12 lovely GoodGymers gathered at Cranbrook Community Garden last night to help clear a big backlog of leaves.

It’s been a while since we joined Janet and Eileen at this busy community centre, and the team needed a hand with the following tasks:

• Clearing leaves and older plants from the borders of the community centre garden, and all around the garden.

• Collecting - and disposing of - branches in the large bin, and the main rubbish areas.

• Trimming the hedges

There was a lot to get done, but the GoodGymers worked so fast, Janet and Eileen were nonethless having to continually find new areas for us to focus on.

By the time we finished up our tasks, returned equipment and debated the best way to spend the final 10 minutes, it was time to run back to the Hotel.

It was a lovely night – great to see faces old and new, squeeze in a little mileage and give Janet and Eileen a helping hand before the busy festive season kicks in.

And a great big shout-out tonight to Ivo, who led the run from the Town Hall Hotel to the task.

Next week, we head to the lovely St Leonard’s Priory Park in Bromley-By-Bow to see Larry for some more garden-clearing.

Until then.

A chilly, two-task start to March

23 runners gathered this evening for two tasks to local community gardens.

We were lucky enough to have brilliant task force member Bryon leading one of our tasks to a new task, the Poets Corner Community Garden where task owner Tahera had prepared the task very carefully, complete with a fine array of snacks. The runners wasted no time in getting stuck in to the gardening task which included clearing, weeding, leaf-collecting...a mixed bag of gardening tasks. Said task owner Tahera of the runners after they'd finished, "They covered so much ground, you can really see the difference."

Meanwhile I led a group to Rocky Park on the Hollybush Estate where Margaret, Michael and Basil the dog had a wonderful selection of tasks for us all, including wood shifting for the bug house (as it sounds); clearing leaves and branches and redistributing various bits of plant debris to another part of the garden.

As the evening got chillier, the runners didn't stop and they worked tirelessly for 45 minutes.

We gathered for some final pics before being joined by Bryon's team at Middleton Green's basketball court for tonight's fitness session, where the runners performed even more amazingly, whizzing through a long session of marching tricep dips, v-sits (on a cold wall), skipping shuttle runs, prisoner lunges...and that's just to name a few.

And then we ran back to base, after a few finishing stretches, to say cheerio for another week.

What a start to March.

What's coming up

So, here's what's coming up...

• On Thursday, the phenomenal Redbridge are hosting the GG social in the centre of town. Details can be found here

• And next week, we head to Columbia Road Youth Hub for a brand new, indoor, decorating task. Followed by our monthyl social! It's all go. Details and sign-up are here.

And not forgetting...

And a big shout out to Bryon tonight for leading our second task, and taking some good pics, and to Polly for backmarking.

Have a brilliant week, everyone, and hope to see you soon.

It was Team Tower Hamlets to the rescue tonight as two of our longest standing task owners needed some urgent summer help. Becky and I led two teams off to two of our local community gardens, before meeting at Meath Gardens to attack our abs in earnest.

I headed up the Cranbrook Crew of 10 who ran to the local community garden, nearly a mile from base, where the team shifted un-moveable vegetable beds; made trellises, shovelled compost, cleared and lifted wood; swept and sawed. Not much for 40 minutes then. Amazing stuff. And brilliantly project-managed tonight by task owner Eileen, who rewarded the team for their hard work with rhubarb and leeks.

Meanwhile, thanks to yours truly giving incorrect location information to Becky’s team, the Hollybush crew ran to the wrong garden via a spectacularly pretty little oasis, full of fascinating flora, including a thoroughly cool monkey puzzle tree. Every cloud and all that. They then went onto enjoy an extreme upper body workout as they dug, weeded and edged flower beds all to a retro background playlist (Tom Jones), courtesy of task owner Michael. The team headed promptly to Meath Gardens where, upon early arrival, task owners were swapped for taskmasters David and Steve, who insisted the best course of action when arriving early is to squeeze in a lap of the park.

The Cranbrook crew arrived, armed with gifts of leeks and rhubarb, and playlist and exercise list. I was concerned Environmental Health might put in an appearance as tonight we were planking and single leg bridg-ing to music. Jess did little to allay my fears as she confirmed that ‘you only need 9 people for it to be classed as a riot.’ (I have Googled this on returning to my desk, and it seems that 3 is the magic number. To be continued, Jess…). The team completed their core and glute-activation work brilliantly tonight. I don’t know what was in the air but as they sailed through the scorpion push-up, Pilates roll-up-on-steroids, the single leg bridge-with-pulse, a hovering side plank, the seated sprinter and then the crab dance, I did wonder if the class content tonight was too easy. Again, to be continued…

And so to the thankyou’s

Thank you to Becky our utterly brilliant task force member, for heading up the Hollybush team; for planning (both before and during the evening), and for the lovely report and pics – and for getting the team to Meath EARLY. Oh, and for finding the correct location. Ahem.

Thank you to Nadia, Alys, Jess and Mi for tonight’s pun, and for my putting up with my scathing dismissal of all your previous fab suggestions (“No – no good. What else?”).

And thanks to David for overseeing sign-in, and for getting the post-run stretching started.

...And welcome!

A big hello and welcome to Jess , who just got so stuck in on her first Group Run, it was amazing! I feel like you’ve been with us forever. Thanks for the hard, hard work (“Are you task-less? Come with me…”), for the fun, and for joining the team so effortlessly. I hope you’ll join us again really soon.

And the fun continues...

Right, two dates to get in the diary: On June 9th, we’re partnering with Mile End Parkrun for the pacing event - all speeds and levels much needed! Details and sign up are here.

…And next week, our Bank Holiday Bonanza, sees us popping to Aldgate to flyer for the Aldgate Square Festival, before running to Weavers for a wicked workout (running and resistance work – tick multiple fitness boxes with this one). And then Mother Kelly’s at 8:45pm for a quick Bank Holiday bevvy. More details and sign-up are here. Come for as much (or as little) of the evening as you fancy!

Okay, that's it from me. Well done for another truly brilliant night of multi-tasking, and I CAN'T WAIT to do it all again next week.

It was an eager team that set out for the Royal London tonight. After being very patient with tonight's extensive task-briefing, the Tower Hamlets crew flew down the mile-long route to the hospital where our delighted and excited task owner, Nancy, was meeting us, along with colleagues Richard and Marufa.

Numerous tasks

This was our first time at the Royal London Hospital where we were booked in for a variety of different tasks.

David headed up the postering team, tasked with putting up information posters on as many of the hospital's 14 floors as the team could manage in the short time available.

Becky headed up the gardening team, whose job it was to weed, litter-pick, and generally tidy up as much of the hospital's designated green space as possible.

Issmaeel had the job of leading the walking-route-planning team, a key task that involved planning a hospital-based walking route as part of the End PJ Paralysis campaign ("For patients over the age of 80, a week in bed can lead to 10 years of muscle ageing, 1.5 kg of muscle loss, and may lead to increased dependency and demotivation. Mobilising (moving) has been shown to reduce falls, improve patient experience and reduce length of stay by up to 1.5 days.")

Leanne and Miranda has the task of spray-painting wheelchairs for the trauma ward, which proved to be one of the trickier tasks...

Our 45 minutes in the hospital flew by, and before we knew it we were congregating for our goodbye pics. It seemed no sooner had we arrived, than we were heading back through the revolving doors, returning to the hustle and bustle of Whitechapel Road, where we soon picked up the pace following tonight's speedy pacer Danny as fast as we could manage back to base.

New faces!

We were a group of 26 tonight = it was a joy to have both new and familiar faces in the team. Hello, and welcome, to new GG Stockport trainer, Lisa , who joined us on a busy night, and who stayed smiling, and unfazed throughout the whole evening, and lent a hand continually to all the teams.

Hello and welcome too, to Christie and Clare, not new to GG, but new to Tower Hamlets. Thanks for the hard work, so many smiles, and really hope to see you again soon. And welcome too to Insiyah who joined us for her first GG run - it was lovely to have you on board, thanks for all that hard work, and please come and run with us again soon.

And a big UK GG welcome to Colin , who was visiting us from Canada! What a treat for us, and well done for all your work.

...And to the thank-you's

And so to the thankyou's which seem to grow each week. Thank you to David , for being on board with last minute planning and for heading up the postering team. Thank you to task force member Becky for tonight's stats, heading up the gardening team, and for welcoming new runners and Lisa, and being such a warm and welcoming face of GG.

Thanks toDannyfor being our speedy pacer back to the hotel.

Thank you to task force member Leanne, for brilliant backmarking as usual, and more behind-the-scenes planning with me, and a massive thank you to Issmaeel, for bundles of behind-the-scenes planning (this started middle of last week for poor Issmaeel) with his insider knowledge, and for heading up the walking route team.

Thank you to Polly and Si, who we left in the hospital briefing Nancy on the team's brilliant walking work. That's above and beyond, and I was very proud of what you achieved. And I can't WAIT to do it all again next week...

SPEAKING OF NEXT WEEK...

...Moving on to next week, come and work off Royal-Wedding-party-calories on Monday! We’re staying local at Cranbrook Community Garden to help the team get ready for their big Open Day, before heading to beautiful Meath Gardens for a special Ab Attack workout. Sign-up is here.

...And don't forget the GoodGym Olympics on June 30th!

…And don’t forget the GoodGym Olympics on June 30th. A description of the events you can enter is here, while event info and sign-up is here. The deadline for signing up for an event is June 3rd.

Do come and join in the Olympic fun - whether you fancy a speedy Summertime sprint or just spectating & sandwich-eating, there’ll be something for everyone. And I’d love to hear from anyone interested in designing our flag and torch!