26 runners ran 9k to help paint a den for a Children's Mental Health Charity, and a further 5 ran 11k to clear an elderly lady's garden.

Welcome to the 100 club!

Tonight's run marked a special occasion- the 100th 'GoodGym Good Deed' from Alex Kenmure! Nice one Alex. Alex has been with GG Camden from the outset and has done a super job visiting his 'coach' until her sad recent passing. Well done Alex- Marian would be proud! We salute you!

Long Run

It wasn't just long - it was hilly. Our run to both tasks took us up Primrose Hill. It's a great view at the top but what an 'orrible climb! The way back was slightly easier but still great effort from all in tackling a challenging course.

Who we helped.

The main pack headed to help out the Anna Freud Centre. They are a pioneering research centre and charity improving the lives of children and young people who suffer mental health problems. A smaller group of 5 GoodGym members went to help out Kilburn resident Diana. She is having a little trouble in her garden and isn't able to do the heavy difficult work anymore. It's great we can help out. Don't forget to bring your documents along if you want to get a DBS check and take part in these rewarding additional missions.

The Task

Anna Freud needed some help painting a den they had built in their back garden. It's an amazing little spot. We have helped build raised beds and dig a pond in the past- all of which is part of their 'garden'. There wasn't enough paint brushes to go round so we rotated jobs with some people weeding the pathways and others being subjected to some weird Core and legs press up walks. Lovely.

In 30 mins we had weeded almost the entire garden and had given the den a fresh lick of white paint. Nice work.

Here's a mission report from Paul Bown

The mission this week was at the lovely Diana's flat in Kilburn. The local community has been clearing away various areas to grow more vegetables and flowers. Our task consisted of packing weeds, thorns and brambles in black sacks and positioning it in the recycling area on the street. With the 5 of us we were able to complete the mission and have time for 2 rounds of apple juice, amazing stuff! As we left the area we admired the work Goodgym Camden had done the year before in clearing part of the estate, they are now growing potatoes and various herbs there. The run there and back was at a progressive pace and the distance was over 11km, fantastic evening for a run!

Next week's run is a slightly shorter one- hopefully see you all there!

30 people ran to Kings Cross Community Orchard and supported heavy plums, killed weeds with cardboard, got covered in stagnant water and hacked nettles with a scythe.

Sounds pretty weird huh. Well it was....but it was great.

We ran together as a pack this week- with the exception of Danica, Pritesh and Alex who legged it 11k to help out Kilburn resident Diana with her unruly garden (great work you beauts- report from Pritesh below). We had a nice short run to Camley Street to the Orchard run by Alara Wholefoods and London Orchard Project.

London Orchard Project and Alara Dream Farm

We were welcomed by Alex from Alara. He manages the site and is a really interesting guy (Have a read of the blog on Alara Dream Farm above). He had a raft of jobs he needed doing a large proportion of which stank to high heavens .....

Task 1

The fruit trees in the Orchard are now surrounded by weeds. Alex want to 'mulchify' them; whacking cardboard around the base of the trees and covering them in rich stinky compost. This should starve the pesky blighters of light and stop them multiplying. The job sounded easy enough but involved climbing in and out of a deep recycling skip. Scaling the 8 foot walls is pretty tough with little legs eh Freya?

Task 2

Weed destruction. A great little task with some fantastic old school tools. Megan went all Stakhanov with her Sickle (big thanks to A - Level History for that reference), Beth, Jess and Monica did their best Grim Reaper impression with the Scythe, and Holly mastered 'Grandpa's Weedmachine'?! We overfilled 2 wheelbarrows with all the weeds they bashed. Nice one.

Task 3 - Heavy Plums

There's loads of fruit kicking about the trading estate- and the plum tree is going absolute great guns. So much so the extensive crop is too heavy for the tree. Using a sledgehammer Jacqui, Jon, Polly and Lucia crated a structure using some big wooden stakes to prop up the branches and keep them off the floor. Nice work.

Task 4

The stinkiest of the lot. This involved planting in various plots at the back of the trading estate. The group prepared the area, got the plants ready and than covered the area in the most rancid water I have ever had the misfortune of coming into contact with. I think Rodney, Becky and George had to have a number of showers post run to wash away the awful smell...nice one guys.

Task 5

Burning some stuff...enough said. Everyone loves making a fire.

The Muesli Gauntlet

As a thank you for our efforts Alex gave us all a lovely box of muesli as a thank you and we trotted off down the canal on the way home....some of us more quickly than others. I don't think I have seen anyone run faster than Paul and Stevie with a 1k box of muesli in their hands.

Heres a Mission Report from Pritesh

It was probably the nicest evening in camden this year, and myself, Alex and Danica had decided to go loooooong with a mission in Kilburn! It was probably more of an evening to be relaxing in the sun and we saw plenty of Londoners taking advantage as we made our way from Somers Town, up and over Primrose Hill (that was a killer) and continued the long run up to Kilburn. We kept a strong pace up and had no map mishaps so made our way safely to the Kingsgate estate.

There we met Diana who was already out enjoying her evening with some gardening. She showed us what needed to be done - a pretty hefty clearing job on the space outside her home. This had become overgrown and unloved and needed clearing so that she can restore it to it's former glory. Diana had already made a start so there was greenery that needed to be bagged up to be taken away as well as the clearing. Danica and I got on with chopping down and bagging up the green waste whilst Alex got properly stuck in dragging up brambles and ivy and all manner of other marauding shrubbery! We soon realised we were going to run out of time so Alex joined in with the bagging and we soon had everything cleared up.

It's a shame on these tasks that we don't have more time but we get the benefits of a hard run as well as the hard task. Diana will certainly need more help and GG Camden will be up to the task...we also can't say no to her refreshments (lovely apple juice today)!

This was my 100th GoodGym good deed and it couldnt've been a more lovely evening highlighting all the best of why GoodGym has such an impact on us the runners as well as those that we help...here's to the next 100 - cheers :)