas, this might be a good one. Check out the Group Runs for Camden on the website.