On a wet and windy Wednesday evening, 3 Goodgymers carried out a litter pick along part of the Grand Union Canal and a section of the NCN route 41 in support of the Canal and Rivers Trust and Sustrans.

After a quick catch up on everyone's Christmas news during the warm up, we ran a short distance to the Tachbrook road canal bridge in Leamington where we started our pick.

Unfortunately James had forgotten his headtorch, but not to worry because Katherine had hers which she switched on and, oh, the batteries had run out...

Thankfully Nigel was our shining light (quite literally) being the only one out of the three of us with a working headtorch. So tonight's litter pick really put teamwork to the test with Nigel having to direct his head the right way for everyone to see where they were walking along the canal path (dodging where possible the huge puddles) and also picking out the bits of litter.

Having got as far as Morrisons at a rather slow pace due to the light situation, we decided the most sensible thing to do was take a detour along the Sustrans cycle route to carry on picking litter along the beautifully lit path.

Having collected 3 bags of rubbish, we headed past Foundry Wood to Victoria Park where we did a quick lap of the park. There were lots of other runners also trying to get their exercise in with headtorches around the park which made it feel a bit like we were in a surreal night running race.

Note to self - must remember to charge headtorch before Goodgym in future!

4 Goodgymers layered up and braced themselves for a frosty morning running and cycling along the fantastic new Lias Line cycleway.

With rain forecast for early afternoon, we were keen to get our run and cycle finished ahead of the bad weather. With some drizzle during our journey over to Long Itchington it wasn't looking good...

Thankfully Amy's wonderful car Christmas decorations (reindeer antlers for her car and elf feet sticking out the boot) distracted us from the cold and we set off along the Lias Line cycle way from the Two Boats pub. Nigel and Amy had the sensible idea of running the 7 mile route which meant that they managed to keep relatively warm, whilst Lil and Katherine decided to cycle with mittens being a necessity today to keep our hands warm.

The idea had been to collect the posters that we had put up for Sustrans a few weeks ago advertising their volunteer days which have now happened. Along the first part of the route though it seemed as though the volunteers themselves had already collected the posters as there was not a single one in sight!

Once we reached the second part of the route we started to spot more of the posters and collected about 8 along with a couple of bits of rubbish that we spotted on the way.

We had a quick stop at the wonderful memorial bench before heading back towards the Two Boats Inn for a warm drink and well earned lunch, thankfully just in time before the weather turned and the rain really started in earnest.

It was lovely to see Amy again after such a long time and hear about all the exciting things she has been up to, as well as welcoming Lil back for another WLS task. We missed you Deb and hope you feel better soon! :-)

This evening 3 Goodgymers plogged along a stretch of the Grand Union Canal and parts of the NCN Route 41.

Our previous picks in these areas have often given relatively small amounts of rubbish but this evening there was unfortunately more rubbish than we've ever seen! Perhaps it has been the recent warm weather but we managed to fill 4 whole bin bags.

We also found some more unusual items this evening. Nigel found a full bottle of Radox shower gel and decided that it was too heavy to carry, so attempted to empty it out and managed to pour half of it over his shoe. Not only did this give him soggy feet, but with a bit more walking and running his shoes started to produce bubbles!

We found a real haul of Kinder Bueno wrappers - by which we mean 8 or 9 large packets that originally had 8 bars in each. I wonder who ate 64 Bueno bars and then left the wrappers?!

Allan was gradually putting together an entire wardrobe, having collected a jumper, coat and pair of trousers at different points along the canal. We also found an unopened bottle of cider. Having learnt his lesson from the shower gel, Nigel decided to put the bottle of cider in his bin bag whole. This seemed like a good idea, until later in the pick having been shaken up from being carried around the bottle exploded, pouring yet more fizzy bubbles of a different kind onto his shoes!

It definitely felt like a productive pick this evening and we will hopefully be back again in the not too distant future to keep on top of the rubbish - hopefully with slightly fewer bubbles next time :-)

7 GoodGymers braved the cold with their dazzling hi-vis jackets and head torches to help Sustrans maintain the National Cycle Network route 41 between Leamington Spa and Warwick rail stations.

After a quick warm-up, we set off with litter pickers and bin bags in hand for a jog/walk to the far end of the path before plogging back collecting litter as we went. Some of the cycle path signs were in need of a good scrub, so Allan's ingenious design to use the litter pickers as an extendable arm came in handy!

We collected three bags of litter whilst dodging a few cyclists (it is a well used route) but the path was generally in good shape which gave us time for a fitness session in Victoria Park afterwards.

We blasted away the cobwebs after Christmas with a fartlek session including some maximal effort sprints.

It was really lovely to welcome Amy to her first ever GoodGym session and she certainly gave us a run for our money (pun intended) with the sprints!

We finished the evening with a chat about upcoming races including Draycote 10K this weekend and the Regency 10k in April.