Another chilly night in Ealing saw 17 of us come out in the final week of January to support Hestia's Ealing refuge.

We started with a getting to know you (getting to know all about youuuuu) exercise. This involved throwing your shoes into a pile in the middle of a circle, yes bear with me, before hopping in and picking up someone else's shoe, finding out who the shoe belonged to and finding out a fun fact about that person. Basically a balance drill while getting to know more about other GoodGym members. Despite the cold feet I think it was a success!

📣 We also had a big announcement, happy 100 good deeds to Shan! Go and give him a HUGE cheer!

So after letting off the party poppers, we set off on the short uphill run to Hestia where a big task awaited...

Our mission for the evening was to do lots of sorting of old files into boxes for archiving as well as sorting out a couple of cupboards. Hundreds of files came down the three flights of stairs in a big human chain before the big sort started with groups across all the levels.

"I can't believe how quickly you work!" - Hestia staff

It didn't take us long to finish the task and before we knew it we were swooping back towards our start location for an epic fitness session to end the night. This involved HIIT exercises and circle sprints resulting in a great boost of exercise endorphins to round off the evening!

Until next time!

Tonight we once again ran the long 10km to Acton to continue to support Old Oak Community and Children's Centre with their fight to get the garden space revamped and also stepped in to help with some food prep ahead of their community BBQ tomorrow night.

We had 16 of us out tonight including Alex who despite hitting 100 good deeds isn't resting on her laurels and came straight back this week to start totting up the good deeds towards the next big milestone! We had the lovely Tash back with us after starting with GoodGym a couple of years ago, that's the great thing whether you come once a week or once a year, you've still made a huge difference and we always having you no matter how often you can make it!

After some quick introductions getting to know your fellow runners through some Mexican wave squats (yes, that's a thing!) we set off on what was a lovely evening for a run, bright and sunny but not too warm, perfect weather!

Our help is grately appreciated!

At the centre we were met by Elly who always has lots of great tasks for us to help with. These small tasks between 16 of us on one evening save her and the team lots of time and resources so well done team! Tonight we split into two groups, one outside continuing to weed and clear the garden space and one group inside doing some food prep for their community event. Tash definitely helped speed the grating process along and utilised her food technology experience to pump up the indoor team to complete the task at hand.

Meanwhile outside the garden was really taking shape and the before and after was really clear to see! Loads more crates of garden waste removed and a clean sweep for the playground, cracking effort all round!

After that it was just a case of getting the 5km back under our belts, well done to everyone who pushed themselves tonight on the distance. 10km is a long way and everyone got it done! After some stretches back at base we were done!

See you all next time!

You guys clearly love to save a sapling as we had 17 of you come along for the evening for the final round of clearing down on the canal.

It’s been a mammouth task over the summer but last night we went down for the third and final time to finish cutting back all the overgrowth so that these new trees have the space they need to continue to grow. Originally planted by trees for cities a few years ago the maintenance of these new saplings is crucial but sometimes forgotten task so we were on board to make sure this wasn’t the case!

We started by welcoming Katie to her first ever GoodGym run (give her a cheer!) and sadly said goodbye to Sam and Callum as tonight is their last run with GoodGym Ealing (at least for a while).

• Sam is off to South London and will continue to take part in GoodGym there (yay!). He’s been a huge part of our group over the last few months and has done 28 good deeds since March, he's been a regular on the group runs and community missions as well as touring around other areas, he’ll be greatly missed!
• And Callum is off to Dublin to do a masters at Trinity, he’s done loads of GoodGyming over the summer and is always a great asset to any task. We’ll get him back in the holidays but for now best of luck!

Milestone Alert 🚨

• First announcement this week is for our lovely Michelle who clocked up 50 good deeds this evening! She’s been an amazingly positive force in our group and continues to run, walk and take part in all the tasks despite now being heavily pregnant! We’ll be celebrating at the next social on Tuesday 3rd September for sure!
• Next we had Alex on number 99! She'll be doing the big 100 on her birthday in Hounslow tonight and we can't wait to see her in wings. Always friendly, positive and welcoming to new runners, she often volunteers to back mark and regularly does at least 2 good deeds a week in different places, we're so lucky to have her in Ealing!

So on with the run! After a quick game to warm up we headed out west towards the canal where Jane was ready with all the tools we needed to get the job done.

We had just one patch of clearing left to tackle and we wasted no time is getting to it.

I love this task, it’s so therapeutic!

Elena has been present at every task here over the summer and said she really loves coming and seeing a difference straight away, it’s also a good workout and ripping away all the overgrowth is a great stress release!

After half an hour of pulling, raking, chopping and digging we were done! What great satisfaction seeing a big clearing with all the saplings in full sight with access to the space they new to continue to grow now!

Great job everyone, we’ll be back to do it all again next year!

It was a beautiful night in Ealing - perfect conditions for a spot of running and digging in Walpole park!

We started the night with a few bits of news and heard about the great running you guys have been doing. To recap:

• Well done to Harvey who after travelling to cross off 'I' last weekend is tantilisingly close to ticking off that full parkrun alphabet - only two to go!

• If you fancy a free timed 10k from Chiswick Bridge, then check out this race which is held every last Sunday of the month. There are even spot prizes!

• Up for the Shindig this weekend? There are still a couple of places left due to last minute drop outs. Email ed@goodgym if you fancy a weekend full of GoodGym!

After a some dynamic warm ups which got our heart rates up, we did a quick survey on London's best parks and it turns out you guys are mostly loyal to West London with answers like Gunnersbury, Richmond and Walpole - the location of our task for the evening!

It was a very short run, so after we got to the park we finished off the run with a bit of single file formation running to clock up the kms slightly. We arrived to find no lock - hurrah - and stuck straight into divvying up the tools and gloves for our task.

The job tonight was to prepare the bases of the beautiful avenue of trees - some of which are over 100 years old - to be spread with mulch. We measured out the area, and started to dig....or at least 'disturb' the ground as per instructions. Turns out disturbing the soil is quite tough going after it has been baked by the summer sun, but it sure was a great upper body work out. There were some interesting and widely varying techniques to be spotted, from the spade shuffle to the fork flip, but after some 40 minutes of going at it, the ground was looking much readier for the next step.

We returned our tools, and attempted to create a checkerboard effect group photo with our red and black tshirts (with success? I think so - check out the photo and decide!). We then jogged over to a nice corner of the park to do some pyramid running - alternating paces in incrementally longer phases up to a hard minute's worth of running. Tough going but you smashed it!

We finished off the night with another minute of planking and a run back to base. Next week you have Olivia back to lead a slightly longer run - enjoy everyone. Thanks for having me Ealing, it was lovely to see you - have a week of happy running!

Last night we teamed up with local running club The Ealing Eagles to help marshal at their inaugural Blondin Park Relays event!

For something a bit different we headed out to marshal for the evening making sure all the runners went in the right direction throughout the event and members of the public were kept safe amongst the stampede! Everyone had to run 8x800 in teams of two (4 laps of the park each) which sounded brutal and exhilarating in equal measures!

Not wanting to miss out on the running fun, we started at our usual location in Ealing Broadway and ran as a group through the lovely Walpole and Lammas before arriving at the park for our duties. Everyone was kitted out with lovely yellow official marshal bibs (a bit boil in the bag on such a mild evening!) and shown to their positions.

• Lionel, Sam and Kate took on some extra responsibility helping with the official finish times
• Harvey made sure no one trampled the lovely wild flowers on the tight bend
• Samar and Samina led people onto the path and made sure no-one got trampled
• Alex made sure no one ran into the bin!
• Callum and Michael held runners off running down two potential wrong paths
• Basia led everyone back around the third bend
• Jenni kept everyone heading towards the finish
• Elena directed everyone into the relay area and finish line
• Adam helped near the finish area, even doing a bit of babysitting so a couple could run as a team!
• Hayley took part coming in as third mixed team!
• Sophie and Tom took part and were in strong competition against each other the whole way
• Chris and Lauriane took part as team Les Aigles, repping GoodGym the whole way in their lovely red tees, they even helped pick up the signage after the event finished

We all stayed to watch the finish ceremony before heading back on our run to the start. Everyone was really delighted to have been able to support the event and thought it was lovely to be able to see lots of local runners giving it their all on a Tuesday evening. Hopefully it will be a yearly event and we'll be able to help again in the future!

Finally, a massive congrats to Jenni who completed her 150th good deed last night! Amazing stuff, we'll definitely be celebrating that one on the next social!

What a beautiful evening to run around the parks of Ealing to get fit and do good!

18 of us out in force including two new runners, big welcome to Louise and Paolo!

A bit of a hiccup with our task last night meant we could see the job that needed doing but the tools we needed had been locked away. Did that mean we just went home?! Hell no! Instead we did a great interval session in the glourious evening sunshine, we partnered up and around a set loop of the park did intervals switching between hard effort and recovery every time you passed your partner. We did 2x5 minutes and everyone looked suitably knackered by the end. Great work everyone!

So that was the 'Gym' part but what about the 'Good', we needed something to earn a good deed...

Improvised litter picking it was! We decided to get on board with the 2 minute street clean and all ran off in different directions around the park picking up as much litter as we could find. Parks in the summer attract a lot of extra litter as unfortunately sometimes people don't always take their rubbish home with them after enjoying a nice picnic. Not to worry GoodGym to the rescue! A good little haul was found and we all distributed it into the relevant recycling or rubbish bins.

Great job everyone, we earned the trip to pub afterwards! Thanks for sharing my birthday with me :)

13 runners, 6km of street pounding and hundreds of bitey red ants! All in an evenings work for GoodGym Ealing helping Trees For Cities.

In the mix last night we had Samina, brand new to GoodGym (and running full stop!) she smashed out 4 miles and got stuck in the the task at hand. What a great achievement! Much like the ants I hope she's been bitten by the running bug! We also had tourist, Jenny, from GoodGym Barnet join us for the evening, great to have you Jenny!

After some introductions and some warm up exercises (not much needed on such a muggy evening!) we weaved our way down to the canal where we met with tools and shown back to the spot we had started to clear a few weeks ago. There was still so much to do and many more trees to unearth so we all got stuck straight in.

Once bitten...

It wasn't long before we realised the stinging in our legs wasn't the familiar nettle sting we were all used to but we had in fact been joined by hundreds of bitey red ants! The key was to keep moving and not stand too still, all just adding to the exercise for the evening. Undeterred the group ploughed on and continued to unveil lots of hidden saplings now being given the space to continue to grow.

Although a little stingy at times, everyone really loves this task. It's great to see the difference we've made straight away and we all left knowing that we'd helped with a really important job that would otherwise struggle to get done.

Last night was a biggie! An amazing 21 GoodGymers came along to get stuck in with clearing space around the saplings planted by trees for cities a couple of years ago!

Joining us this week were two new runners Samar and Jenny who both did an awesome job on what was quite a long run and heavy task. Go and give them a massive cheer!

Much needed maintenance

After a group warm up to get everything moving after lots of us had been sitting at work all day, we meandered towards to canal where we were shown the mammoth task that needed doing. Good job we had our biggest turnout since January! The task this week was facilitated by our good friends at The William Hobbayne Charity who kindly came down and gave us all the tools we needed to get it done. We were told how so much time, money and effort is put into planting new trees but unfortunately the same amount of resources are not put forward for the maintenance so it was great that we were able to step in and help.

The thorny issue and a sticky situation…

The saplings planted a couple of years ago couldn’t be seen and were getting lost under a mass of weeds, brambles and general overgrowth. Our job was to grab some tools, don some gloves and get to work tearing it all away. As we moved through the mini jungle we slowly started to undercover the tiny trees so that they will now have a good chance at continuing to grow!

40 minutes later we had a few stingy arms and legs but lots of happy faces! We packed up shop and headed back to base for a stretch before heading to the pub for the monthly social (ah that’s why numbers were so high!).

We’ll be back in the jungle in a couple of weeks to finish what we started so be sure to sign up again then!