A good sized crew of 26 headed to Weavers Adventure Playground tonight to give task owner Alex a hand with a variety of interesting tasks…

Hammertime

We headed the short, ½-mile run to the playground where Alex greeted us with an assortment of tools to make a start on the main task: building tables and benches from reclaimed wood. The runners divided into three furniture-assembly teams, and soon the noise of drills, saws and hammers could be heard echoing around the Bethnal Green neighbourhood.

It soon became clear that many hands don’t make so much for light work as no work at Weavers, and so Alex took a team of three task-less runners to dig, wheel and shovel soil into the tyres surrounding the playground’s go-kart track, while another all-female crew of three headed inside to clear the upstairs area of the hall in preparation for an important meeting later in the week.

All teams accomplished a lot, and by 8.05pm Alex was, as usual, a happy customer (unlike some of the runners - this was the third time Polly and Si had returned to finish assembling a table, determined to complete the task tonight, only to discover to their horror that their previous effort had been dismantled…). Despite the fact tonight’s task involved the use of many potentially hazardous tools, it was nonetheless a bit of a miracle the only thing hurt was our pride.

An ABomination…

And so at just after 8, Chi, the birthday boy whose birthday I forgot to mention tonight - ahem - took to the stage to deliver nearly 20 minutes of dazzlingly effective fitness content. He started the runners with squats and quickly progressed to jump squats, before the whole team hit the floor for every kind of abdominal abomination going. It was a brilliant session, leaving no abdominal muscle fibre untouched. Thank you Chi.

And then we were racing back through damp streets to finish with a final stretch on the hotel steps.

Amazing effort, everyone.

And so for tonight’s Group Run thankyou’s and shout-out’s…

Thank you to Bryon and Leanne for leading the team to the task (I had an eleventh hour DBS-delay).

Thank you to Chi for his brilliant fitness session, and for being able to push the team so hard after all their previous hard work! And Happy Birthday, Chi – we’ll (I’ll) make up for it and celebrate next time we see you.

A big warm GG welcome to first time runner Dom – really lovely to have you along tonight and well done for getting so much work done outside, and we hope to see you very soon.

And onto next week…

Next week we’re multi-tasking it: we’re heading to Look Ahead for some indoor decorating and to Margaret at Hollybush for some planting in the planters, so do sign up here.

I hope to see you then, and in the meantime, have a wonderful week.

Task force to the rescue

It was a feelgood factor like no other tonight as a large group of runners gathered on the steps of our lovely hotel to warm up for the evening’s run. Task force came to the rescue as several of the runners were called away to an impromptu medical emergency from a nearby local resident. Leanne speedily stepped in to lead the 18 runners down to the Royal London, while Bryon was already leading the task to the Cranbrook Community Food Garden. And thankfully Joel was already navigating the Royal London route, having previously responded to my route SOS (“Calling all runners who can show us a Low Traffic Light Route”), so as I remained with the three runners who were providing life-saving assistance to the local resident, the teams were led quickly and competently to our tasks.

Runners fixed the runner beans

Bryon and the team accomplished a lot at the garden, painstakingly taking tomato and runner bean plants out of their soil, and removing plenty of fiddly bamboo sticks and wire ties. Janet the task owner was over the moon, messaging me at 10pm to say, “They worked so hard! They were a delight tonight. Thank you.” And having completed their task very promptly, proceeded to put their additional time to good use, with Bryon taking the team on a detour back to the hotel, squeezing in some additional miles on the cardio clock.

…And accomplished a lot at the hospital

Meanwhile at the Royal London, teams were divided into two main tasks: one large group continued last week’s training with task owner Nancy and Richard heading onto the elderly and dementia wards, while a further two teams were dispatched to deliver Evening Standards, chaplaincy packs and Friends and Family Tests papers to multiple wards, zig-zagging between the two towers of the hospital, navigating the somewhat complex lift system.

And then it was gone 8pm and we were heading back to base, with Chi leading the pack at a respectable speedy pace for those who fancied a fitness boost to end the evening.

Monday mentions

What a night. BIG GROUP RUN SHOUT-OUTS tonight to: our wonderful task force members Leanne, Bryon and Becky for leading the runners to the tasks, and thinking on their feet with marvellous Plan B’s; Joel for jumping in with a brilliant new Royal London route; Chi for our end-of-evening fitness kick, and Stefaniaand Bryonfor lovely pics. And to Lisa, Polly, and Sophia, for your role in helping to save a life this evening. Thank you for putting the ultimate Good into GoodGym.

Coming up: our social on Thursday (and back to Weaver’s next week)

Onwards to the rest of the week, and on Thursday we’re kicking off our trainers and letting our hair down as we head to the GG social, which we’re co-hosting with Hackney at The Star of Bethnal Green! Do come along, even if just for a quick post-work pint – more details can be found here.

And next week we’re back to the adventure playground, where Alex has a variety of the usual fun tasks for us, which will be followed by a challenging Autumnal Abs session. Come and join in the fun!

In the meantime, have a really great week everyone, and hope to see you very soon.