It was a blustery evening in Ealing but that didn't put off the 16 fantastic runners from coming out on our second double task week last night!

We met at our usual spot, the wonderful Bodyline Studios who very kindly accommodate us every week, before deciding who would go to each task for the evening. Taskforce member Michael C agreed to take Tim, Alexander & Emily off to The Ealing Winter Night Shelter to be on hand for a few tasks to help their evening run smoothly, while the rest of us were excited to be heading to help A Mile In Her Shoes sort donations.

The two tasks were very close to each other so after a few warm up drills we all headed out on the same route together, swerving down the busy Uxbridge Road, dodging pedestrians for some extra agility practice on our run!

We arrived at our first stop (which just so happened to be the pub!) letting the small group of night shelter helpers head on a bit further down the road to complete their mission for the evening.

We were using the function room at The Grosvenor to sort donations, so a massive thank you to them for hosting us and being so friendly and helpful all night.

Inside we were met by Nicola from the charity who explained a bit more about what we were doing for them, and it was basically Christmas! Unlike previous tasks we'd done before instead of just sorting into sizes/type we were opening up all the packages sent in and donated from members of the public. It was lovely to open things up and see all the lovely messages and notes people had sent in with their donated kit!

There was a lot to get through so the night was just about getting it all open and sorting into three sections, usable by the charity, not usable but good condition so can be resold/redonated elsewhere and finally a no thank you/bin pile.

Sorting the good, the bad and the ugly!

A few brutal decisions were made as unfortunately not everything that's donated can be utilised by Nicola and her team but at the end of the evening we had a HUGE pile of great kit that can be used as part of the process to empower women affected by homelessness to find their feet through running!

We even had a bit of a catwalk show with Tony strutting his stuff in a striking pair of jellyfish(?!) themed lycra tights, it was a strong look!

We were joined back at the pub by the night shelter sub team who had been busy sorting the shower schedule, making tea and walking around the grounds to litter pick and make sure the area was safe. They also helped with all the last bits of clearing up from our task so they really did provide the total package last night!

Amazing work last night, thank you to everyone who was involved! Next week we continue the theme of combating homelessness as we have another double task week at The Night Shelter and The Hestia Refuge, get yourselves signed up nice and early here!

The results are in....

With 2 days left of the January Challenge we needed just 5 more good deeds in the bank to hit our target but an incredible 18 people showed up last night meaning we totally smashed it! Full results to come next week but for now we can rest safely in the knowledge that we did an awesome job this month at GoodGym Ealing!

This week we had one new person join us with Mirko coming along to GoodGym for the first time. He nailed it, getting stuck right into the (grubby) task at hand and finishing one of our longer task runs. Great stuff!

One of our regular tasks, it's always a delight to head down to Hanwell on behalf of The Canal & River Trust to meet Jack with his big van of tricks and last night was all about litter picking and making the approach to the canal and surrounding area look a lot nicer.

Dump & Run...

A lot of rubbish was collected (a simultaneous feeling of satisfaction and disappointment) amongst which was sadly a load of crap... literally! So many poo bags flung into the woods off of the canal path but luckily GoodGym Ealing were most definitely on top of the situation... some may say on top of the plops!

A good haul later and it was time to shut up shop and complete our fitness session for the evening, we did a mix of sprints and exercises followed by a final show down where Alexander showed what his fast twitch muscle fibers were made of with one of the most impressive sprints I've seen on a group run yet!

Absolutely fantastic work tonight as always and a great end to a brilliant month of doing good and running loads!

Here's to more of the same next month!

Happy running :)

This week the message was loud and clear, we need to smash this January Challenge! And with that 18 fantastic runners came out to do some good with their evening. This included two newbies brought along by existing members of the group, welcome Tony and Pat and well done to their recruitees Sophie and Michelle!

After a quick warm up (not needed quite a much this evening as it felt positively balmy after the arctic temperatures from the weekend!) and the usual health and safety briefing of 'there may be sharp tools, please don't stab eachother with them', we were off!

It was a straight forward run tonight with only one turn to make, so with clear instructions we set of in different pace groups to make our way down there. We made a stop at the turn to reconvene and do what runners do best, talk about food! We each discussed our favourite cakes with interesting choices all round.

With our appetite now heightened we completed the final bit of the run to arrive at The Log Cabin ready for a big weeding session!

It was straight down to business with three groups spread across the site to take on the weeds and a few other clean up jobs around the playground. Michelle & Michael definitely chose well with a cheeky go on the swings on offer in their area!

Talk soon turned to puns and newcomer Tony came out with some blinders but they may have been slightly too risqué so we've gone for a toned down combination from the group instead, loving your work though Tony, keep 'em coming next time!

We finished up with a quick fitness session in the playground to get everyone's heart racing before a nice recovery run back to base. It was a tough little three way plank, squat and lunge interval session with the intensity rising with each round.

Quads were burning!

Thank you to everyone for coming out and hopefully see you all next week when we'll be completing the last task and run of the month. It's the last chance to make it count for The January Challenge so sign up now!

Happy Running!

It was a FREEZING cold night but that didn't stop 16 of you coming out to run and help out at Hestia!

This is a hostel for single, homeless men, which supports and empowers service users, to develop their skills, promote their independence and make a positive contribution in the local community, with the ultimate aim of moving on positively and avoiding repeat homelessness.

Such a good cause!

We were joined by lots of people coming along for their second run which was great to see and we also had two brand new GoodGymers with Imogen and Juliane running to do good for the first time!

There was also a special t-shirt to give out this week with local missions legend Michael Kidd receiving his wings and getting his 100 good deed milestone tee!

Well done Michael!

We started as always with a quick warm up on the green which we definitely all needed on this winter evening, a mix of lunges and drills soon got us feeling slightly less like ice cubes and we began our short run up to the hostel with promise of a slightly longer run back featuring a few sneaky hill reps if they were lucky!

We had a real mix of tasks to do tonight and we split into 4 teams across the site to get everything done. We had team kitchen, team wall painting, team bathroom painting and erm... team toilet?! We quickly re-branded this to team bathroom, much more glamorous!

A few paint mishaps couldn't dampen our spirits (cleaned up after of course!) and after just under an hour of painting, scrubbing, polishing and mopping we'd covered almost all the tasks on the list. The cleaning of the paint brushes held us up slightly at the end which meant there was no time for hill sprints en route back (a tactical decision from the team I feel!) so there will be plenty on another run to make up for it next time!

A quick stretch at base and we were done, great work everyone and hopefully see you all on the next run!

We stacked up the good deeds and the shelves last night as 27 AMAZING runners came out to help at Ealing Food Bank. This included 9 lovely new additions with Sophie, Aurelia, Jane, Vicky, Chris J, Chris B, Gemma, Perrine & Mohand all kicking off the new year in style by beginning their GoodGym journey. Welcome everyone!

You butter believe it!

With everyone full of beans (and in some cases peanut butter) and ready to raise their pulses (literally) we started with a quick warm up and fitness session on Haven Green. We began with some simple drills before turning up the tempo with some running circle drills before seeing how far our legs could curry us to the task.

A lot of the group had bought donations down with them to give on the night but fortuNUTely the many jars of peanut butter we had for offering hadn’t weighed us down too much and we made it to the task ready and raring to go! We were met by the lovely Hillary who after the initial shock of the number of us gave us lots of different tasks to do around the warehouse! With such a large turnout we were crammed in like sardines and soon it was a feeding frenzy of shelf stacking, food sorting and cleaning in every aisle.

The time soon came to make like a banana and split and we headed back to base for a quick stretch and debrief on the nights events.

Hopefully the extra puns littered throughout the report have whet your appetite and given you food for thought for next time when you could have your pun in lights on the report.

A special mention to Michael Kidd this week for leading the run and helping co-orindate the task, also his 99th good deed with GoodGym so next time we get to present him with the BIG 100 T-SHIRT!

As always a massive thank you to everyone who came tonight and hopefully see you all next time!