We started off our run last night with some stats from our month of doing good to kick off 2020. You did an incredible job in Wandsworth, racking up a brilliant 188 good deeds, and covering a huge 1821 kilometers. Seriously impressive. As a whole, the numbers are even more amazing - the GoodGym community managed 8646 good deeds, and ran 98521 in the process. What an incredible wave of good happening across the country!

• Welcome to GoodGym Christina, Emily and Karen. It's all about getting fit and adding purpose to your run, and we're really happy you've joined us!

• Well done to all of you who got out there at the weekend, including Caroline who ran her first parkrun, and to Kate and Diego all spotted covering the miles at parkruns across London!

The Venue is a community centre we visit fairly regularly to support - it is run by Hadas, who organises the Waste Not Want Not , the first project in Battersea which collects surplus food from nearby markets and distributes it through local community . The community centre is run by volunteers, so we were happy to run the 2km down there to lend a hand.

Before we set off we did our weekly warm up, and also discussed the objects in our life that bring us joy. Top of the list were bikes, food, our beds and of course, cheese. What more could we need?

After a quick stop to knock out a wall sit, we arrived at the Venue and split into groups to tackle the jobs. While one team set about giving the community kitchen a deep clean, ready for another week of cooking for local people, a human chain was quickly formed to transport crates of mushrooms and compost to the roof garden around the corner. Meanwhile, several GGers got to work emptying the storage room to be able to fit in some beds which will be going to a refugee family. There was also a spot of tidying up to do outside the centre, as well as window washing and hoovering. What a lot of elbow grease!

With all the jobs ticked off it was time for our abs blast, and we kicked off with a core triathlon, before moving on to various planks and other abs focused moves. Great for keeping our form in good shape when we run and preventing injury, it's good to make this sort of conditioning part of your weekly training. Hello abs of steel!

We finished off the session with a run back to base, a bit of a hill sprint, and some nice stretching. Great work everybody! It was off to the pub for the monthly social for some of us - watch out for March's post-run fun on March 2nd, and in the meantime why not sign yourself up for next Monday's run here. Hopefully see you then. Until then, run happy!

Storm Brendan made a bit of an unwelcome appearance at our run last night, but that didn't stop 30 slightly damp GoodGymers running 4km to a community garden to lend a hand.

• Welcome to the group Anna, Calanna, Becky and Emily - lovely to meet you all!

• January challenge update! We've still got along way to go, so we need to keep those missions, group runs and coach visits going. Check out where we are on the rankings here. Let's go, team!

*If you know of anybody who wants to join GoodGym but is a little nervous to come to a group run, or you simply want to do a bit of good on a Saturday morning, check out this starter session this weekend. All welcome for a big litter pick and circuits session.

After a warm up where as well as raising our heart rates and getting our systems warm and ready to run, we talked about the nicest things we had to eat over the weekend. Ikea meatballs, steak, vegan pizza, lobster (veganuary fail!), and cheese cheese cheese. Sounds like a weekend very well spent!

We took at gentle (wet) run for 2km down to the Venue community centre where we picked up some tools for our night's task. It was then just a short walk over to a local community garden which, before this summer, had been closed to the public for many years. We had previously helped local residents get it ready for opening, and our job for last night was to give it a bit of a spruce up.

With Brendan showing no signs of shoving off, we got stuck in to the jobs, which included clearing leaves, weeding, litter picking, cutting back ivy and sweeping. Half an hour of elbow grease later and the place was looking much tidier. Check out the photos to see the phenomenal number of bags of litter and leaves you cleared - great work!

We returned the tools to the Venue, got rid of the rubbish, and took a nice steady run back to base, stopping only for a few wall sits. The original plan to do hill reps was scrapped in favour of a nice inside abs blast session, so after a five minutes of intense core exercises and one plank, we were done for the evening. Well done everyone!

Next week the BAC is shut so I'm busy finding a one-off alternative starting point for us nearby. If you've got any ideas let me know - I'll keep you posted when we've got something sorted. You can sign up for what's going to be a cracking task at a children's adventure playground here. Have a lovely week, and until then, run happy!

Last night 35 runners joined forces in Wandsworth to kick off 2020 by doing something great for themselves and for their community. It's the best way to start the year!

• Welcome back to GoodGym everybody! If it was your first group run yesterday or you're racking up those good deeds, we have got a cracking year ahead of us. A big welcome to Helena who came along for her first session last night - give her a cheer! It was also lovely to see faces old and new, and to welcome runners from other areas too.

• If you need a bit of January inspiration to get out there when it's a bit cold and dark, then we have just the thing for you - the january challenge! This is where each area tries to do as many good deeds and as many miles as possible this month. So get yourself down to as many missions, community missions and group runs as possible and let's get cracking!

• In a great beginning to the year, we celebrated Lorna's 50th good deed! This means that lovely Lorna has supported her community in huge ways, and covered quite a few miles in the process. Way to go, Lorna!

We kicked off our first session with not one but two tasks. The choices were to do a litter sweep of Doddington estate, where the local people have been reporting a rubbish problem, or to run to a primary school garden in Battersea to help empty raised beds of soils for the children to use to plant fruit and veg.

While deciding on which task to go for, we headed outside and, after a warm up, did a survey on new year's resolutions. While some opted for not making one so they can't break it, there were quite a few people wanting to improve their timekeeping, eat fewer biscuits, eat more biscuits, a number of great running challenges, learning how to accept a compliment and being kinder to ourselves. Keep at it, GoodGym!

We split into two groups, with Chris leading his down to Doddington, where they picked up the litter pickers from the local community centre. They got straight onto filling black bin bags with as much litter as they could lay their hands on - with bottles caps, cig butts (they can take up to 10 years to decompose and in the meantime they release nasties into the environment) and other packaging. After a good sweep, and with 4 km under their belt, they ran over to reunite the groups.

Meanwhile the other runners had been working hard at the primary school. Our job was to empty the huge raised beds of soil so that they could be rebuilt for the children to plant fruit and veg. It's a big job, but dividing into two teams we tackled it with spades and muscle. It soon became clear there was a little bit of healthy competition between the groups, and I can report that while one group shifted a massive 22 bags of soil, the other managed a whopping 29! I'll leave you to figure out which team came out on top...

We all met up at a park round the corner where we knocked out a tabata session. Great to increasing aerobic capacity and raising our heart rates through short bursts of high intensity drills, we did two round of eight exercises featuring the dreaded frogs and power lunges. Great energy levels, team!

After a short run back to base, we finished off the night with stetches and some cookies to celebrate Lorna's milestone. Lovely to see you all again in 2020, GoodGym! Sign up here for more fun, doing good and getting fit next week. Until then, run happy!

It was the last run of the decade in Wandsworth last night and we saw it out with some proper festive spirit!

Before we headed out for a very Christmassy run, we had a look back at the year and everything we've achieved together.

A massive well done for notching up

• an incredible 1906 good deeds in just 12 months

• visiting 68 individual elderly people, along with 214 coach runs

• running a whopping 22 779 kilometers

Those are some seriously impressive stats! If it was your first run last night (hello and welcome to Amy who joined us for her debut group run - a huge welcome to you!), or if you're into triple figures, you've all made a difference to your community and to yourself. Roll on 2020!

Our task last night was our annual running and carolling session to raise money for Paul's Cancer Support Centre. This small independent charity in Clapham Junction enables people affected by cancer, through community-based care and support, to find strength and resilience, and supports them through therapy, counselling and complimentary treatments. It's an incredible lifeline for those living with cancer.

So after a warm up where I shouted snowman, snowflake, super santa and Christmas tree a lot, we headed off with our song sheets and collecting tins to our first stop. And then after our local supermarket turned out to be a humbug, quickly on to our second stop to start our night of singing. We got a few contributions there, so moved on to the massive Christmas tree to try our luck.

That was a bit more successful, but we really made it big at our fourth stop at Clapham Junction. We were quite the hit with lots of passers by, one little boy that really wanted to join in, and a man who lived in the flat opposite who wanted us to sing as loudly as humanly possible. Our next pitstop was the pub and it turns out that tipsy people are also generous and appreciative of festive singers especially the running kind, which was good, because our final destination at Clapham Common tube wasn't quite as lucrative. Where was everybody? Nevermind, we just had time to knock out a few of the 12 Drills of Christmas for our fitness session before heading back for stretches and to our festive pub social. Pace your bets on how much we raised last night - final figure coming soon!

We're back on the 6th January to do more good and get even fitter after mince pie season. Enjoy your break GoodGym, but keep an eye out for the missions happening over the next couple of weeks. Happy holidays and here's to all the good stuff that we're gong to make happen in 2020!

xx

It was the penultimate Wandsworth run of the year (and the decade!) last night and it was a goodie....

It all started with a lots of nice news:

• There was some great parkrun tourism going on, and some good long racing from Rosie - well done guys

• Don't forget that it is our last run of the year next Monday when we'll be singing carols for Paul's Cancer Support Centre, followed by our Wandsworth Christmas social - join us for the last session of the year and get ready to get your Christmas on in a big way.

• If you want to warm up those voices and do your bit to support the local community at the same time, then there is a great community mission this Thursday when Kambala Cares community organisation will be hosting their annual local event. [Sign up here for carols, mince pies and a nice good deed]

• There was even more to celebrate last night as it was Morag's 100th good deed - what a superstar! Give her a cheer for all those good deeds and many, many kilometres along the way. Shout out to Matthew who hit 200 good deeds last night- getting ever closer to that 500 tshirt!

Our task for the evening was at Spear, a south west London based charity that helps get people off the street and into secure accommodation, supports young people and helps them move into education or work. They had asked us to come and paint their training rooms, which were in need of a little love.

So after a warm up and a brussel sprouts referendum ( 23 to 6 in favour...with some caveats) we headed off on a short run to St Mark's Church, Spear's base. When we got there we found all the equipment we needed waiting for us, and got straight into the job. While most of the group got painting, James and Hanna took on the challenge fixing the broken cupboard. Half and hour of work later and we were done - the walls had a good lick of paint, the cupboard was put together and replaced, and the brushes were washed up. That was the true definition of many hands making light work. Well done guys.

We took a short run up to Clapham Common for fitness, which kicked off with a squat waterfall, before moving onto Chase the Hare - with a very strong hare performance put in by Morag. Then we moved onto flying 30s, where we knocked out some good sprinting concentrating on different technical points.

A steady run back to base and some stretching and we were done for the night. Just one session left - hope to see you there! Until then, run happy everyone.

ps thanks to Helen for the punspiration and photos - photo credit also goes to Sian!

It was a chilly old night in Wandsworth but that didn't stop 22 community warriors meeting up to spread the word about a special lunch being put on for elderly people who would otherwise be spending Christmas day alone. That is worth braving the cold for! As Lorna said " I got in and saw the warm sofa and decided to do my little bit for humanity instead!"

We started the night with some well deserved cheers:

• Way to go Sian and Oliver who both got hefty PBs at the Fulham 10k at the weekend!

• Fancy a scenic trail run this sunday? Here is just the thing!

• Goodgym had teamed up with food poverty charity Foodshare and Tesco to help people struggling with hunger in a series of community missions (no need to be DBS checked). Have a look at this one happening in wimbledon

We did a much needed warm up, but before we set off, we had a quick chat about all the nice things that had happened to us at the weekend. From seeing family and long walks, to not leaving the warm house to getting tattoos, it sounds like it was a lovely couple of days!

Our task tonight was to spread the word about an amazing event that is being put on in Battersea on Christmas day. The Rotary club is making sure no elderly people spend Christmas Day alone, so they are organising transport, a lunch, music and bingo for anybody facing isolation on the big day.

So after a short run down to Providence House we met Senia from the Rotary Club who met us with A LOT of bags of flyers for us to deliver. It was a bit of an optimistic number, but we took what we could and set about our job as Monday night Santas.

7km later we found ourselves in Battersea Park, and to beat the chill and get a good dose of fitness in, we did tabata (ta-BAT-a/ ta-bat-TA) sprints. This is a tough workout, with 20 seconds of hard sprints interspersed with 10 second recoveries for eight rounds, but you guys smashed it.

Next week we're going to help out at a school in the secret garden the kids use to grow fruit and veg. Bring a headtorch if you have one, and sign up here for all the details. Until then, run happy GoodGym - and wrap up warm!