28 runners ran 5km to clear the garden at the Charlton United Reformed Church!

Well yesterday was the hottest day of the year so far and it was also the longest! Double whammy! And what a beautiful (read:sweaty) evening it was. I think between us we must have sweated enough to fill Charlton lido! Well I certainly did anyway. So big well done for coming out and running in those sticky conditions, you did GREAT!

It was also a special day because our very own Ben Cooper (aka Mr Greenwich) turned 50 last week (50 good deeds of course - you don't look a day over 25 Ben) so it was the perfect excuse to have a social after our run! And probably was the only thing keeping some people going by the end!

New recruits!

We were joined by 3 new runners yesterday... Vickie's friend Sarah, Brin's girlfriend Kerry and Scott who has run with GG Bromley before! WELCOME ALL!!!!

We did a little warm up in our usual spot, not that it took much to get everyone warm..! The two Bens led a faster group to the church while the rest of us attempted to take it easy! We went through the park, up a pretty awful hill (sorry) but everyone did it WITHOUT STOPPING which was AMAZING!!!! A little rest at the top, and a sweaty photo by the nice tree then we pushed on.

On arrival at the church, we met Andrew who took us through to get some water and some fake squash to Vickie's disappointment. It was definitely hotter inside than out so we got out of there pretty swiftly and cracked on! Group 1 had already got stuck in, hacking away at the garden and filling bin bags with weeds. There were plenty of tools to go around so we handed them out and got to work on the other side of the church!

We had a bit less time than I anticipated due to all my faffing and photos so the decision was made to skip the fitness session and stay a bit longer at the task. After 25 minutes, the place was looking AMAZING! Mission "sign Ben's card" was well under way and seemed to be more difficult than the task itself! Especially when Steve takes up 50% of the card with his sentiments!

A big group photo in front of the church and then we were ready to head back. We ran home as one big group which was lovely :) a nice little stretch on the grass and then that was it!

PUB TIME!!!

Alex had kindly booked some tables at the Old Brewery and I had totally forgotten about their outside space and it was LOVELY! Andy was spotted taste testing one of Mridula's INCREDIBLE cupcakes! At the run a few weeks ago, I asked everyone's favourite cake so she could make Ben's favourite... and of course he went for BLACK FOREST GATEAU. I remember seeing Mridula's eyes roll back so far into her head that day, but what an amazing job she did, they were DE-LISH!

The twins had kindly prepped a quiz for Mr Greenwich about all things Greenwich and I think it's safe to say that everyone was blown away by Ben's Greenwich knowledge! Lots of food and drinks later and we headed home. What a lovely evening!

Thanks so much for coming everyone! Hope you had a nice time and well done for coping so well in that heat! For those of you who are new or who haven't yet, please join our GoodGym Greenwich FB group! See you next week where we are helping out again at Neil's school!