20 lovely runners ran 5km to help out at the amazing MEfA Montessori!

Well it was FREEEEEZING this evening but a whopping 20 Greenwich folk made it out for their weekly good deed! Nice one!!!

We had one new runner this evening, the lovely Claire who is just coming back to running after a knee operation last year and did absolutely brilliantly - well done Claire! Hope you enjoyed the first session! And we also welcomed Chloe who came along to the starter session on Saturday :)

After a little warm up running around in all sorts of directions we headed off! The Montessori is located up in Westcombe Park which involves a litttttle bit of a hill but as I always say, what goes up must come down!

We arrived at the Montessori and were greeted by the loveliest of ladies, the amazing Wendy! You can tell she is an education professional as she has the most calm and perfect manner! Love her!

Anyway, enough about my love for Wendy.... so we split into groups. A few people headed outside to tackle the pesky ivy. A small bathroom needed painting so a few people squuuuuueeeeeeezed in there. Whilst the bulk of the group organised and sorted a whole load of books!

After just half an hour, the books had all been sorted, put into piles and ticked off Mr Rogers's list! Meanwhile the twins were getting more paint on themselves than on the walls.... wouldn't want to be doing your washing at the weekend guys! Hope the paint comes out alright... although it definitely has the proper GoodGym look about it now!

The gardeners outside were also just about done, except Dom was just wrestling with one thick bit of tree trunk... don't worry we will come back for it another time! They brought through 4 bin liners jam packed full of ivy and other garden waste so you can definitely be proud of that!!

Light up hat!

We all gathered outside for a group photo and this is where we discovered THE most amazing invention probably ever??? Andy's amazing cap with a built in head torch!!!! Whack one of those on your birthday list guys and girls! Mind blown!!!

Sadly we didn't have time for a fitness session but you've all worked pretty hard these last few weeks so thought you deserved a little recovery week! You're welcome :) We headed back to the uni, had a little stretch and parted ways!

Well done tonight everyone! Great work on the task, and well done for getting so stuck in. If you want to find out any more information on the Montessori then have a look here. As I said I'm not here next week but Vickie is taking over so I'm sure you'll be in for a treat! See you in a few weeks!

17 lovely runners ran 3km to help out at Christchurch community garden!

Well what a lovely morning that was eh folks! So this was the third starter session in a series of four aimed for runners doing The Big Half in March (but of course everyone and anyone is welcome!). The fourth and final session is on 10th February and you can sign up here!

We had lots of lovely new GoodGym runners today as well as a few familiar faces which is always nice. And lots of people who travelled far and wide to make it over to Greenwich this morning, some all the way from Richmond! Now that is dedicated!!! Hopefully it was worth it.......!

After everyone had dropped off their bags at the gym and emptied their bladders(!) we headed up the stairs, found out what everyone was having for dinner tonight and then did a quick little warm up just down the street before we got going!

We arrived at the church a little under 10 minutes later and were greeted by vicar Andrew who explained a few things which needed doing in the garden. On the whole, it was a general tidy up which included removing all the moss and grass from between the bricks and sweeping up the leaves! Everyone grabbed some gloves and a weapon of choice and got stuck in!

After about 20 minutes the place was looking LOVELY! Those bricks had been set free after being engulfed in moss and were now able to breathe! All the leaves had been swept up and put into a nice pile. Now it was just time to get everything together into a big bag ready to be emptied onto the compost later on.

After all the tools had been put away, we said our goodbyes and headed back to the uni for a fitness session!

We started off with a few partner exercises to target the core muscles, because a strong core means a stronger, faster and more efficient runner! And then we finished off with 3 minutes of continuous running at varying speeds to get used to the feeling of running at different paces rather than just your standard plod which everyone is guilty of! It's something that can easily be incorporated into your training and will make a whole world of difference, I promise you!!!

Once everyone was suitably puffed, we headed back to the gym for a little cool down stretch and called it a day!

Wednesday group run!

As I mentioned, our usual run is on a Wednesday evening, 6.45pm at the Old Royal Naval College. The format is the same as today except the run may be a little further and it's dark because it's in the evening... but it's still fun! You can sign up to Wednesday's run here.

Well done today everyone! It was great seeing you all get so involved with the task and there was some amazing running going on from everybody so you should be really pleased with yourselves! Hopefully see you at another GoodGym run soon! Good luck and enjoy the rest of your training!