Frankly the size of these houses in Fulham are incredible, but Michelle and Jonny made a quick job scampering round the streets to flyer some of the affluent areas of the borough, asking for support for the homeless and vulnerable.

Due to the cold, we did not manage all the streets so will likely be back to finish off where we can.

Turns out as well that running with 2,000 leaflets on your back is not conducive to speed!

This week GoodGym were invited along to the launch of ‘Small Tap Big Change’ in Hammersmith. It’s an initiative by Hammersmith BID (Business Improvement District) to raise money for four local charities who are helping to tackle homelessness in the area. With London rough sleeping up 18% in just the last year, and a particularly cold Winter forecast ahead, it’s especially pertinent now as these services are expecting to be busier than ever. We were invited by one of our past task locations at Baron’s Court Project. They support people on low incomes who are vulnerable to mental ill health and / or homelessness. BCP are one of the four charities who’ll benefit from the donations raised, alongside: The Upper Room Glass Door and St. Andrew’s Church Also along to the event were United Hammersmith and Fulham who’ll administrate the fund, and representatives from Hammersmith BID and the local council.

The mechanism is that contactless payment terminals will be placed in businesses around the borough for the next year where people can use contactless payment to donate £2 a time (but can manually raise the value up to £30)

Alongside this passive presence, the hope is that events and drives will be organised to increase visibility and keep the momentum over the next year. As such 10 or so of us turned-up in uniform to let the beneficiary charities know what GG is about, in case they should they be in need of some people-power for fundraising. One which shouldn’t be too far around the corner will be cycling for donations (see James above warming-up the saddle) Also, some may be in need of Group Run or Community Mission type tasks in the future like BCP did, in which case they’ll know who to call.

If you have an idea for how you or GG can help-out, please speak to a Trainer or Run Leader or Task Force, and they’ll be able to point you in the right direction, and if you’re in Hammersmith keep an eye out for the terminals (as pictured above) to make a donation of £2 (up to £30 if you’re feeling flush or festive)

Nine GoodGym’ers arrived rather hot and sweaty to lend a hand at the Barons Court Project, a wonderful Day Centre for people in Hammersmith & Fulham who are vulnerable to mental ill health and homelessness. They just secured funding for four rooms to be re-carpeted to make their Day Centre more welcoming for those who go there. Their aim is to be a home for those who do not have one and for those not at home within themselves- a really important part of the community.

However, in order to re-carpet they needed to move all the furniture and items out of the rooms and there was a lot to move! GoodGym got going and with some addition help from Michael and his fab team of staff we were able to transfer all the contents of the first room on the second floor down to the kitchen in the basement. We then moved on to moving clothes, chairs and other bits and bobs from the front room to the adjacent room. Time flew and the job was completed in no time!

We then posed for a team photo in their beautiful garden and Michael expressed his thanks for the hard work we’d all put in, he said he’d team may have resigned if he’d asked them to do the job on their own- lucky we were there! Michael also invited everyone to their Summer BBQ on Saturday 10th August from 2-5pm to enjoy some fine hospitality and meet some of their guests - please RSVP by email to Poppy Sharkey: poppy@baronscourtproject.org if you are able to attend.

Thanks again to everyone who turned up to lend a hand and hopefully we’ll be back again at Barons Court Project to help them out again in the future. Big welcome along to Naveed who completed his first GoodGym good deed (hopefully of many)! Hope you had fun!