After two weeks off, we were back with a bang! Quite literally as 25 runners showed up for GG Southwark's first group run of 2024. With last year's average being 12 runners, it was amazing to see such high numbers and 4 newbies! A warm welcome to David, Jenny, Josie and Roberta. We also had new GoodGymers to this area including Laura and Lucy.

Gathering in the intimate space that is Old Spike Roastery, everyone listened in on Sam as he delivered his typical GG speech including his ice-breaker question which was all about the darts due to the World Darts Championship final. After introducing themselves, each runner had to answer:

Underrated or Overrated: Darts as a sport?

It was a close-call, but underrated won the snap poll.

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Live and let live

With the rain starting to chuck it down, we skipped the warm-up in the alleyway as Sam led from the front and Maria backmarked to ensure no one got lost or left behind. During the 2.5k run over to Telegraph Hill, we met up with Mikhail who ran from home to the task and at the task, Jessie found us.

Having reached what felt like the top of Everest... we split the group into teams of five with a taskforce member as their team leader. We had Team Daryl, Team Emma, Team Katy, Team Maria and Team Mikhail. With a healthy competitive competition going on with the five teams heading out in different directions as they had 30 minutes to find as many Christmas trees to bring back to the drop-off point and covering as many kilometres and metres as possible.

After 30 minutes, the results stood as such (trees x kilometres covered = final weighted points):

• In 5th place, Team Mikhail collected 2 x 🎄 and covered 2.2km 🏃‍ = 4.4 points
• In 4th place, Team Maria collected 3 x 🎄 and covered 2.71km 🏃‍♀️ = 8.13 points
• In 3rd place, Team Katy collected 2 x 🎄 and covered 4.1km 🏃‍♀️ = 8.2 points
• In 2nd place, Team Daryl collected 3 x 🎄 and covered 3.63km 🏃‍♂️ = 10.69 points
• In 1st place, Team Emma collected 4 x 🎄 and covered 3.12km 🏃‍♀️ = 12.48 points

This meant Team Emma won and collected a Quality Street and Winegum boxes for her team, which she kindly shared with everyone! It's still the Christmas spirit!

After our group photo, we said our goodbyes to Mikhail who ran home from Telegraph Hill whilst the rest of us ran back 2.5k to Old Spike via the front of Nunhead Cemetery. We finished off with a much needed stretch before heading over to Angel Oak for our January social and to watch the World Darts Championship final. 180!

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Thank You to all the GG-ers

A personal thanks from me to all those who came out last night! Firstly, welcome to all the newbies and thank you to everyone who came out last night in the pouring rain. I appreciate the commitment and I am sure the Lewisham Council and neighbours of Telegraph Hill thank you too! The competitive fun task was done in an efficient manner, so thank you to my taskforce members for getting your teams coordinated and top marks on your time management too! Finally, thank you to Maria for backmarking the run. See you all soon!