This evening I was joined by 9 Good Gym runners to help clean the streets of Willesden clean.

We started with the news. There will be a Brent social on Wed 12th February when we will eat dinner and play the quiz at the Queensbury. Oxford has won the bid for the GG Games 2020. Watch this space for further info. Also, big welcome to Velvet who joined for her very first GG session.

After a quick warm-up, we ran around the corner to meet Elayne, who provided us with all of the equipment needed for the task ahead. We split into two teams, one on each side of the road. Starting at the station, we made our way to the Library gathering litter along the way. We collected four bags of litter between us.

On the return to base, Tabitha led a walking group, while Liz led a running group, returning the litter pickers and then taking a slightly longer route back to base. The groups were reunited in the pub for a well earned beverage!

What a way to end GG Brent’s January! An incredible 19 people ignored the afternoon downpours and joined me to run 5km and help Mora Primary School!

Lucy, Molly and Giuliano joined for their first ever GoodGym run, Sarah touristed all the way from Bexley and we capped off the evening with a triple celebration of our own 5th birthday (yes we do celebrate all month), Claire’s actual birthday and Amy’s 50 good deed milestone!

Celebrations

As mentioned the afternoon had been super wet and this had then cleared to a cold evening – to combat this Liz led everyone on an epic warm-up session whilst I got held up by various trainer-type things! Eventually I joined everyone, took us through the news, health and safety and general intro.

• The main thing to remember is that we are going to the Queensbury on the evening of the 12th Feb to do the quiz (join for dinner from 7pm and quiz from 8pm!

Once we had gone through the intro and set the backmarkers we set off for the short journey to Mora. Once we got to the school we met Polly the headteacher who was amazed at the number of us and our general enthusiasm to help out. She was worried that we wouldn't have enough to do but as you'll see from the pics there was more than plenty! the task at hand was to empty out a stock cupboard and sort the items and then return them to the cupboard.

With such a large group I left everyone outside to assess the task at hand. As you'd imagine if you leave an energy filled group out in a playground they are going to play. My taskforce instigated a game of stuck in the mud goodgym style. To free those stuck three squats were due.

Playground antics

With the task set and a plan forming in my mind I stopped the game and split the group in two. Nine became the cupboard crew who were tasked with emptying everything out of the cupboard - human chains were very much the order of the day! The second team of ten became the sorting crew - they took everything that was taken out of the cupboard and grouped and sorted items. We had a hall adjacent to the cupboard and this proved the perfect space to get everything out and sort everything.

With such a large task we decided to go long on the task and get as much done as possible. After a good 40 minutes everything was sorted and we had started to return the items. Polly was amazed at how much we had done and I had to force everyone to stop - you guys are the best!

Polly thanked everyone and explained why it was really important to her and the help so appreciated. We said our goodbyes and Polly promised to invite us back for more tasks - we can wait!

With that we headed back to base, stretched and gave ourselves a huge round of applause - what a fantastic evening. We then went on to the queensbury for some cake and drinks to celebrate!

Get yourselves signed up for next week, can we get an even bigger group?

Cheers,
Pritesh

On a very soggy night in Brent 13 amazing people gave up their time and their opportunity to stay dry to run and help Abbey Community Centre!

What a wonderful bunch you are, I was expecting a drop in numbers with the foul weather but instead we matched our total from last week - great effort! We welcome back Pippa who hadn't been for a run with us in some months, and said hello to Charlie who joined Brent for the first time! The main news was the continued push for the January Challenge - keep it up everyone and don't forget to join strava and add your totals!

With the weather so horrible we stayed inside for the intro but then headed out, very quickly got warmed up and then we were on our way with Tabitha kindly backmarking.

We got our heads down and powered through the wind and rain and before we knew it we were at the centre!

"Hey! It's the runners!

A lovely welcome and some of the regulars to the centre remembered us and wished us all well. Simone handed over a big pile of leaflets and we got ourselves arranged to head back out to deliver them. The centre always sees an uptick in visitors after our leaflet drop so it was important for them to start the new year off well.

We split into three teams with Liz, Sasha and Pete captaining. Pete took his group off and hit the streets around the centre, Liz and Sasha headed to the "Rowley Way" estate and each team took one of the sides and went ahead and delivered away!

I ran between the groups and made sure all was going well. We met back at the centre after 20 mins and all the leaflets had been delivered.

We said our goodbyes and to ensure a bit of variety we took a different route home! Once back we stretched quickly before heading back in to the warmth of the Queensbury. Some headed home and others stayed as we celebrated Samina's birthday and belatedly celebrated our own 5th birthday too!

Let's hope for better weather next week!

Cheers,
Pritesh

Eleven awesome folk braved the cold and ran over 8km to help Abbey Community Centre.

As temperatures dropped to the lowest we've had for a Brent run this winter we gathered at the Queensbury for another night of Monday fun.

Once we gathered we went through a long and convoluted intro as we hoped that Val world met us in time to leave together.

The main news this week was still our various Christmas parties (GG-wide on the 6th and Brent on the 16th (email me if you want to attend)). The other news is that sadly the Queensbury has finally lost its battle to keep developers away and the Planning Inspectorate have granted planning permission to developers. Don't worry for now, nothing will happen soon but it's still sad news.

On to the evening's activities and once we were all set Liz led the way for everyone. Val managed to join us at Kilburn Station and then we ran the rest of the way via West Hampstead and were soon at Abbey. Once there we caught our breath and then split into three teams. Myself, Liz and Tabitha led teams and we took a load of leaflets each and went our way. Liz and Tabitha hit the Alexandra Road estate and I went to the streets around the back of the centre, before we knew it the time had passed and we regrouped at the centre.

Despite a couple of injuries on the run home we all survived and once back at base we were sure to stretch and then headed for a drink to celebrate James's birthday!

Cheers all, see you next week!

TEN fantastic fellows joined me to run over 8km on a cold November night to vist the Brent Feeder and help out our old friends at the Canal & River Trust

We were joined tonight by James who was at his first GoodGym run. We welcomed him and did a quick run through of the new... it's all about Christmas parties!

• GG wide Christmas party - details here
• Brent Christmas social (at the Queensbury) after the run on 16th December - fill in details and send money to Tabitha by Friday this week. Spreadsheet here

With the news done whilst jogging on the spot we threw in a quick warm-up and then we were on our way. We kept a good pace mainly to keep warm as we wound the 4km to Stonebridge! We there met Emilie who told us a bit about CRT and told us about the task in hand - a litter pick of the canal.

Everyone donned high-viz, gloves and armed themselves with various tools from grappling hooks to litter-pickers of varying sizes! The new hawk lights from GG Central (thank you!) got their first outing and were much needed. We work hard for 20 minutes and fished out a load of un-opened shopping, many many tins, cans and bottles AND...

• TWO supermarket trollies and
• a full suitcase

Quite the haul. Once that was all taken in and loaded up into the van, we all anti-bac'd our hands and then said our goodbyes to Emilie before another quick run back to base! After that long run, despite the cold it was important to stretch out and then we headed home/for a drink!

A fun night and a really wortwhile task.

Thanks all,
Pritesh

12 GoodGymers dominated 8.8k of running plus another 30 minutes of delivering action to post 300 leaflets promoting Open Age’s new subsidised fitness class in Paddington Green.

A brilliant running performance from the whole squad!! One if the longest GG runs I have done and great that everyone held strong in a tight pack and at a great pace to!!

Awesome that we delivered all the leaflets to! Great energy as we found suitable places right near where the class will happen so even more likely to drive more over 50’s who would like to get a bit more active into a subsidised class run by our friends at Open Age!

4.5k all the way out the edge of the borough was no mean feat then we got to work and dominated!! Having just enough time to drop off the last few leaflets as we headed back towards Edgware Road.

Timing the lights and road crossing nearly perfectly and getting back with a big finish onto Oxford Street finished off a monster step count for the evening!!

Hope to see you next week for our visit to Help the Homeless via the Ebury Lodge project.

Joel

As the nights are rolling in, head torches became the new fashion at Goodgym Brent

15 runnners ran a total of 6km to Harlesden Town Gardens to help with the task of removing cardboard slips from coffee cups that were used for a B3 event the previous week

After a quick warm up and welcoming two first timers Laura and Jenny we set off to the task . It was approximately three km to the task but with a slightly longer route than planned as we had to run around the Fairground in Roundwood park. Philip was waiting at the task to meet us to let us (and lock us) in. He had saved us a huge stash of cardboard cups for us. To the untrained eye they may have looked like they could be composted but he explained that was a plastic lining that had to be removed. So we set to work peeling the card from the cups , definitely a first for Goodgym Brent. We set to work peeling the plastic and avoiding the coffee spilling out of some of them. In not too long at all we had the cardboard removed, ready for composting. Philip kindly gave us a tour of the gardens and offered us some rosemary to take home. In no time at all it was time to run back, and we finished off with a cool down before heading home (via the pub). Get well soon Pritesh! We all hope to see you next week

9 GoodGym Westminster runners ran 7k to Little Venice to pick up 8 buckets full of recycling along the canal to celebrate GoodGym’s 10th Birthday!! #GG10

A lovely evening in London Town for our Wednesday adventures as we glided down 3.5k on Little Venice with a couple of stops to fly the GG flag along the way.

Big shout out to Elena for her first GG run and a massive congratulations to Tom for reaching to Magical 50 GoodDeed milestone.

Arriving at the Canal and River Trust HQ where we grabbed our kit and headed out to rid the canal of as much recycling as possible for the evening! We limited the rubbish collection as the bins were way over flowing and really focused our efforts on recyclables as there was a handy line of recycling bins we could use.

Working our way West we found plenty of plastics, bottles and cans and even managed to do a on the grab sort of the recycling.

Great to be on the canal path as the sun set on a lovely September day doing our bit to help this beautiful stretch of water looking at its best!

35 minutes of grabbing, sorting and recycling away had us ready for the off. With the hands sanitised and kit put away we runoff as the darkness fell.

Getting back to base with a good workout complete and a top task in the bag we stretched out and head off into the night!

Thanks for coming along and hope to see you next week for our visit to St Andrews youth Club!!

Joel

This week seven spectacular people joined me in Brent, litter picked an entire high street and then ran over 3km!

This week we were helping Willesden Green Town Team with their bid to make what we're calling Willesden High Street a winner of the Great British High Streets Award Rising Star!

After a quick intro and news round up, with the main news being Samina's effort with both volunteering and taking part in the Rough Runner run - congratulations.

With the start point for the task being Willesden Green Station we crossed the road safely and ran all of about 10 metres before meeting Elayne and Marilyn. They quickly outlined the task at hand and doled out litter pickers and bin bags.

With that we split the group so we had people on both sides of the road and off we went! Everyone was very diligent and in the end, given the ground we had to cover, I had to start imposing rules on the size of litter we could stay to pick up. We were all amazed at the huge number of cigarette butt's and if we had the time we all wanted to stay and get them all!

After a good 40 minutes of hard working and mega litter-picking we were all done (though not nearly as done as we wanted to be!) and after a mega effort to clear the areas around the library, old police station and St Andrew's Church we were done and took our many bags and met Marilyn at the Library and posed for a group photo with our many piles of rubbish (in bags I should add)!

Now as litter picking doesn't allow for much fitness we thought we better use our time wisely and so with the 'good' very much accomplished it was time for some 'gym'. A quick check map check and we were on our a way a nice 3km loop and some Indian File running. The Indian File is a simple but fun way of getting some fartlek running in and consists of everyone jogging in a line with the person at the back sprinting to the front. We had some with this running back to base and with only one wrong turn we were back and stretched right on time! Great effort everyone - let's hope our help will win Willesden the rising star award and remember you can help even more by voting here - thank you!

Next week's task is being sorted but it's the week of GoodGym's 10th birthday so expect much fun (and possibly cake)

Cheers,
Pritesh