Another scorcher of an evening and the start of a new series of Bake Off didn't stop 26 runners at GoodGym H&F from turning out to run, sweat (lots!) and do good for their community tonight!

It was wonderful to welcome along Sophie and Ella for their first GoodGym H&F run - thank you for coming along, it was lovely to have you both involved tonight, hope you enjoyed it!

Sweat it be!

We slightly reluctantly left the nicely air conditioned Better Gym reception area and immediately were hit by the oven-esk 30 degree heat outside, this was going to be a warm and sweaty run! With sweat droplets already beginning to form we gathered outside for some special announcements and the weekly news round-up.

Today was extra special for two reasons:

1. Today was Eloise and Matt's last group run before their wedding (not weeding as autocorrect seems to think!) 👰🤵
2. It was Sarah's birthday! 🥳

Obviously both had to be celebrated in true H&F style; Eloise was presented with a veil, rosette and runners numbers 310819 (the date of the big day) for both herself and Matt #dogoodgetwed and Sarah a birthday rosette!

A reminder of this week's news:

• Next Tuesday it's our 3rd birthday! There will be cake and lots of post-run celebrations, please come along.
• Thursday 5th September is the next GoodGym social in Central London, all details are here.
• GoodGym is turning 10! There's a big party at City Hall on Thursday 12th September, please register here if you'd like to come along! There will also be a BIG day of missions on Saturday 21st September - more details coming soon.

Tonight's task was flyering for the wonderful charity Family Friends that offers parent befriending and child mentoring services in the three London Boroughs of H&F, Kensington and Brent. Next month they have some volunteer training planned so our aim tonight was to spread the word about Family Friends before next month's training all around Hammersmith tonight.

With everyone already feeling rather warm we completed a short warm-up and stretch before we split off into two groups and headed in opposite directions so we could cover as many shops, newsagents and supermarkets as possible in 45 minutes.

Catriona kindly led half the group along King Street and up Goldhawk Road while I led the other half of the group up Shepherd's Bush Road and along Goldhawk Road, with both groups splitting in two up the roads so as to cover the entire street!

In the pair tonight

Amazingly we all reconvened as planned at Ravenscourt Park bang on 8pm with all runners accounted for! With the weather not being sprint friendly the group were treated to some fun partner games and exercises. We started off with rock, paper, scissors in the press-up/plank position, after five rounds we tallied up the totals...no one won all five rounds but Mo did manage four! Next up were some high tens sit-ups, followed by some lean out squats back-to-back and some controlled holding squats.

A new back and field event!

The best was saved for last, BACKWARDS JUMPING!! An event we're sure will be included in next year's GoodGym Olympics after it's debut at Bristol last week, so we thought we'd get some secret practice in (hence why the video below is dark and blurred...)

With time ticking and the light quickly fading we called it a night and headed back to base where we had our cool down and stretch off. We also had our sweet-based treats handed over to us by Graham as a big thank you, and an array of cake and biscuit-based goodies to continue the celebrations and ensure we replenished our energy before we headed home.

Thank you for a fab evening all, great work getting so many leaflets distributed despite the heat. Next week we'll be celebrating our 3rd birthday and lending a hand at Springvale Tenants Residents Hall, please sign up here. Have a great rest of your week and weekend!

Despite the pouring rain and prospect of another wet and cold run, last night a brilliant 7 other GoodGym'ers avoided the temptation to stay dry and in the warm and joined me for our final group run of 2018! Amongst my lovely regulars it was great to welcome along James for his second H&F group run - hope you enjoyed it!

That old chestnut...the news!

1. Tonight was the last group run of 2018! So NO Christmas Day or New Year’s Day GoodGym H&F but remember there are quite a few parkruns happening.
2. There’s still time to get your festive GoodGym badges with Community Missions still occurring over the festive break. Why not aim for the Winter 321 Challenge badge: 3 cheers, 2 community missions and 1 group run?!

In the line of flyer

This week we had a flyering task for 3 wonderful community organisations:

1. Family Friends - a small charity who provide a parent befriending and child mentoring service in West London. They use volunteers to support the service and are currently looking to recruit new mentors and befrienders.
2. Doorstep Library - a charity that recruit and train volunteers to go into some of the most disadvantaged areas in London to help introduce children from ages 1-11 to the pleasure of reading and inspire them with it.
3. Acknowledging Youths - a project that was set up to raise the aspirations and make a positive impact on the life of disadvantaged young people in London. They provide education and training to help prepare the young people for interviews and ensure they are ‘work ready’.

Following a quick warm-up we all headed off up to Shepherd’s Bush Road. Once at Brook Green we split into two with Team One - Sarah, Jonny, Jason and Chris covering one side of the road and Team Two - Sarah, James, Johnny and Beth covering the other side so as to maximise our flyering efficiency.

Both teams headed up Shepherd’s Bush Road and then along Goldhawk Road distributing many of the flyers to local newsagents, laundrettes and pubs as they ran, with the latter proving very tempting for a quick refreshment stop!

Safe you 'elfs for Christmas!

With the pub temptation avoided both teams pushed on and regrouped by Goldhawk tube station. With the rain still coming down and the flyers beginning to get overly damp we decided to call it a night on the flyering front and posed for a group photo under the shelter of an office.

In order to get a good run in, especially since as Sarah noted, I'd begun to get my bearings around the area a far lot better so there were less 'scenic routes' taken, we all headed down towards Furnivall Gardens.

The 12 Days of GoodGymas

Once at Furnivall Gardens the group completed a nice festive themed pyramid fitness session. In true grinch style I added an extra degree of difficulty by asking everyone to complete a short 10m sprint after completing each exercise.

On the 12 days of GoodGym Christmas, my GoodGym Trainer gave to me (carol singing however was not enforced!)...

1. One nutcracker knees
2. Two tricep presses
3. Three snow angels
4. Four Christmas Tree balances
5. Five Boxing Day Presses
6. Six lunge wraps
7. Seven shooting star jumps
8. Eight rocking bridges
9. Nine press on the walls
10. Ten leaping leap frogs
11. Eleven drummer squats
12. Twelve toy soldiers with high knees

Lighten up, it's Christmas!

Everyone put in 100% effort and had significantly raised pulse rates, and redder and sweatier faces after completing the session. Brilliant effort all! All that was left was for us to run the short distance back to base, admiring the wonderful Christmas lights on display at St Paul's CE Primary School en route. Back at base we sheltered under the car park of the Better Gym and had our final stretch off in 2018. Here's to 2019!

Thank you all for a RUN-derful latter part of 2018, thank you for all your hard work and smiley faces week in week out no matter what the weather. Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! See you in 2019! And many thanks for my Buddy the elf approved treat!

The first group run in 2019 will be on Tuesday 8th January!! It will be an INDOOR task sorting donations for St Mungo's Reconnection Post, sign up here.

It was great to be joined by 14 other GoodGym'ers for tonight's Hammersmith & Fulham group run, following a wonderful weekend of racing in York for the final big 6 races of 2018 - have a read about the very inspirational and emotional story of GoodGym York runner, Sean here. It was lovely to welcome Charley and Harriet along to their first H&F group run - great to have you both along, hope you enjoyed it! And for the second week in a row we welcomed back GoodGym tourist Alex.

As it was a very welcome dry and mild autumnal evening, we all headed outside for a quick round-up of this week's news...

Firstly, a huge well done to all those that raced in the very wet and windy conditions at the weekend, Tom & Fiona in the Royal Parks Half, Alex in the Yorkshire 10 Mile and Jason in the Cabbage Patch 10.

1. October Long Run - this month's long run will be this Sunday! (21st October). A 19.3km run along the Capital ring - East Finchley to Hackney Wick and will be led by Simon Fitzmaurice. Sign up here.
2. Fulham 10K (Sunday 18 November) - If you've entered, or are thinking about entering. Sign up here.
3. The big C word......GoodGym London Christmas Party! (1st December). Hosted by GoodGym Southwark, fancy dress, killer tunes, dodgy dancing! Sign up here.
4. GoodGym H&F Christmas Party - either on Monday 10th December or post-run on Tuesday 11th December. Please vote for your preference here. Please vote by next Tuesday's group run!

Chariots of flyer

This week we had a flyering en masse task for 3 wonderful community organisations:

1. Family Friends - a small charity who provide a parent befriending and child mentoring service in West London. They use volunteers to support the service and are currently looking to recruit new mentors and befrienders.
2. Doorstep Library - a charity that recruit and train volunteers to go into some of the most disadvantaged areas in London to help introduce children from ages 1-11 to the pleasure of reading and inspire them with it.
3. Acknowledging Youths - a project that was set up to raise the aspirations and make a positive impact on the life of disadvantaged young people in London. They provide education and training to help prepare the young people for interviews and ensure they are ‘work ready’.

In the line of flyer

Following a quick name and number count the group split in to two teams: 'The Red Devils' (Route 1) no resemblance or link to Man United! - Will, Jason, Catherine, Bex, Charley and Martynas, and the 'Hammersmith Flyers' (Route 2) - Sarah, Johnny, Harriet, Alice, Alex, Joyce and Helena.

Fast flyering

To add a bit of fun and friendly competition to the task I had devised a scavenger hunt for the group to accompany all the flyering! Each team had the same sheet of items to find or actions to complete on their designated route: a red car, a team selfie, a wild animal, a pub named after an animal, something beginning with H or F, three flyering puns (definitely not to cheekily help with my run report punspiration!), a stop sign and a joke ideally running based, tell someone about GoodGym, wave at another runner & the bonus point round....road scrabble, find a road name with the most scrabble points!

I briefed both groups on the shops and areas that they were looking to target and hand out the flyers to, with the key instruction that both teams were to meet at the corner of Askew and Uxbridge Road at 8pm. The flyers were distributed amongst each team and plans for efficient flyering, whilst successfully scavenger hunting were formulated by both teams.

Come flyer with me, let's flyer let's flyer away

Plans formulated, Sarah led the 'Hammersmith Flyers' off on their route up Shepherd's Bush Road and along Goldhawk Road, while I joined 'The Red Devils' on their route down King Street and along Askew Road. Each team quickly ducked in and out of coffee shops, libraries, newsagents distributing the flyers, whilst also on the lookout for lengthy road names and other items from the scavenger hunt list.

No flyers on me

Time 'flyered' by and it didn't seem like half an hour had passed as the clock struck 8pm. Will and Charley from the 'Red Devils' had bumped into the 'Hammersmith Flyers' en route as they either intentionally - possibly on a secret sabotage mission - or unintentionally - accidentally took the scenic route! To my great relief both teams arrived at the meeting point only a few minutes late, and thankfully there were no missing runners lost around Hammersmith! With heaps of flyers distributed around the Hammersmith area and the group as one again it was time to head off on the short 2.5km run back to base. As we made our way we stopped for some bonus squats, lunges, high knees and back flips...otherwise known as heel flicks!! There was also a quick stop for a group photo before everyone began to part their separate ways.

Flyer me to the moon/back home

Back at base we had a quick cool down and stretch, both teams then re-huddled and had a final debrief on their scavenger hunt. With both teams applying the same tactic of noting down multiple road names they saw while running, there was of a lot of referring to the scrabble tile photo and adding up before they brought their attempts and photos over to me for some 'official judging'. There was some brilliant lateral thinking on some of the items, with the 'Hammersmith Flyers' presenting me with a (bus) stop instead of a stop sign. It was very close between both teams with each amazingly finding a road that equated to 32 points!! However, with the full compliment of three puns (all included within this report!) the victory went to the 'Hammersmith Flyers'! Fab flyering and scavenger hunting this week, each charity is very grateful for your help!

Next week, we hopefully have two tasks, a shorter 3-4km run back to Hestia and a longer 7-8km run out to Ray's Playhouse. Sign up here.

Thank you all for another fun night, hope you have a lovely week! Thank you to Johnny of the 'Hammersmith Flyers' for this week's pun! And thank you to Clare who biked home to distributed some flyers around the Fulham area. And thank you to Helena and Bex for the extra photos!

I'll leave you with my favourite jokes from the night....

What do runners do when they forget something? They jog their memory!

What do you call a runner behind a car? Exhaust-Ted!

A very rare sight occurred this week as I arrived at the Hammersmith Fitness & Squash Centre, Jason was not already there ready and waiting - we missed you tonight Jason, hope you're ok and resting your achilles, hopefully see you soon! As the clock hit 6.55pm there was only a handful of runners and I was a touch worried that the combination of the slightly longer run distance, weekend races and injuries had hit my group. However, I shouldn't have feared as minutes later there was the mass entrance of runners, timed to perfection!

It was great to see the familar face of Alex along doing some GoodGym tourism - hope you enjoyed it and hopefully see you again next week!

As it was a lovely mild Autumnal evening we all headed outside for a quick round-up of this week's news...

1. Well done to all those that raced at the weekend and good luck to those running the Royal Parks Half, the 10K/Marathon in York and those doing Cross Country in Claybury this weekend.
2. The run was a #RunAndTalk session, a wonderful campagin from England Athletics that is supported by the mental health charity, Mind. With World Mental Health Day on Wednesday 10th October this week their week long campaign encourages people to #RunAndTalk to improve their mental wellbeing. Have a read of the wonderful blog about mental health and running by Tower Hamlets trainer, Laura here.
3. October Long Run - this month's long run will be on Sunday 21st October. It will be a 19.3km run along the Capital ring - East Finchley to Hackney Wick and will be led by Simon Fitzmaurice. Sign up here.
4. Fulham 10K - Sunday 18 November - If you've entered, or are thinking about entering. Sign up here.

AND...a big well done to Catriona who completed her 50th good deed last night - so much good done!

Following a quick warm-up and name and number count, in honour of Catriona's 50th good deed we played a quick-fire game of 'True' or 'False' with Catriona based questions. Those in the group that chose the incorrect answer had a small forfeit of an exercise, such as 5 x burpees or 5 x press-ups. With Catriona herself unsure of a few of the answers and in general disbelief that she had run over 700km this year (p.s. I double-checked last night and this did only include running!!), the group ended almost in unanimous agreement, minus Andrew on the final question as to whether or not she had stayed out at the social last week until last orders! Great work and knowledge all!

Warm-up and the mini-game complete we headed off on our 4km run up to Family Friends with Catriona taking up the role of back-marker in Jason's absence. Everyone, myself included were sceptical as to whether we would manage to run there without getting lost en-route...

Hot desking

Amazingly we arrived without getting lost and made our way up the office of Family Friends. We were met by Graham, the administrator at Family Friends who explained to the group what Family Friends do - they are wonderful small charity which is solely volunteer run that carefully recruits, trains and matches volunteers with parents, children or adolescents and provide both parent befriending and child/adolescent befriending and mentoring services to families living in deprived areas of West London. Our task tonight was to help remove and dispose of some desks from one room and relocate a couple of filing cabinets and a printer. What sounded like a relatively simple and speedy task quickly became a more complex task once it was apparent that the desks were not going to fit nicely through the door, even with the desk feet removed. After a few attempts and different angles attempted by Alex and Graham to remove the first desk from the room they decided it was time to admit defeat and take a new approach...the forceful demolishing pre-removal approach!

Printer is coming...

Tom, Andrew and Chris got quickly stuck into taking apart one of the desks while Alex and Martynas (with Graham's help) took apart the other desk, quite literally! Alex ripped off one of the desk's leg and it wasn't long before the drawers and other parts of the desk were being removed outside the office with the help of Abi and Catherine. While the others worked on the desks in the other room, Fiona, Catriona and Arba moved the filing cabinet and printer, which looked deceptively heavier than it looked! Desks removed, and the printer re-located into the other room our work was done. As a thank you, Graham kindly provided refreshments and some treats to the group to help fuel them on the run back to base. Nicely re-fuelled the group posed for a quick group photo and said their goodbyes to Graham.

Two deeds purse...

Sadly, Johnny and Sarah missed the group photo as while the group were lending a hand at Family Friends, they had continued their run an extra 2km up to complete another good deed of the day; they went on a mission to return a purse that Johnny had found earlier in the day. The woman was hugely appreciative, well once they had convinced her they weren't on a charity promotion mission, as she had not yet realised the absence of her purse! Lovely stuff guys.

With two good deeds completed and the group back together we all began the 4km ran back to base, with the decision made to follow the same route back so as not to tempt fate with directions as time was beginning to get against us, and there was post-run celebrations and cake to be had! It wasn't long before we were back at base having a cool down and stretch, very much thinking of all the well-earnt cake and drink refreshments!

It cakes two!

The 'Great British Bake Off' season may be back on TV but here at GoodGym H&F we have our own bakers and selection of cakes within the group to celebrate milestones, and last night was no exception - a 50th good deed = 2 cakes! Johnny's gluten-free lemon drizzle cake was absolutely divine and was polished off by the group in no time at all! A handshake from Paul Hollywood would definitely have been given! With one of the cakes demolished marginally quicker than desks, we headed off the pub for the second cake and post-run chat. Sadly my coffee and walnut cake had not survived my day's tube journey's particularly well so had a 'slight lean' to it but was still edible and seemed to go down well with everyone's drink of choice.

Thank you all for a really fun night, hope you have a lovely week! And thank you to Catriona for the punspiration and extra photos!

Next week, we're doing some flyering for a couple of local charity's which I will attempt to combine with a hopefully fun scavenger hunt! Sign up here.

SHOUT OUT

We started the night off with some celebrations - Jason got his black t-shirt for doing 50 good deeds. The second congratulations/ celebrations was for Justine's who walked a whopping 50km at the weekend in aid of Cancer Research. Give the a Cheer!

RUN & CYCLE

After the news, we started the task briefing a bit differently. Graham from Family Friends came to join us at the start location. He gave us an overview of what the charity does and told us about flyers we'd be delivering to local organisations. He had wanted to join the run, but a knee injury meant he grabbed a boris bike instead!

Are we running in a circle?... Yes

First, we headed off first to Gelato Mio near Holland Park (where apparently we can get a discount - yum!). Next, we headed across to Shepherds Bush Library, stopping by at cafés and corner shops on the way.

After the library we headed down Shepherd bush road to drop catch some more late night coffee shops and even a Fish and Chip shop.

Will met us by Brook Green at this point having already sped off down King St to dispatch flyers at Château Dessert and the supermarkets on route.

We missed Hammersmith Library by 10mins, but it was made up for by Jason's Japanese Cheesecake (specially requested by Ellie).

Yum yum!