High energy, positive vibes and a big impact - it's all in a night's work at GoodGym Westminster!

It was amazing to welcome members of North Paddington Youth Club to our session last night. Waleed, MJ and Husan have all been making some incredible stuff happen, from foodbank collections, to walking cricket for the elderly, big cleans ups and more. Why not check out upcoming sessions and join them?

We also gave a big welcome to Vita who came along to her very first group run - great to meet you Vita!

We met up in a busy Hyde Park with no sign of the predicted storm, and found a place away from the army of bikes streaming in for our warm up. We tested our brains as well as muscles which was a challenge - and resulted in some 'interesting' high fives! After a quick discussion about our chosen super power (super strength rated very highly, although you all already seem to have that) we set off for the task.

The Abbey Centre in Victoria is an important resource for local people, offering support in the form of hot food, legal advice, somewhere warm, therapy and classes. Our job was outside in the garden, so we made our way through the building and divided up the jobs.

Laura and Catarina got straight in making sandwiches for rough sleepers, Waleed, MJ and Hussan grabbed gloves and cleared the weeds (I think that geranium survived!), Kush gave everything a good water, Ciaran and Vita were in charge of clearing and sweeping, Emma and Lydia were on banister and fire escape duty, while Jacob worked with photographer Simon to capture some fantastic shot for the evening. You can see the whole gallery here - what a lot of happy, energetic faces!

Before long the jobs were done and the place was transformed - brilliant work everybody. That wasn't all though - there was just enough time for a fitness challenge which saw us test our balancing skills. Turns out they were very impressive, even when I threw in a few dynamic exercises to test you all! We finished off the night with a leg burner in the form of a progressive squat.

While some of us went for a delicious curry, others opted to add a few miles, and we also managed to catch the Under One Sky Team to hand over the carefully prepared sandwiches. They had run out of food to hand out to rough sleepers, so we were there in the nick of time!

Great to see you all last night, thanks for all the effort and smiles. We run as a group every single Tuesday in Westminster at the same time. Next week we're off to the oldest youth club in the world to help out - would love to see you there!

Recycled bottles for the youth club to earn money out of it.

As I walked to Mr R's to do his weekly shop this afternoon, I came across an elderly lady on the pavement standing stationary over her walking frame. I asked if she was okay, and she said she needed help hailing a cab and that they usually come past this particular stretch fairly frequently. With a bit of time in hand, I was happy to try and help, and fortunately an empty taxi appeared at the end of the road, and following some frantic waving, pulled over to stop - as the elderly lady shuffled her way slowly to the open door, the driver also got out, and between us we got the lady and her walking frame into the back of the cab..."you are my lucky star" she said with a smile as I shut the door and wished her well.

On the basis that one good deed deserves another, it was then on to Mr R's to do his weekly shop - assisted again by some visual clues (old packaging...), I managed to get everything he needed this week and was soon back to have another chat with him about the challenges he's dealing with of getting confident on his daily walks...it's really no fun getting old.

I helped set up the walking cricket session in the NPYC sports hall.

Unloaded the van and put the groceries in the pantry room at NPYC

Lillinton Garden estate was one of the last of the high-density public housing schemes built in London during the postwar period and is considered one of the most distinguished. However visitors to the conservation area could find themselves wondering through the labyrinth of paths and covered walkways, past the 19th century church hidden in the middle of the estate and still not spot the sunken garden that is in the process of being turned into a thriving community space.

Luckily GoodGymers have a keen nose for doing good and all met at the green area on a drizzly Tuesday night to help get it prepped for planting. There were plenty of weeds to take up, raking to be done, soil to turn and ivy to trim so we all got cracking with the tasks.

Chat turned to using AI to get a 5km pb training plan, a potential royal visit to GoodGym, future races and, of course, parkrun news. We couldn't believe it when we looked at our watches and saw our session was up. Time flies when you're helping transform a space into something local people can use to promote biodiversity and grow fruit and veg!

Next week we're going to the Abbey Centre to help with various jobs - check out the future sessions as there is always something impactful happening on a Tuesday night in Westminster!