After over 20 years of running the streets, footpaths and bridleways of Huddersfield I like to think I have a pretty good knowledge of the town’s geography. Consequently I get quite excited if I discover a somewhere new, however small, and last night I had just such a treat. GoodGym found a little green space and a super circuit for interval work on the Springbank Estate, not a stone’s throw from the Stadium.

Why we discovered this little gem between the estate and the B&Q car park was because KNH housing officer Owen Cockburn had commissioned GoodGym to clear an accumulation of rubbish from it. Litter picking is of course a GoodGym staple and an easy win. Whilst we wouldn’t necessarily want to do it every week there is a certain satisfaction in getting stuck into an area strewn with rubbish and investing 45 minutes of effort making it look much better.

A task literally 2 minutes from the Stadium requires either a very short run, or a little creativity, so we opted for the latter. A 3K loop took us on a somewhat circuitous route to B&Q, and also gave us opportunity to make a mental note of a lot of litter on Red Doles Lane which could benefit from a GoodGym litter blitz sometime in the future.

Anyway nicely warmed up from our run, Owen met us outside B&Q to give us our orders and show us the task. Just a narrow fenced-in strip of land between the store and the estate, the area was absolutely covered in all kinds of litter, the usual sweet wrappers and drinks cans, but also retail signs and sheets of polythene caught up in the branches of the trees. GoodGym would definitely need to be on form to get this cleared in our 45 minute work window.

As usual however with minimal fuss and maximum effort from the team grabbed black bags and were soon scouring the undergrowth and leaf litter for rubbish. Joining the regular GoodGym crew of Kati Law, Chris Green, Ben Godfrey and Fiona Armitage was first timer GoodGymmer Jess Earnshaw. Jess was with us due to her usual Tuesday Yoga session being cancelled, but I hope we might be able to tempt her swap the Downward Dog and Sun Salutation for a good deeds more often in the future.

The dry conditions made collecting the rubbish less of a chore than it might have otherwise been, and I got a little plyometric practice jumping up in an attempt to reach the polythene stuck in the branches of a tree. I manage to retrieve some, but a couple of pieces evaded my reach😬! Once we got going it was surprising how quickly we cleared the relatively small area, and three quarters of an hour later we had about eight bags of rubbish to show for our efforts and the little slot of greenery which looked much better for our attentions.

That left a little time for the second hidden gem of the night! It turns out Springbank estate is centred around a lovely little crescent with a children’s playground in the middle, which is perfect for running intervals around. So for the next 15 minutes we were all running 150 metre loops, one hard, one easy in an attempt to improve flat out speed and top end endurance. I say all, although that is not entirely true, one of our number saw this as a great opportunity to pop into B&Q to use the loo! Well done to everyone for getting stuck in, particularly Chris Green who managed a total of 17 loops in the 15 minute slot.

From there it was just a 5 minute steady jog back to the Stadium on weary legs, but with glowing hearts from the knowledge that GoodGym have worked hard for ourselves and the local community. Well done team, you are all superstars!