33 GoodGym Cardiff runners celebrated Christmas in style at The Classroom - Y Dosbarth

Everyone began arriving at about 7.15pm into The Classroom. The first thing everyone had to digest about one another was the fact that people were wearing clothes other than GoodGym t-shirts! Firm believers of the work hard, play hard principle, after an incredible year of running and helping others it was now time to let off steam, and the bar staff were challenged to make a whole array of cocktails to satisfy taste buds.

Let's get quizzical

Ben planned a quiz for the Christmas do; There were 2 two picture rounds (Guess the breed of the dog, and name the artist) and 3 question rounds (How well do you remember 2018, A Christmas round and Miscellaneous round - You've got to love a bit of everything).

Martin and Ben both facilitated the quiz. The team names... The Goodgym Guys, Tom to the power of 9, and two other team names I cannot remember! (Apologies :) ) Many teams had an extra team member, Google - You know who you areeeee! The winners were Tom to the Power of 9 - Well done folks.

Thank you everyone

I had been quite unwell with flu symptoms over the past few days so I didn't plan a script for the evening's speech. What I did say though, and what I will echo again now is, thank you. Over the past year at GoodGym Cardiff and Vale we have achieved incredible milestones, both personal and as a team, and these deserve recognition. I say thanks because being the lead of GoodGym Cardiff is made an absolute pleasure because of each and every one of you - you make it all worthwhile - your determination and tenacity to made Cardiff and the Vale a better place inspires and motivates me.

Where to?

After The Classroom people went in a few different directions, but many went to Bootlegger in town and the hardcore amongst the group headed to Clwb Ifor Bach until very late!

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The Classroom is a wonderful place to go for food and drinks. The Classroom has a vision and passion to develop future talent for the hospitality industry. They have a team of industry professionals with a wealth of experience from Michelin Star and multiple AA Rosette awarded establishments. Led by these experts, the Classroom is staffed with Cardiff and Vale College students who are keen to hone in their skills and experience to start their careers in the profession. Former students who attended the college have progressed into top professional kitchens and venues across the region, UK and beyond!

WOW, a whopping 27 runners turned up to Big Moose Café tonight! A remarkable number and best of all, everyone was ready to run and do some good in Cardiff - 12 First time runners this week - Well done all... do come again!

Our new meeting point is working well and everybody loves it. The staff at Big Moose always greet us with a warm welcome and many of us pop in there during the week to enjoy a coffee and their friendly hospitality. If you haven't been there yet then you moose try it out!

Our run started this week with a GoodGym intro led by Ben. He let everyone know about the three ways there are to get involved with GoodGym; 1.) Group Runs 2.) Mission Runs 3.) Coach Runs - These are the 3 fantastic ways of combining your running with doing good in the community! 😃 We then did a head count which included our name, our head count number and our favourite animal – With the amount of animals mentioned I am surprised nobody burst out into a rendition of the Lion King singing the Circle of Life... A wumba way... A wumba way! 🦁

There were LOADS of new runners this week… A HUGE welcome to Sophie, Eleanor, Katherine, Nicola, Cheng, Rhodri, Andrew, Peter, Wendi, Marion, Amanda and Sean. All new runners to GoodGym were greeted with a HUGE applause and cheers (Oh I remember the day of my first GoodGym run… nostalgia!)

A few of the runners brought friends/family members along and earned themselves ONE RED LACE (Dreams really do come true!). Well done Sean, Nicola, Cheng and Gwenni. - If I missed anyone, let me know and i'll get you a red lace!

We then played a quick warm up game of Fish and Chips before allocating back markers and then beginning our evening run.

We took the route through Bute Park, AKA Jurassic Park to get to the Samye Foundation. We saw a Tyrannosaurus Rex, a Stegosaurus and a Diplodocus. We didn’t hang about though as those animals can be feisty sometimes! Ben also began playing John William’s orchestral music and it began to seem very real. 🦖🦕 Click here to listen to the Jurassic Park theme tune

We then continued our journey to the task for that evening…(Still with 27 runners, nobody got eaten by the T-Rex)

Welcome to the Samye Foundation.

Lorraine greeted all of the runners as they arrived through the gates of the Samye Foundation, directing everyone to much desired water. Lorraine then told everyone about the awesome work they try and do at the centre to help individuals who struggle with challenges to their mental health – This really motivated us to do the best we could in the allotted time.

Lorraine then informed us of our tasks for the evening. The tasks included clearing out a shed and re-organising it, pulling up weeds, breaking up old fencing, digging up soil and planting flowers, painting the outside walls and more! Are you ready for this?!? Lorraine asked. To which we replied we just fended off dinosaurs, we can do this!

• The shed-sorter-outers were: Katherine, Mikey, Tom and Jess
• The Picasso-painters were: Lucy, Peter, Lydia, Cheng, Marion and Gwenno
• The dig-a-planters were: Sean, Rhodri and Andrew
• The fence destroyers were: Aimee, Adam and Emma.
• The fence installers were: Sean and Rhodri.
• The weed-exterminators were: Lowri, Wendi and Sophie.
• If I missed you out or you were doing something different then comment below and let me know!

Lowri chanced her luck with the weeding and correctly identified the weeds! Marion and Cheng both managed to get covered in paint... oh dear. Sean, Rhodri and Andrew did well working together planting a rose bush! The shed team tidied the shed beautifully! A new fence was installed behind the buddha statue, 3 outside walls got painted and loads of weeds got pulled up.

All in all the task was a huge success. Everyone ‘rose’ to the challenge and ‘dug’ deep. After we had finished Lorraine and friends at the Samye Foundation invited us in for some scrumptious snacks as a thank you for us running to help out; It was very thoughtful and many of us who couldn’t resist temptation may have suffered a stitch on the run back.

This week's pun for the run winner/s! Well done Darren and Rosie for coming up with this week’s PUN FOR THE RUN! You can take home the virtual ‘RunPunstiltskin’ award this week. Take it home, spend time with it, go to the cinema with it if you want, but just make sure you return it next week when the RunPunStiltskin award is up for grabs again.

This week's Tweet off winner is! Nathan Swain

Well done to everyone who ran with us for the first time! Llongyfarchiadau to everyone who ran with us this evening, especially those who ran with us for the first time! Davina McCall retweeted our tweet on Twitter too!

Other info:

• Click here to find out about the Chrismtas party! It is taking place on the 15th December.
• Click here to find out about the upcoming paddleboarding

Click here to sign up to next week - It's good exercise! :)