On a lovely warm summer evening as the sun settled down in the sky this band of Goodgymers made their way by biking running and walking to the Riverside Meadow beside New Bedford Road. Welcoming Chrisshane and Omayemi to their first Group Run. 👋🏻

Our mission for this evening was a familiar one, uproot all the Goldenrod. We've met this plant before which is invasive and trying to take over on this meadow, but it's back to test us again. It is noticeably thinner than in previous years, a good sign that we are winning, and there was a good mixture of native plants in the gaps we have cleared.

So we got stuck in and started pulling at the clumps. We made good progress and managed to clear about half of the field before our time was up. We'll be back soon to finish the job!

This weeks group run/walk/cycle to the Luton team to 61FC, to do a bit more painting to help them prepare for the new season which is just around the corner. After meeting in the town centre and having a brief introduction session as we had Pashew with us for the first time, the 11 strong team headed off to the task. On arrival Richard from 61FC was waiting with Rollers and brushes and several pots of paint 🎨. So we split into 2 groups and painted the outside of the clubhouse and some more of the posts around the pitch. It was good fun and definitely gave us all a good arm workout. The task was also Omar 's 100th task. So we look forward to seeing him in his 🪽 t-shirt very soon. After some quick refreshments and agreeing to come back and finish the posts in a few weeks time, we headed back to town centre. This week we also have another milestone in the group, so we decided to tag a mini social on the back of the task to celebrate 🍾 our very own David who's birthday it is (age reveal in the pics). This is the perfect opportunity to shout out the man who brought Goodgym to Luton and has truly helped us go from strength to strength 💪 A real leader. Congratulations to Omar, Pashew and David and awesome job to all that attended. Well done team 👏 👍🏻 🙌 👌

To Luton Wardown parkrun for our monthly takeover, where we aim to fill as many volunteer slots as possible to support the best and friendliest parkruns around.

This morning’s event was a sea of red as local running club Stopsley Striders was marking the completion of its 2025 beginners’ course with a graduation parkrun. We set up, marshalled and scanned barcodes, helping the Luton Wardown team to put on a hugely successful event for more than 370 parkrunners.

A great event in sweltering conditions. Luckily, ice-pops were on sale in the clubhouse afterwards!

This weeks group 🏃‍♀️ run, 🚶‍♂️ walk and 🚲 cycle, we visited Penrose Roots to Recovery. We had a great turn out if 13 Goodgymers, 4 of which were first timers and 1 joining for their first group run. So welcome to Lee , Dilpreet, Fayemi and Bauyrzhan, we hope you enjoyed the evening and look forward to you joining us again. After heading off from the town centre the team headed out on a 2.5 km run, walk or cycle to join our friend Pete at Penrose. He got everyone shovelling fertiliser on to some beds and when that was done, we all got stuck in to some epic weeding. All in all, a great task that everyone contributed to and a fantastic evening to welcome some wonderful first timers. Great effort everyone, you done a fantastic job 👏 👍🏻 👌 🙌

This weeks run/walk/cycle group task took us to a familiar setting. We recently supported the Shri Guru Ravidass Sangat Gudwara with their Near Neighbours funded cooking classes and it's always a great experience being in the kitchen, but on this occaison we helped in the temple by giving the upstairs a spruce up. When we arrived Sanjeev from the the temple had prepped the carpeted area in the main prayer hall by sprinkling a liberal amount of Shake and Vac across the floor, which once vacuumed up left the room smelling great - we really did "put the freshness back" in the room. The team also wiped down all the woodwork and dusted all the plant pots. We also had a good go at cleaning a bathroom area. Our hosts were grateful for the help and have asked if we can return again soon. This session was the first for Yohanns who met us at one of the previously mentioned cooking classes.

Great job team, well done 👏