Wednesday 20th November 2019
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Report written by Aron Fulton
The promise of staying around for a drink after tonight's session obviously convinced enough people to run with us this week and we had a bumper turnout. 32 runners were part of our amazing crew, including Leah and Suzie who both joined us for the first time. Go and give them a cheer!
This week's task was in aid of 'The Lost Plot', who use gardening at their allotment to offer an alternative to traditional talking therapies for people in sustainable recovery. We were tasked with collecting as many leaves as possible which the group could then use to turn into leaf mulch. There was no task-owner on site with us, which meant trainer Aron went wild with the power.
The whole group was split into 5 teams with their tasks as follows:
There was also the promise of a fabulous secret prize for the winning team, which really got everyone's head's in the game. After a quick warm-up demonstrating some potentially inefficient leaf collecting techniques, we were off.
The allotment is in Hyde Park/Woodhouse moor, which roughly 100m away from our start location, so we took a slightly scenic route to the allotment to make sure we were all thoroughly warmed up for our task. We pointed out where the leaves needed to be left and headed down to the edge of the park where there were loads of leaves and a bit more light.
Armed only with gardening gloves and some bags, the teams were free to collect leaves wherever they wanted, and on Aron's shout, each group raced off to claim their own patch. With the 30 minutes of frantic leaf counting underway, it looked like the breakneck pace might prove unsustainable.
"It's like the crystal maze!" Goodgymer whose name was lost in the melee.
Bags were being filled quicker than we could count them, and they were stuffed full to the brim. After realising we definitely weren't going to have enough bags to last us the full 30 minutes, the decision was taken to start running the bags up the hill before emptying them into one gigantic pile, and then refilling them.
After the initial buzz started to fade, thoughts turned to the other tasks the groups had been set. Here's what they all came up with:
Exercise - frog squat/leaf collecting
Photo - team frog squat with added leaf throwing
Exercise - erratically falling leaves with wide stance fast feet
Photo - Team tree, with a two person trunk, and everyone else as leaves.
Exercise - Tree pose
Photo - group tree hug
Exercise - choreagraphed workout (The Monster Mulch) with 3 exercises set to the music of Journey
Photo - Boomerang of leaf throwing with added musical accompaniment
Exercise - Curtsy squats (another gloriously inefficient leaf collecting technique)
Photo - leaf throwing action shot
By now, a huge pile of leaves was forming and with 5 minutes to go, teams started collecting closer to the allotment gate, with everyone congregating around the two trees that were closest. As the final countdown commenced, everyone raced into the finish line to make sure their leaves counted. The final pile was enormous, and even though Team 1 tried to keep their own pile separate, eventually common sense prevailed and all the leaves were piled in together.
We got a quick snap of the whole group before heading down to the corner of the park where the teams demonstrated their exercises. There was wonderful mix of strength, endurance and even flexibility, and so obviously this had to be a group workout. We started with the Monster Mulch's high energy, before running through each of the exercises and finishing with the relative calm of the tree pose. All of the exercises were 'creative' and left people surprisingly tired. Awesome work everyone.
We jogged back to our start location for a stretch and the big reveal of our winners! Despite picking a team name that was shared by another team, the judges were impressed by their commitment to a theme, and with everything either about or set to the music of Journey's Don't Stop Believing, there could only be one winner. Team 4, Don't stop beleafing took home the Curly the Caterpillar cake, and more importantly the glory!
We all then moved inside to the warm of the pub for a drink and a chat to fully debrief the day's evening's events, and the winning team even shared their spoils! What a team.
Thu 21st Nov 2019 at 9:10am
Team two were The Unbeleafables - it's not a pun otherwise! ;)
Leeds
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