The first garden task of the year at St. Matthews Church found Ashley, Mandy, Ellen, Jenny and first time Goodgymer Sarah tackle some overgrown trees and the fallout of the recent windy weather. Copious amounts of hand tools were employed to hack, cut, saw, bludgeon our way through the branches cutting them into smaller pieces that we could hide away in any bin we found. One very long branch had almost snapped off but try as they might, Ellen and Sarah were unable to bring it down no matter how many times they twisted or swung on it.

Ashley, Jenny and Naomi met David again to help clean up the moat at St Matthews. Naomi is recovering from an operation so joined us in a supportive role, giving words of encouragement from the bench, while Jenny and Ashley worked hard at scraping the weeds and moss from the stone only occasionally punctuated by tea and biscuits, looking at frogs, trying to feed a friendly robin and a quick visit to the crypt. After 2.5 hours we'd removed 6 buckets of moss and polished off 4 teas and 12 biscuits. As a stretch goal we even managed to clean up the steps leading down into the crypt. Another very satisfying task.

There was magic everywhere in Alvaston Park as dreams (of two new run leaders) hung in the air.

Ashley and Gwyn had completed the academic side of their England Athletics training, and today, as the sunshine filled our hair, we were put through our paces as they led us through warm-up exercises and training sessions for their Leader in Running Fitness (LiRF) training. Simon is a qualified Leader so as well as exercising with us, was acting in a supervisory role on behalf of England Athletics. Other GoodGym members, Jenny, Naomi and Tracey took part, and in times like this when you need a friend (or two), neighbours and family members also came along and joined in the fun!

The event had to be filmed, which isn’t an easy task when the sun’s in your eyes, but we got two successful sets of recordings from the evening.

Ash’s warm-up had us alternating between walking, running and stretching, all seemingly simple until we needed to rotate one arm forwards and the other backwards - no need to laugh or cry at the faces we pulled whilst trying to coordinate this! Gwyn got us warmed up with a slightly different mix of walking and running, adding a bit of skipping, some bounces and “high-knees” running on the spot.

For his main session, Ashley split us in two relay teams, wisely choosing team members so that the contest didn’t feel unfair and was a close-run race. Gwyn’s main session focused on technique – we were all standing up straight in the sunshine as if we had a balloon pulling our head up, and running with high hips and high toes. No need to run to try this posture, it’s useful for walking, too.

Simon gave some very positive feedback on the evening, and added some bits of advice that he’d picked up from his experience. All in all, it was a wonderful, wonderful LiRF, and we hope that England Athletics agree when they view the recordings.

Apologies to anyone who was hoping for film rather than song references – I’ve not actually seen the film... yet (that's my homework for this week!)

DOING GOOD

A Sunday special & it was indeed a special one! Visiting the Age UK centre on Chad Park is always a pleasure; the regular volunteers there are delightful & the whole place has such energy & enthusiasm about it. This was especially true yesterday as the centre was eagerly anticipating the arrival of over forty local elderly people for their Sunday lunch club... or more like a runch club in our case!

What a wonderful initiative to help combat isolation & loneliness in the local community. We were excited to be playing our part to help support it.

It was also a special run as we got to greet some newbies to the GG Derby clan; a warm welcome to Gemma, Tracy & Clare.

We arrived at the centre to the waft of cooking & were welcomed with a pot of hot tea to warm us up - perfect! There was only time for one man to sit around on the job - cough, Sam, cough - (evidence is in the photos) & then it was straight to work, moving tables & chairs ready for Sunday lunch'in.

Once the furniture was in place, the finishing touches came out & tables were laid with cutlery & condiments. Everywhere was looking great & then it was of course time to grab a group photo with team GG & the Age UK centre volunteers before running back to base.

WHILST GETTING FIT

& what a beautiful way to get fit! The run out was a little damp as with got caught in a quick blast of rain, but we soon dried off once hard at work in the Age UK centre, working our upper body strength lifting & carrying. We then enjoyed glorious sunshine for the run back to the Jurys Inn as a reward for our good deeding!

A small hill to jog up & then it was plain sailing down Nottingham Road, over the bridge & up to St Mary's Church where Derby City was beginning to brim with life on a Sunday morning. We finished with a bit of a bounce as always on the bouncy-bridge by the Jurys before stretching & showing our butts to the world... well, to the guests in the hotel lobby anyway.

It was fantastic to be running in the daylight on a group run again, something we haven't done since our launch back in September. We'll certainly await the lighter evenings with anticipation!

WHAT'S NEXT?

After a little chat yesterday with the volunteers of Age UK, we think it would be a fun idea to host a 5km fundraising run for the centre on Chad Park... watch this space as its likely to involve both group runs & some community missions to pull it off, so we'll need your help!

Big Loves