21 of Greenwich's finest ran 8km on a blustery Wednesday evening to tackle the garden at the Scouts!

I knew yesterday was going to be good. Why? Because Mridula was back from holiday YAY! Apparently she hates running but I don't believe it for one second.

We were 21 strong last night which is great especially considering it was a lot further than normal! We welcomed one new runner, the lovely Emma, GIVE HER A CHEER! Also Jo made a return after she injured her knee a few weeks ago, great to hear you're on the mend Jo!

We celebrated some wonderful marathon news from Vickie, Ben P and Brin and we shall hopefully have more to celebrate next week after our 10K on Friday! Fingers crossed!

TWIN EGG

I was feeling festive (yes Clare you can definitely be festive at Easter!) so favourite thing this week was Easter related and therefore favourite egg...! We had some lovely answers, dippy eggs, lots of posh avo and smoked salmon eggs, poached was a firm favourite, twin embryo egg... you know, the usual types.

We dropped our stuff and did a quick warm up which featured a light jog, some nice partner leg swings to increase hip mobility followed by some other bits and bobs to get the whole body nice and warm. 5 mins later and we were good to go.

We took a group photo along the river with some nice tall ships in the background and then set off for our 4km run + hill! We split into two groups led by the two Bens so everyone could go at their own pace. Everyone knew there was a hill coming, but didn't know quite how steep or how long it would be. Even I wasn't sure which one to pick... short and steep or a long slow climb? But in the end, to me it seemed both long and steep. URRGH. That being said, hills are GREAT for training. Why? Because it helps build muscle and power, it helps with your running form and it also increases your VO2 max. So hills make you a faster, stronger runner in the long run if you keep doing them so I do it because I love you! Plus it makes running on the flat feel way easier and it's downhill on the way back :)

We had a little rest at the top of the hill, Simon even went back down for round two without any pestering whatsoever, nice one Si! Matt and Vickie also went for another hill rep after a little convincing... and a resounding "I'm good" from everyone else. To be fair to them, a long run was coming...!

After we'd all got our breath back, we ran through the park and down some roads towards Charlton. The first group went off to find the scouts which is tucked away in a little alleyway. They got started with the task and then a few minutes later, the rest of the gang arrived.

This place is great because there is always so much to do. Almost too much! Last night the main things on the agenda were giving the shed a hair cut, clearing the back of the building, pruning a big tree out front and weeding the fence along the side. Everyone grabbed a tool. Nina was pretty excited about using the axe and partnered with Brin for some tree surgery. Ben P had the fun grim reaper tool but I could see it in his eyes that he couldn't fully enjoy it because he was worried his new shoes were going to get dirty :( "I only wanted to wear them so I could show off to James." It's ok Ben.

20 minutes down and things were looking GREAT. Simona was weeding with a saw and was doing a fantastic job! The tree was being stubborn but Nina & Brin managed to get the last two big branches off in the nick of time. Must've been all that pressure from everyone watching! In the last few minutes, everyone mucked in to drag the bits of tree away. We took another group photo in front of our handy work and off we popped!

Sprintervals!

Since we were a little tight on time, we did the fitness session as part of the run back. We grouped into similar paces and did little fast bursts from landmark to landmark all the way back to the uni. This is another great way to mix up your training if you are stuck in a rut just doing easy mid-paced miles all the time. I saw some lovely speedy sprints going on which was WONDERFUL!

A nice speedy downhill section to finish off and we arrived back for a few stretches. 5 miles DONE! Amazing.

We grabbed our stuff, had some mini eggs and went to the pub for a well earned bev and some (insanely overpriced) food, although Helen's bangers and mash did look amazing.

Down the twins' side of the table, we found out that everyone was pretty good at social media stalking. When you're looking at a photo from Malaga 2008 of your friend's girlfriend's brother's cousin and you've not already accidentally double tapped on anything, you know you've done well. Christian was unfortunate enough to be scrolling through his ex-girlfriends Instagram and double tapped to zoom in on a pic of her new boyfriend to see how ugly he was and obviously liked the pic instead. CRINGE!

Thanks for such a nice evening everyone! We truly have something special in Greenwich, you guys are the best :) Massive well done on the task and the run, you got loads done in such a short space of time so really great work! See you next week for a slightly shorter run :)