Fourteen glorious Goodgym runners ran to help the Bothy Gardens which are used by the children’s charity Terapia .The Bothy and it’s garden was constructed in 1879-81, to H.C Stephens’ design and looks like a miniature castle in the grounds of Stephens House and Garden .The garden is used as a quiet space for the students and children during the week and is also open to the public on Sunday afternoons. (Go and see it in the day light its lovely) Terapia link We warmed up before the run and stated our favourite colours- I think turquoise won but otherwise quite an eclectic mix! We then headed off to the gardens ,1.6 miles away, through the black back streets of East Finchley. We met Alison, the head volunteer gardener, at the one of the Park gates and were shown into the Bothy garden. Alison explained what we had to do. The bulk of the GGB team used shovels to load wheel barrows with leaf compost and then unload the wheel barrows onto tarpaulin adjacent to the flower beds. Another group used folks to turnover the soil. Really good fun! ( I don’t take a survey it helps me with my task pun title) After completing our tasks we had time for a small jog and a couple of sprints up a hill path in the park. It was a lovely moonlit night and a unique privilege to have the park to ourselves. Before leaving we did some yogic breathing to re-energise for the run back. The group were so enthusiastic about this last exercise that they insisted on doing at again while the gates were unlocked to let us run home.

Thanks again for your efforts.. you did good!…& keep running!( and don’t forget the core exercises)

Also… Congratulations to Shawn who’s reached 50 good deeds and will be getting his ‘ninja’ black shirt! Lois and Vicki have been awarded full Mission status Lois has also been Coach verified… good luck with your first mission and coach run. Give them a shout out!

Last night seventeen stellar GGers ran 4.5k and 9k on a busy double task evening picking litter at Cold Fall Woods and flyering for the new Barnet Family Hub.

Meeting at the Phoenix we were joined by Mairead for her first GG run while visiting from Ireland (welcome!!) and our returning half marathon heroes: Rob (Hatfield House), May and Vicki (Royal Parks) while Fay (Royal Parks) joined us after for drinks (and biscuits!).

We divided into teams for the two tasks: taking on the long run led by Jody were Avital, May, Claire and Mairead. They dashed off with the flyers to get started. The rest of us headed over to Cold Fall Wood.

The run to Cold Fall is nice and short, but we decided to liven it up by cutting through the woods. Almost all of us had torches so, with Paul leading the way, we cut through and found our contact Linda waiting for us on the other side. Dividing into twos, the team grabbed litter pickers and got to work. The management of the part is left to volunteers, so this help is really valuable. There was quite a bit of litter accumulating around the edges of the park so everyone got stuck in.

25 minutes hard work later we gathered at the park for a few minutes play before setting off. Once we reached the other side of the woods Paul led a fast group back, setting a fearsome pace, while the rest of us followed back to the Phoenix for stretches and high fives.

Jody's team followed soon after. Here's her report:

"5 GoodGym gals headed towards Woodside Park to do some flyering for the New Barnet Family Hub. We hit the pavements hard and stuck together, completing a flyering relay and covering 9km in record time. Job done!"

Well done team.

This week's Barnet biscuits were chocolate hob nobs courtesy of Fay and ginger nuts courtesy of Charlotte. See you all soon!

Twenty two ran for goodgym barnet to Alexandra Palace to help the friends of the park clean up litter from the bank holiday weekend. We started outside the phoenix cinema with a head count, a name and a favourite film. With the hard part done ( its so hard to pick a favourite film!) we jogged to Cherry Tree woods for a warm up. It was a beautiful evening to run, an excellent temperature and an autumnal feel about the evening. The run was mostly off road along Highgate woods and through the Parkland walk, the old railway line to Alexandra Palace, with fabulous views over London. This has got to be one of our most picturesque runs. After a short but steep incline we reached the information centre for Alexandra Palace, where we met up with Charia and Gordon, who help coordinate the friends of the Park. We were tasked with litter picking and set off in a line of pairs and threes into the park grounds. To make things a little more interesting I had prizes for the best litter picking groups. The first prize went to Mairead, Claire and Katie who collected one and half bags of refuse and the second prize went to Laura who found two ten pound notes and donated them to the friends of the park. There is money in rubbish after all! We were then invited to the time honoured ceremonial throwing of rubbish into the skip.(not before checking for some more ten pound notes.) The sun had set so it was a dark run back through the streets to east Finchley where we found Sarah waiting for us with WARM cookies!.. now thats what you call a warm down!.. Thanks to Rupesh for back marking and well done new runners Kate & Peter. Give everybody a shout!

Thanks for coming and doing good!