7 fantastic Goodgymers came together to help a local charity with a renovation project

The leisure centre in Penistone used to be owned by the authorities but was closed and taken over by a local community group to keep it going. The group of locals that had formed a charity to run the centre, had used donations, grants and money raised by the public to pay for some of the renovations doing, however had run out before having chance to finish it!

They reached out to see if we could help on a lovely rainy Saturday in February! Some of the members of GoodGym Barnsley were also joined by GoodGymmers from Leeds and London!

It was a tough task with lots of dust! Our job was to prepare the room to be painted and this meant helping shift the piles of dust and dirt, clean the surfaces, walls, ceilings, steel girders etc and remove the hundreds of plugs and fill the holes!

Armed with facemasks, goggles, brooms, screwdrivers, hammers, wire brushes, cloths and soapy water, the team got to work on the room. We were a really good team and although some people had to leave before others, the photos from the end of the day show what we managed to achieve in only a few hours! Great job team!

To top it off, one of the organisers had made yummy cakes and flapjacks which were enjoyed at one of the tea breaks!

A great way to spend a Saturday - I was grateful for the shower afterwards though to remove all that dust!

Fantastic day out of trail running workshops, guided runs, yoga, talks, playing with Bobby the puppy all rounded off nicely with a rather hardcore 10k scrambling up rocks and rivers on all fours, running through mud and chucking ourselves down a very stony pathway.

Huge well done to Abi and Grace for doing your first timed trail runs! Big well done to Gill getting a trophy on a Strava segment and hats off to Chris for doing two 10ks in one day!

Twas a lovely morning to help the environment and help a local park that is in desperate need of volunteers to help maintain it.

After the weekly park at Locke Park, the four of us headed to Ardsley Park where we were met by Roy and his son, the main two people trying to keep the park looking beautiful.

We split into two teams, the edgers and the pickers. The edgers task was very physically demanding with lots of digging up of soil and grass, followed by a long walk to move the soil to the area the park wanted it to go. Meanwhile, myself and Sharon aka the pickers, got to work picking up the litter around the childrens play area and football cage. To our horror, we found a knife, some scissors and tinfoil, which we think might have been used to take drugs, not good near where children play! We then teamed up to tackle all the broken glass around the football cage, sweeping it into pile and putting it into a wheelbarrow.

Two hours later and we were saying our goodbyes! A job well done and a visible improvement - lots more to do for this park, we'll be back!

20 fantastic GoodGymers came together to run the first official Barnsley Parkrun of 2019!

In what turned out to be a Yorkshire GoodGym gathering, GG Barnsley were joined by 14 members of GG Sheffield and Kati from GG Huddersfield! Huge shout out to these amazing, dedicated volunteers who got up extra early on their first Saturday of 2019 to come along and support us, we seriously could not have done it without you, thank you so very much!

We prayed it wouldn't rain and luck was on our side, as as the sun rose on 5th January, it was a bright, crisp wintery morning! Barnsley Parkrun is a lovely course, through the town's main park, Locke Park - which is rather hilly and therefore has been rated one of the more difficult Parkruns in the UK. Don't let that put you off, because where there is uphill, you always need to come down and it is a very pretty park to run around!

The run director Darrell was very happy to have our support on the day and quickly briefed everyone on what they'd be doing. Thanks to team finish line for timekeeping, funnel managing, token giving and barcode scanning to perfection, everything went very smoothly with very few hiccups! Team marshals were full of bags of enthusiasm and support for the runners, cheering them on all the way through. We even had 4 GoodGymers running the course, wearing their GG tshirts with pride and being our moving adverts throughout! Great job by everyone!

As the runners came in to the finish line, we handed out our GG Barnsley flyers for anyone keen to learn more about what we do! We'd love to get some more members to GG Barnsley so fingers crossed all of our hard work pays off! There was lots of thanks, praise and interest in what we do locally, from lots of the runners which was lovely to see!

We finished off with a hot drink and donuts in the Park's cosy cafe, before saying our goodbyes. Thanks again to everyone that came to show their support, it is very much appreciated!

Happy New Year!