On a fresh February evening in Bromley, nine runners covered 3.5km of hills and got stuck in at the Upper Norwood Library Hub.

Thank you Louise for this week's pun, that paint was fuming strong!

So much news this week!

• There was some super work up at the Crystal Palace Museum on Saturday, with Louise and Tim joining in the volunteer session. Have a read of Louise's run report here (and just check out that title pun! Where have you been hiding this talent Louise?!).

• On Sunday March 17th, we will be taking over the volunteering at our local junior parkrun in Crystal Palace Park. Sign up here to find out more and to volunteer for one of the many jobs on offer (marshalling, timing, barcode scanning, handing out tokens, tail-walking...).

• Quiz night at the Bridge House! Next Thursday, February 28th, we will be having a quiz night social at our start point. Sign up here, so we know how many to book for our team (and so we can work out our areas of specialism!).

The biggest news this week though, was that Louise was completing her 100th good deed! Amazing! Louise is only our second member to reach this wonderful milestone and has done so by being with us consistently from the start and taking time out from her busy week to visit an older person for a chat. She has also recently started taking part in missions, so those good deeds will be mounting up! Since we met, Louise's running has gone from strength to strength, with a few half-marathons now under her running belt (with the Big Half coming up in a few weeks too). Really well done Louise, we're all very proud of your achievements.

Tonight's task was taking us up the hill again, this time to the Upper Norwood Library Hub, but first we had to do a little warm-up in the park (cue some cone-grabbing fun and a few dynamic drills).

Livres those there!

Did you see the moon tonight? Wow! It looked even more lovely from the top of Anerley Hill, that's for sure (thank you Louise for leading the way)! This week we were met at the library by Alison, who made sure we rehydrated before we got started (thank you!). We had a few jobs this evening, with one group stepping into the office to do some painting, Lizzie and Bradley popping outside to pick up litter and Emma and Tim sorting through books in the basement.

Once I had made sure our book sorters and litter pickers were set in motion, I jogged back upstairs to check on the painters, who I thought must be rolling and brushing with gusto by this point. Instead, I was met with a cluster of perplexed faces, with Stuart trying his best to get the lid off the tin. It was one of those soft, plastic lids though and all attempts were met with it springing back into place. I thought I'd be clever and get my house keys out to have a go...bending my front door key in the process (don't worry, I bent it back and it did open the door when I got home, phew!). I must point out here that The Library of Things is situated in the next room, home to tools and gadgets galore, but these were all locked safely out of reach, but tantalisingly close. Thankfully, Stuart persisted and found himself a hammer, giving the strong leverage needed to get that tin open once and for all, good work!

Let the painting begin!

Meanwhile, our 'ploggers' had found two big bin bags of rubbish and had now joined our painters. Our sorters had decided what would sell and what might not, boxed them up and transported them upstairs and our painters were well on their way to covering up the scuffs and scrapes that had previously marked the walls around us. We made sure there was just enough time left to wash the trays and brushes (but not before we had painted a '100' and 'wings' onto Louise's t-shirt!).

Flying back down the hill, someone (Bradley) suggested going a different way, which meant a fair bit of shouting out from those wearing head-torches and some careful step leaping as we ran through the darker spots of Crystal Palace Park. Reaching the bottom, we did a couple of hill repeats before a nice stretch and chat. Next week we will return to the home of the GMax Trackstars, to do some more lifting and shifting - sign up here.

As snow fell on South East London, eleven athletes endeavoured to run over to Sydenham to help out at Gmaxtrackstars.

As we went to press, we were in third place in our division for the January Challenge, just a few places away from second - can we change that in the next two days?! We had a few extra good deeds happening over the weekend, with our coach runners busy visiting older people for a chat, Ian and Bradley over at South Norwood parkrun for a bit of pacing and others helping out on missions in people's homes - excellent work!

• We do have another opportunity to do good this coming Saturday, with a community mission to collect donations for the Rainbow Trust at the Sainsbury's in Crystal Palace - find out details and sign up here.

The biggest news today though, was that we now have our first wings in Bromley! Congratulations to Bradley, who completed his 100th good deed, thus earning himself the very special red winged t-shirt. Bradley has been with us less than a year, so this is quite some achievement, especially when you consider that he had never run before he joined us! He has really grown in many ways in the past year, going from strength to strength as an athlete and sharing his skills widely through volunteering at other groups outside of our sessions. Well done!

In single pile

Tonight we were super excited to be heading to a brand new task! Our beneficiary this evening was the Gmaxtrackstars, an athletics club who work locally with people at all stages in their sporting journey and are in the process of setting up their new space on Sydenham High Street. A short run there in the rain and we were set to go. We were met by Mark, who was up in the back of a big lorry, bringing in some lights and air vents that had been donated to the space. He quickly showed us our job for the evening, pointing out a big pile of flooring that needed taking downstairs.

Dust a minute!

Mark proudly showed us around the space, telling us his plans for the various areas, with a focus being on a yoga studio (we can't wait to come back and have a go!). Embracing the dust, we quickly found a rhythm, carrying a pile of planks on our shoulders, sharing the load with a friend, slotting lengths of flooring under our arms, all done with a great deal of teamwork as we maneuvered between each other on the stairs. Some took a few moments away from the flooring, to help Mark bring in some materials from the lorry, then resumed lifting and shifting.

Plank you very much

When we first saw the pile, we did wonder if we could do it but, as time ticked away, it was clear that yes, we could! A few quick jogs up the stairs and we had cleared the space. This flooring will be laid in one of the studio spaces, which we decided to use for our fitness session - it was a choice between dusty indoors or snow! There was some great work here, using the space for its intended activity. We did rounds of squat jumps, lunges, push-ups and a special plank - could you feel those glutes working?

Running back towards the Bridge House in the snow, we made use of one of the bridges for our stretches, steam rising from our hot bodies! Next week is another new task, this time in the other direction, at Anerley Town Hall, where we will be moving some tables into the basement, sign up here to join in. See you then!

As big fluffy snowflakes fell, eight eager runners covered around 3km and cleaned all the windows at Melvin Hall.

Yes, snow! I was a bit excited, not just by the snow, but also by the fact that the stretch of road outside our start point was closed, so we would be able to do our warm-up there instead of cramped onto the pavement! Small things. This week we were very pleased to welcome a first-timer, Reece, into the fold and to welcome back Claudia, who joined us last week and, on just her second visit, came up with our really rather good title pun!

Before we ventured out into the freezing cold weather, we talked a little about missions, since Louise took on her first weekend mission on Saturday - well done! You can read the run report here and check out the before and after pictures! So Louise has contributed an extra good deed to our January Challenge there, but we need to get things moving, being in third place. Conroy from GoodGym Croydon has given us the perfect opportunity this Saturday, with a GoodGym takeover mission at nearby South Norwood parkrun. He's looking for pacers, marshals, barcode scanners and so on, or you could just go along and run, of course (don't forget your barcode)!

Oh, what fun we had, doing our warm-up in the middle of the road! It featured snowy cones, ins and outs, shaking-all-over and some high-knees. All the good stuff to get your body ready to run. Stepping carefully, we ran down the slippery High Street, remembering the run in February last year, that turned into a walk, due to ice! As we arrived at Melvin Hall, we enjoyed the warmth and gathered all that we would need to clean the windows - thank you John. We had decided that the outside probably wouldn't happen tonight, so got on with the windows in the halls...then in the kitchen and the entrance and the corridor, then the mirrors... We then noticed that it had stopped snowing, so went out into the little courtyard to give the outsides a shine. As we cleaned the main hall windows, we had some fun on the stage, getting into our band pose - any ideas for a name? The tables were set out for tomorrow's lunch, which happens every week on a Wednesday. You can see all the other activities that take place here, including a Rock Choir, on the Melvin Hall website.

We might have been stalling slightly, but we had a fitness session to do, so ran up to the little park, where we partnered up for some shoulder-tag, a game of 'everybody's it', then some really tough shuttle runs, interspersed with strength work. Well done everyone, it's even harder when the ground is wet and cold!

Next week we have a brand new task, with G-Max Trackstars, who are setting up a new space not far from our start point. Expect a run of around 4-5km and a good upper body workout! Sign up here to join us and have a great week!