19 awesome runners ran 3km to tidy up around Greenwich!

Another Wednesday over and another good deed done! Well 19 good deeds in fact, one for every one of you!

We welcomed one new runner to the crew, the lovely Victoria, hope you had a nice first session with us!

As always the evening began with some intros, name, headcount and something different each week... this time I needed some dinner inspiration so we went round and found out everyone's most run meal plans... and I know you're all dying to find out what I ended up having..... PIZZA! Must have been so inspired by Jenny's one a la freezer!

Anyhoo, we went a did a bit of a warm up before we split off into three groups to target three areas of Greenwich. Ben took one group across the creek sort of verging on Deptford, Bliss took her group towards East Greenwich and the Forum whilst my group stayed relatively local and made our way through the town centre and the housing estate near Greenwich Station.

These were all areas which we have visited before and are usually covered in litter. Unfortunately (or rather fortunately) we started on Thames Street which is always SO BAD but today there was hardly anything! Typical. So it took a while for our group to get into the groove but slowly but surely the bags started filling up.

We had 40 minutes to cover as much ground and pick up as much as we could before reconvening for 8pm.

The clock struck eight and we arrived back at the boat, everyone nicely on time! All groups had completely bulging bags which was GREAT! We had a quick pic with all our handywork before we disposed of it all in the big uni bins.

For the fitness session this week, we worked on some leg strengthening moves. A little circuit of wall sits (a clear favourite), stair runs and reverse lunges all working different parts of the legs helping to get them nice and strong. A lot of you are training for big races and now is around about the time where your mileage is starting to build up quite a lot so it's really important that you support your extra mileage with extra strength work to help your body be able to take on that increased load.. otherwise niggles will start to appear and no one wants that!! So get your strength work in people!!!! :)

After two rounds, we were ready to call it a night. But not before a nice little stretch of course!!!

Well done everyone for clearing up so much stuff! It might not have looked like much but imagine just emptying out those bin liners, it would have been horrific! Have a wonderful rest of the week and I shall see you next time where we will be digging a pond!

20 runners ran 3.5km to rip out weeds at the Christchurch Community Garden!

It was another warm summers evening at GoodGym Greenwich. We had 3 lovely new runners join us, Mani, Shelomoh and my probably one of my oldest friends Marina! Great to have you all along with us!

HAPPY PINEAPPLE DAY!!!

It was pineapple day yesterday so we went round and found out everyones favourite fruit, we posed like pineapples in our photos and a few people even went out for some post run piñas! Nice one!!

We did a little warm up and then made our way along the river to Christchurch garden. We were greeted by Kate who had lots of tools and gloves ready for us. And then it was all hands on deck, literally! Everyone took to the floor to yank out as many weeds as possible. Some of them were super stubborn but it was always really satisfying when they came out, roots n all!

After about 20 minutes, we could really notice the difference, patches of weed-free areas were growing bigger and bigger! And the buckets of weeds were filling up rapidly! By 8 o'clock it was time for us to leave. We gave the place a final sweep, had a group pic and then made our way to the park!

Hill repeats!

We had a bit of time to spare so we made the most of it with some hill repeats up One Tree Hill. We had 10 minutes to complete as many ups and downs as possible. There are quite a few steps and you soon feel the burn (I did 25 of these on Tuesday so I know how you guys felt!) but it's a great thing to incorporate into your training to build leg strength and strength endurance which will ultimately make you a faster and stronger runner!

Not sprints!

When you hear about hills you usually hear the term "hill sprints" so you often see people charging up a hill at full speed but that's not what we want to be doing! If you sprint up those hills, you will burn out and be too tired to complete more than a couple of reps, its better to just go up them at a steady speed and then recover on the downhills and do 6-10 reps rather than be completely wrecked by the time you get to the top on the first one!

So give it a go next time you're in the park. Ideally once a week you want to be getting in some kind of session like this is, whether it's hills or intervals and you will see dramatic improvements in your running fitness!

After 10 minutes, we had a nice little jog back to the uni with the sun setting ahead of us. LOVELY!

A little stretch and we were done!

GoodGym Olympics!

A few people asked me yesterday about the GoodGym Olympics, you can find all the info here and while there is no space for any events, it will be great to have as many of you down cheering and helping out as possible! It will be such a fun day with loads to get involved in! Hopefully see you there :)

Great work last night everyone! Well done for getting so stuck and for embracing those hill repeats! See you next time!

A team of 20 tough runners braved another melting Monday to head into Tower Hamlets and really get up a sweat.

Team 1: What Lies Be MEATH

16 of us headed to Meath Gardens where we returned to help Tunde, Joanna and Julia of Friends of Meath Gardens water the new young trees, which need a bit of TLC in this warm weather. There’s currently no water-point in the park itself, which means the water has to come from the canal, an arduous process involving trolleys, buckets and a lot of manpower.

Dave headed up the canalside operation, loading vats and buckets of water onto the trolleys, as well as into smaller vessels for the runners to carry back to the trees. Running and walking mileage soon added up - new trees are dotted all around the sizeable park - but we got it done. Every tree received the much-needed two buckets of water. Phew.

Team II: Strim and vigour

Meanwhile, Becky headed up the Cranbrook team, who had been requested as a last minute SOS to head to the estate’s Community Garden for some urgent lawn-mowing and strimming. After a speedy run to the task, well navigated and led by Steve, the team arrived at Cranbrook to be introduced to two strimmers and the task for the evening: weeding the planters, ahead of a garden inspection on Wednesday.

A new (thankless) task soon reared its head, however: an unruly extension cable, knotted in a manner even the best Boy Scouts would have been in awe of, hindered the team’s speedy start. Steve took on the tangle, while the remaining runners donned gardening gloves and declared war on the proliferation of dandelions. Eventually the strimmers buzzed into life, with the team tackling the majority of the mowing, making a respectably-sized addition to the Cranbrook compost heap.

30 degree time trial

After our obligatory end-of-session S&C exercises in Meath Gardens, we headed back to base with a time trial (to celebrate this new, nationwide 1K GG challenge, inspired by the GG Olympics - all the details are here). Our time trial was led by Yesh (PBs are easy to achieve when your goal is simply to keep Yesh in sight…).

Hot, satisfied and ready to hit the beer, we exited our lovely air-conditioned room and made our way to Mother Kelly’s where Bryon greeted us with a Stanley Knife (in the best possible way) to begin crafting Leanne’s beautifully designed Tower Hamlets Olympic Torch. Thank you to Beckys J and G, for all the planning, and to Sarah and Becky J and Becky G for supplies, and to Bryon, Dave, Becky and Becky G for building. We look forward to the end result.

Hello’s, welcome’s – and thank you’s

A very big GG welcome to Hannah, Yas, Chrisanna, Anna and Bea, who joined us for their first TH run. It was great to have you on board - thanks for all your hard, hard work last night and please come back soon.

Lovely to see Dave and Nina (by no means new to GG but new to me) and please come back to TH soon!

Thank you to our utterly fabulous Task Force members: Leanne for her beautiful torch design; Bryon for supporting the GG Olympics and coming well-armed to the pub; Becky G for her Olympic input and for receiving the torch at gone 10pm; Becky J for all her GG Olympic planning, leading up the Cranbrook team, for some great pics and her report-contribution; Sarah for her pristine plant pots and for being such a great New Runner Rep; Dave for heading up the canal team and a great pun; Alys for a wicked pun (and sorry for being such a slow-coach); Si for getting on board the Olympic-craft spirit, Mother Kelly’s suggestion and for encouraging us to get down the pub together a bit more.

Next week, we’re heading back to the Royal London to meet Nancy and the team for more hospital fun, so do join us if you can. Details and sign up are here.

And, if you fancy joining us at the GoodGym Olympics on Saturday, either sign up here, or drop me an email (laura@goodgym.org) if you fancy meeting and travelling there together. There are a few of us going: some of us racing, some are cake-making; some are simply sandwich-eating and beer-supping - so there’s something for everyone.

I can’t WAIT to do it all again then - have a great week in the meantime.