This task owner was one of our very own team regulars Becky!

Becky works at Ferndown Upper School and one of her projects is the Community Garden, which contains all sorts of wonderful flowers and plants - But also lots of Mares Tail (which apparently is a weed!) Becky was planning in weeding tonight so a few extra pairs of hands can make a massive difference despite being outside our usual area!

As we entered the Community Garden, it was a lovely site with raised beds containing vegetables, sunflowers and other assortments. The school has a gardening club which students enjoy maintaining the planters - Although they prefer to avoid weeding 😁

Elizabeth and Esther were given instructions to what a Mares Tail is from Patricia, our resident gardening expert!

Ali joined us a few minutes later and there was soon a bunch of red t-shirts bent over the planters, filling trays of weeds, with plenty of nattering and chattering!

There was even a calendar girls moment in the sunflowers - 'We are going to need significantly bigger sunflowers!' 😉

May the forks be with you!

This was a community mission of two half's!

Thursday afternoon, Day Team with Patricia, Elizabeth and Christine took to the streets of Lower Parkstone whilst Friday evening, Ali, Esther and Robert tackled to houses around Whitecliff! Each team had an hour and 3 people and tackled it head on, with Friday nights team knocking up 4 miles each in an hour, benefitting from terraced houses and even took a sneaky visit to a fellow Goodgym members house!

Leaflets all dropped ready for Chestnut Tree Nursery fundraiser!

Tuesday evening usually sees Goodgym Poole out on a mission but tonight was an extra special mission as ten of us took on the Sheepy shuffle half marathon.

We had sunshine and showers but with lots of laughter we stuck with it and completed the challenge . Christine originally found the virtual race which raises funds for a small charity that cares for retired sheep.

Lovely Goodgym runner Sian joined us at the start in Poole Park to cheer us on our way before having to sprint home to a hungry toddler. Nicola our very experienced half marathon runner led us towards the old town with Patricia directing us and making sure we didn’t become lost sheep. As we headed along Holes Bay Esther and Robert ran down to join us and we continued towards Upton Country Park . Shelley was next to join the growing flock as we headed into a torrential downpour which destroyed not only our sheepy curls but also all our race bibs. Round Upton and Annette, our Goodgym star Guest, led the flock in style with a good jeffing technique that covered the miles. Jane, Patricia, Ali, Christine and Robert all completed their first half marathons this evening – what a great achievement in this Olympic fortnight. As for Nicola this evening saw her complete her twelfth of twenty half marathons planned for 2021.

Come the end we felt chuffed (although most definitely puffed ) and happy to have done our bit to support the retired sheep at Mirkwood.

Thanks for report Elizabeth and also being the kindest Goodgym member running back and forward, checking everyone was happy and comfortable. As ever a rock to the team!

Monday we had seen biblical rain fall in the area, roads flooded, people stuck in miles of traffic for hours. It certainly reminded us that nature is stronger than us!

Tuesday, Its a new day - the sun peeps out, it's warm, it's Goodgym night!

Runners came from all directions tonight! Becky and Esther ran down from Upton House, whilst Patricia and Ali suddenly appeared from local area.

Nicola and Lauren walked up from Oakdale with a plan to run back - giving them opportunity for connection time on route!

Sian tried to hot foot it over the bridge only for big boats to ruin her stride with the bridge up! Jane came equipped with her 'Goodgym Painting Clothes' on her bike!

We all met Stan and Pat, who as ever were equipped for us! Tonight was painting of metal blue benches dotted across the play area. An evening is a perfect time to paint these as only a few kids around and hopefully all dry by the next day's play and sun!

Jane and Esther went off to help Stan with his mission to pull out wood from the bottom of the fences. Sounds easy enough! Well, over the next hour there was a lot of squelchy in the mud, digging up of grass and earth, hammering, leveraging with crow bars, pulling, pushing, talking, pondering and finally a 2 metre board was released! 4 adults, 2 hammers, 1 crow bar, 1 sharp spade and a lot of sweating and squelching- We knew it had to be a complete job!

Meanwhile, 6 other Goodgym runners were on a mission painting benches. The final bench was a team effort and took 4 members, 20 mins to cover all the old rusty bars with fresh metal paint.

It was definitely a good job well done!

Each runner went back to base, either muddy or covering in paint but all happy! Knowing the part we are playing to maintain this fantastic park and beach.

So if you are reading this report - Your final questions are:

What are you doing today to help your future self? At Goodgym, we keep active, we connect as individuals on a shared goal, we do good!

What are you doing today to help your future community? Well I think this report answers that!

Nice work Poole!

If you had told any of us runners 18 months ago, how one Saturday we will be super excited to go to parkrun to see each other and run 5k, you may have been a little unsure why this week was so special!

But it really is!

We are on track for return of parkrun on July 24th and this brings a new route for Poole! The new route allows for a much wider, larger start area. It also reduces the mass gathering around and in the pavilion area. The new route does however include a steep right turn at one point, which many speedy runners may have to adjust to. But it's still flat, free and lovely park to run around.

We all met rather nervously where others were grouped for this trial run. Great to see the red T-shirts of Goodgym standing out from the crowd! The core parkrun team, led by Mike and his crew had arranged this meet up to test the new route with a larger group of runner's including timers, marshal's, posts and even a lead bike!

What we had all forgotten was how fast you can run at a flat parkrun! Nothing can compare to the opportunity to run with others, whether listening to the chatter, joining in, running off a hangover or wanting to feel the lungs burn!

The start was so wide, we were all off and feeling the wind in our faces felt so fresh and good!

Calum I am so sorry we did not give you a proper hello! The excitement of parkrun meant we missed seeing you down to join us!

The results are listed in the pics, but in all honesty, this was about being part of the parkrun return so whether you loved to see your mate, (Ali), enjoyed a PB (Robert), showed us how fast you easily can run (Tracy), completed a cool sub 22 min run pre a long run that afternoon (Aaron) or brought the sweets for after (Elizabeth), we all loved it!

Bring on the official return in 2 weeks!