Sunday morning began early, grey and wet, as 8 GoodGymers made their way, on foot and by bike, to Otterspool Prom.

We had been asked to help out again at one of Liverpool's most popular running events, the BTR Half Marathon and 10 Mile race. Our job was to help set up and give out water at the Mile 9 water station, and help marshall the runners onto the prom. Of course, we were also there to cheer on all the runners with our famous GoodGym energy and winning smiles!

This event is always a great opportunity to promote GoodGym, and we all wore our T-shirts with pride!

We arrived at 08.30 for set up as the race was to start at 09.00. First finishers were expected around 9.30 (10 mile runners) with the bulk of the runners coming through by 11.00 and the final half-marathoners by 11. 30 ish.

We would then have about an hour to put away the tables, clean up any litter and collect in all of the discarded water bottles!

As always, the GG team worked non-stop: carrying packs of water, filling each of the 5 tables with over 200 bottles, bagging rubbish and dealing with members of the public who were trying to drive through the race area.

As the first runners came through, everyone cheered and waited for them to take a water bottle from one of the tables... all very calm and quite relaxed... that didn't last 😁

Gradually, the numbers coming through increased until we had a constant throng of runners for about an hour... at one point, we could barely keep up with the demand... but no runner was left without access to water 👍

The smiles on the faces of the runners as we cheered them on, and the genuine gratitude and thanks as we kept the tables filled with water, made all the hard work worth it.

Everyone encouraged the runners, but for my money, Siân and Dan take the award for the top cheerleaders... making sure every runner was encouraged and using the runners' name when handing them their water bottle 🌟🌟

After 3 hours, the last of the 12,000+ runners passed through our station...amazing!

We had a brief moment to enjoy the feeling of a job well done... then the clean up began!

Unfortunately, this is the part of the task that is not enjoyable. Thousands of single use plastic bottles... and their lids... are discarded along the route, littering miles of Liverpool's streets, parks and riverfront... a problem that is repeated at many running events in many cities across the world... and an issue that definitely goes against the grain for any GoodGymer. Quite an ethical dilemma for us all.

BTR organisers are obviously aware of this environmental issue and are working towards viable solutions:

**'In recent years we have all become more aware of the high volume of natural resources that go to waste in our daily lives and in many respects the same can be said of waste within race events.

One of the first items to come under BTR scrutiny was single use plastic and in the three years since BTR stopped using plastic Goody Bags at events we have reduced use by around 60,000 bags that would have otherwise have been used.' Alan Rothwell BTR Liverpool Ltd

Other actions that have been/are being introduced by BTR include: 🔸️using paper to protect medals, instead of plastic bags 🔸️providing smaller bottles of water 🔸️at some events, paper cups are used alongside bottles 🔸️at the Wirral Half Marathon, blocking drainage gaps in the sea wall, to prevent polluting the water ways.

We can only hope that these sustainability measures, and more, are adopted at every running event, as soon as possible. BTR seem to be heading in the right direction, and we wish them every success in this regard.

It would be a great shame if BTR and, by association, the many community groups, including GG, who volunteer at their events, were to attract negative press for this single use plastic problem... as this is such a positive, community-based event.

As always, we would like to end on a positive note, and thank our 'extra' helpers today, so: A huge shout-out to Dan's sister and nephew, who came to support Dan and ended up helping out! Well done Esther and Alexander... our star water station volunteer 🌟 Also, Myles who rode into Liverpool with me to make sure I arrived safely, and then helped to carry water bottles to the tables. 😁👍

It was an early start for a group of GoodGymmers this fine Sunday morning as we came together to set up the Otterspool prom water station for the Liverpool half marathon. Three GoodGym members were taking part, Vikky, Roz and Emma, while Sallyann was running the Bath half marathon the same day. We were looking forward to cheering on our friends along with the rest of the runners, and got going setting up our tables either side of the route. As we prepared by unpacking crates of water bottles from a shipping container, opening the bottles and screwing the tops back on so they were ready to hand out, there was a growing sense of anticipation as we waited to see the first runners pass by. Not many of the leading runners wanted water, leading to the teams on each side of the path competing to hand out water to those who did and jokingly boasting about our bottle tallies. This was soon forgotten as we began to get steadily busier and were very quickly deluged with runners as the main body of the race passed by. Even though our stock of prepared bottles filled three trestle tables, it vanished very quickly and everyone was working flat out either unpacking bottles or handing them out. We were so overwhelmed that eventually we had to give up unscrewing them, something that has never happened before in our time running the water station for this race - there were 9 thousand runners this year, an increase of about 2 thousand on previous years, and it really made a difference! Despite how intense it was we kept up a cheer for all the athletes as they passed, and when we spotted Roz, Emma and Vikky we made sure to shout extra loudly for them. As the race drew to a close we turned our attention to our next big task - collecting up all the bottles the runners had thrown behind them. Charmaine, who happened to be passing by on a walk, got stuck in to help which was amazing, and even signed up as a GoodGym member later that day - a big thank you, Charmaine! With the extra help we powered through the clean-up and collected a staggering 52 rubbish sacks full of plastic bottles. We were all quite sobered to see the scale of plastic waste and are really hoping to see a more sustainable solution for next year's run. As for this year though, it was hard work but good fun and made enjoyable by the camaraderie and conversation of the GoodGym team - huge thanks and kudos to everyone!

This Sunday saw the return of the BTR Liverpool Santa Dash, the biggest and longest established Santa Run in the UK. Fun fact - in 2005 it achieved Guinness World Record status for the Biggest Santa Gathering!

This year Goodgym were once again enlisted to help with the 1k mini dash for under 12’s. After stopping by the official finish line for a few mins to clap some of the 5k runners over the line and admire the beautiful winter scene being created by the snow machine, we headed over to the mini dash start to help usher the children (and their parents/guardians who were showing a whole range of enthusiasm levels…) to the correct place. The big crowd of mini Santas was a great sight!

With the sea of mini dashers on their way, we legged it over to the finish to use our ushering skills once again to make sure all the children got to the right place to collect their thoroughly deserved medal and chocolate. Here we were joined by Pauline, although it took us far too long to realise it was her behind the awesome blue wig and Santa beard! Well done to Pauline and family for completing the 5K dash and to everyone for clocking up a festive Sunday morning good deed!

Whilst most of the city were still asleep Heetu and Sallyann set off across the Mersey to the beautiful village of Port Sunlight to help out with the BTR Port Sunlight run events. Three runs - a 5k, a 10k and a childrens 1k.

We were partnered up with three Running Bugs and a Kirkby Miler to make a fantastic team. Together we set up the finishing area with all the finishing goodies, put together the children's goody bags and handed out water, bananas, cliff bars, hydration packs, foot lotion and Chai Latte sachets to the very hot grown up runners and the goody bags to the (very speedy) children.

It is sometimes easy to take part in the runs and not take into consideration the hard work that goes into the events - it felt a privilege to give back to an event and help out Thanks to BTR for the opportunity and The Running Bugs and Kirkby Milers for great team work and company

On a lovely crisp, bright and slowly warming, early Sunday morning a fabulous five GoodGymers got together at the 9 mile point of the BTR Liverpool Half Marathon to set up a water station. Experience of previous water station tasks meant the team came equipped with rubber gloves (makes a HUGE difference when opening hundreds of screw top bottles, guarding against the usual blisters!), litter pickers for the post run clean up, the GoodGym flag to fly, and some warmed up voices ready to cheer and cheer and cheer!!

We were in the middle of Otterspool so surrounded by trees and just by the gorgeous Mersey River, a beautiful place to spend a spring Sunday morning.

Setting up a table either side of the route, filled with opened water bottles ready for the first runners and then the crowds, we handed out bottles as people hurtled past us, catching their names on their bibs and shouting well done, you're doing great, you got this, and other phrases of encouragement for what felt like a thousand times. All while swiftly opening more and more bottles ready to hand out, working at speed to keep up with the crowds. But the real work began when it was time to clear up the sea of discarded water bottles stretching from the tables and all the way down the prom.

We worked hard emptying out the remaining water in each bottle (watering all the plants as we went) and filling a whopping 36 bin bags! With offerers of help from a couple of young kids and a group of older women on their way for Sunday lunch and lots of thank you's from passers by.

To be fair it took us a good while to clear the entire stretch but the sheer satisfaction of looking back and seeing it all clean, and fresh with no trace of 2000 runners that had just raced, jogged and plodded through was worth every minute.

A huge well done to all who took part in the half and 10 miler including GoodGym friend Jak and new member RJ!!

Once upon a time, on a cold December morning, an elf, a Santa ( who dressed on the bus) and a colourful personality met up at the port of Liverpool building thinking to themselves what the hell are we doing?!?

Santa met her friendly elf from the bus in Queens Square before skipping ( mostly because she was still trying to fix her pants) through town towards the waterfront.

Once the other Santa's started to arrive Ema, Pauline and myself were put to work directing the reds and blues to the start line ready for the Santa dash!

As the Santa's started to run through the start line, Pauline, Jess and myself joined in and completed the dash while Ema, Jo and Roz got ready.

Post dash (to which I finished first out of the group... yes its never going to happen again so I get to brag for once!), the magical six joined together like Santa's reindeers to help hand medals and selection boxes to the mini Santa's with the help of the cadets.

The scene was magical, there was snow( well bubbles), a live drumming band, Christmas music playing, characters on stilts, Santa's everywhere and lots of smiles from young and old.

Another great day, a great cause, bling for the dashers and as always great company. Lots of smiles, lots of dancing and lots of laughs. It's official. Christmas has come to Liverpool!