What a lovely evening for a run! We had lots of lovely new people along to join in with our three task bonanza. They were IN LUCK as the most important thing in the GG Lambeth calender has come around once again: The Great British Bake Off Sweetstake!

Beth had all the names and descriptions ready to go and fearless Lambeth runners drew the names of their star bakers. As if you needed an excuse to join us on a run - now you can with added cake right up until Christmas. It really is the most wonderful time of the year!

Onto the tasks!

From Beth: A group of 5 of us took a short jog to Loughborough junction farm to meet Walter who had an orchard of trees that needed watering. Once supplied with watering cans, a couple of wheelbarrows and rather nifty H2Go bags we were given directions of where we were to fill up said watering vessels and headed through Wyck gardens. Where we had been directed to appeared to just be a regular street so we were a bit confused, it turned out our water source was just a very kind man called Andy who had a hose running through his flat and out of the front door. Once the hose was appropriately positioned so that any leaks ended up watering his flowerbed we were laughing and chatted away while we watched the bags fill up. We covered various topics including the best baths to visit when in Budapest (there’s the popular one in the park that everyone goes to but there’s also a new rooftop one) and thanks to Andy having to call his dog Marley back every so often were reminded of this gem. Once all the trees had had a much needed drink we took our equipment back to the farm, got a grateful hug from Walter and made our way back to Papa’s.

From Jim and Tom: The largest group headed down to old fave Kennington Park, where the very organised Marietta and Rita set us about the usual jobs. There was litter picking, removing the pesky bindweed and trimming the hedges in the lovely rose garden. Kudos must go to the 'advanced level' rose trimmers who certainly know their petal from their lead and also to Andrew G who dug up a tree by following instructions very well!

From Katie: 15 of us headed to a new task, helping out at an adventure playground. They want to develop an area of the playground that's a bit overgrown and the first thing was turning some compost that had been there for a while. It turns out that some bees had set up home in one particular part of the compost and so we turned them over by accident. Luckily they were friendly bees who were happy to see us and didn't sting us at all. The compost was quite stinky but everyone did a great job! Freyja and Elise got to measuring up specific bits of the park that will be renovated. We did some nice planks and then ran home.

TOP EVENING LAMBETH

It was another lovely summer's evening and we welcomed Saul, trainer for soon to be opening Huddersfield, along for his first ever GoodGym run! As the last Tuesday in July, it was time to award our Shit Prize of the Month to another deserving winner. This month it went to Mark, who bagged himself a 10km PB in the stonking heat at the British 10km and for making such a great contribution at the Shindig earlier in the month. WELL DONE MARK!

JKB led one group across to Myatt's Field, where they set about unwinding some pesky bindweed around the nature garden. Once a satisfying pile of the pesky weed was accumulated, they did some paired running around the circular park path. Once you meet each other, you high five, turn around and run back the way you came. If you're both keeping a steady pace, both runners should arrive back at the same time.

Katie led the second group up to the lovely Ruskin Community garden. Justin was very delighted that we were all there and we set about clearing two beds from weeds and turning the soil as well as spreading some compost on another bed. We also learned the difference between a mattock and a hoe - which was very exciting. After that we did a pyramid hill session before heading back to base.

When all the runners were back from doing so much good, we celebrated GoodGym's 100,000th good deed with a banner and some photos. Well done Lambeth - you have made such a big contribution to this number and long may it continue!

Well on June 30th 2018 many things were happening it was National Paddy Day of Nepal, Edmonton Royals beat Toronto Nationals by 8 wickets in the 20Twenty and the Nation sat down to watch Nick Knowles hosts the quiz for people who can't resist a list in another cracking episode of Who Dares Wins. Meanwhile in leafy Hampstead Heath Park dog walkers, parents and local residents were making reports of strange behaviour, incidents included lots of cheering, signs of red thunder, folks running with eggs on spoons and a sea of flags. Not only was the behaviour incredibly positive they were also plying spectators with these delicious homemade cakes, what these folks were witnessing was Olympic fever GoodGym style. So as reported, June 30th 2018 was the 2nd ever GoodGym Olympics. The day brought together 24 different GoodGym area, ranging from Lambeth, the South West to Colchester. The events on offer were a range of events varied from the egg and spoon, 400m to the elimination race. The events were varied but the competition was not and every race brought a bigger and bigger sea of cheers, particular highlights for me was the epic finish of the elimination mile between George Bright and Richard Dowling, Folks flipping pancakes, listening to our two wonderful commentators, the GoodGym relay madness, and human tunnel finish that welcomed the final 5,000m runners brought a tear to my eye that did. Not only were the runners being judged but we also had a torch parade before to show off each boroughs creative sides and although it was a fierce competition. All in all there were 18 different events which each borough their own brilliant moments. This year to even the field I placed the areas in two different leagues due to levels of runners from each area. So up for grabs was the Hunter-Sidhu Shield and the Kerry-Barnard Cup named after our two fantastic commentators, John Hunter and James Kerry-Barnard.

I could write about this for hours however I think picture would do a far better so I will leave some of Tom Hunters and Sarah Rajabalee fanatic shots up and will post a link to more when they come available.

These events don’t work without a band of helpers and I have to say a massive thanks to all the all members of taskforce and GoodGym who have gave up their time to volunteer, help time and marshal on the day and general mean that I didn’t have to do too much, it was amazing there are just too many of you to write down but again thank you it was really a truly lovely and special day, thank you all and here’s to next year. If you have any feedback please let me know on tomb@goodgym.org. I will be putting together a committee of people to help out and organise next years, if you would like to be considered please drop me a email too.

Nice one, Tom

Race Results please click here on the link below. Please note we did not record heat times and some events do not have times or positions as these got put away during the tidy up. Please accept my apologies if this affects you.

Here are the rest of the results we https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1WR3tnGIEXq6ylA-JhZEduRuGKiW5SgD4alhfHJqJFWY/edit#gid=0

Here were the final results

Kerry-Barnard Cup

AREA	PLACE
Lambeth	1st
Wandsworth	2nd
Camden	3rd
Hackney	4th
Lewisham	5th
Islington	6th

Hunter-Sidhu Shield

AREA	PLACE
Greenwich	1st
Brighton	2nd
Hammersmith and Fulham	3rd
Colchester	4th
Southwark	5th
Barnet	6th
Hounslow	7th
Tower Hamlets	8th
Haringey	9th
Croydon	10th
Bristol	11th
Brent	12th
Newham	13th
King's College London	14th
Redbridge	15th
Westminster	16th
Waltham Forest	17th
Ealing	18th

Torch winners: Big shout out to team Islington for their Stella effort combining biscuits with a fantastic touch. Highly commended goes to Tower Hamlets, Bath and Brent. Well done everyone.

Another lovely sunny June evening and - as the last Tuesday of the month - the evening kicked off with the Shit Prize of the Month (SPOTM) award. This month Lavinia was awarded the coveted prize, which this month consisted of a Sky reusable mug with the phrase "Plastic is not fantastic." Not only does Lavinia now possess a truly unique and remarkable mug that will be the envy of all her friends, she can also save 50p when ordering a hot beverage from many popular coffee outlets across the length of Britain. CONGRATS!

The whole group headed 1.5km to Myatt's Field park. We met Helen, who is the park manager. She had lots of jobs for us and we started off with a nice history lesson. It turns out this lovely Victorian park was designed by Fanny Wilkinson - yes that's right, THE Fanny Wilkinson, one of the first professional women landscape gardeners and an active campaigner for women’s suffrage - you know the one. Hooray.

How great that a Victorian lady designed this park! Said everyone.

Helen was very organised and had A LIST, which we all deeply approved of. She split the group into 4. Group 1 went to disentangle some very tangly bindweed from some lovely lavender plants.

This is the best smelling task I have ever done! Said Tess, as she stood amidst the lavender.

Group 2 had lots of mops and buckets and wipey things and they cleaned a beautiful Victorian glass house from top to bottom. Group 3 pruned some roses that were quite dead and didn't have any leaves left on them and did some weeding.

I think you mean PETALS! Said Lucy.

Yes we did mean petals - and for all your other gardening needs, just ask Lucy. Group 4 took to the park armed with litter pickers and bags and did a huge clean up. Sadly in the summer months many people choose to enjoy the free space of the park but leave it in a right old mess after. Great work to the team for sorting it out but really, come on people, tidy up after yourselves!

After this we all took part in the GoodGym Olympics 1km challenge. JKB designed a pattern within the park and the rest did a speedy lap around the outside. There was some really good running and impressive times. Well done everyone. And with that it was back to Papa's for stretches then home.

This evening started with a merry celebration of Katie's 300th good deed and two year anniversary of being Lambeth trainer. Woo! Victoria and Tom dressed all in black and hid in the basketball court expertly decorating gingerbread people into GG runners with sparkly trainers. What more could I want? Thanks gang!

We had three lovely run options:

Group 1 went with Katie down Brixton Road to Kennington Park. The park is being judged on it's Green Flag status on Friday so we helped to tidy it up. One group got busy removing bind weed, another gave the hedges a close shave, some people went on a litter pick and more still did some excellent cleaning of signs all over the park. We did a top job and fingers crossed the park keeps its status as a nice place to be.

Groups 2 and 3 went to GP surgeries to support the GP Food Coop. This great group puts plants and veg in surgeries and hospitals in Lambeth for a nicer environment and also for patients and staff to get involved with.

Group 2 went with Issy up to Streatham. They covered 7.5km and transferred a big bag of soil out pf the surgery, past the security guard and into the garden! They were rewarded with delicious strawberries from task leader Elizabeth's allotment. Yum!

Group 3 went with Tom Hunter to West Norwood...maybe even just Norwood. It was far! 7 runners ran 10km to Crown Dale Surgery in Upper Norwood. Where we were met by Brenda (and Brenda’s excellent doggo Riley). She explained to us all the benefits of the GP Food Co-Op Scheme, in providing community spaces for people to learn about growing some tasty fresh fruit and veg.

We quickly shovelled some soil into the last empty plantar. Then made room for an intriguing sounding vine growing space along the side of the building.

After finally convincing Riley the dog to sit still long enough to be featured in our group photo, we were on our way home. Lovely Summer’s evening for it.

She was so happy! Said Tom Hunter

And with that it was back to base with everyone, some walking lunges, single leg deadlifts and stretches. Then home! Thanks for being great as always - here's to the next 300 runs!