15 lovely Propercorn employees bagged up 7 bags of leaves and planted seeds & bulbs for Cecil Sharp House!

On a wet but warm evening a smiling group of employees from Propercorn (those guys who make yummy pop corn! mmm) turned up at Cecil Sharp House to do some good for their local community.

Upon introducing ourselves, I explained a bit about GoodGym; we were founded in 2009 and aim to combat loneliness and help our communities all while be getting fitter. We think that gyms are a waste of energy. There are many neglected tasks and people in our communities that need that energy. We want to bring these things together. There are three ways to do good with us:

1. Group Runs - We run in groups to do physical tasks for community organisations.
2. Coach Runs - We run to make social visits to isolated older people who we call our 'coaches' because they motivate us to keep going.
3. Missions - We run missions to older people; clearing gardens, changing lightbulbs and doing odd-jobs for people who struggle to do them alone.

Onto information about Cecil Sharp House, Susannah explained that the Home of English Folk, Song & Dance was founded in 1932 but the charity lost funding in 2012 due to Local Government cuts. Therefore the gardens were planted by permaculture and the venue hired out for weddings. Ultimately this means that volunteers like you guys are essential to maintain the garden, which means the charity can keep growing.

Now for the GOOD

Right enough chat, what did we actually do? We grabbed all the tools, soil, seeds and bags around the corner to the big lawn. Splitting into two teams:

• Team A - a group of seven started tackling the leaves on the lawn, path, flower beds and steps. Using all the fun tools!
• Team B - learnt all about soil, seeds, planting and more from Susannah. They then planted some peas and some flowers!

It's quite amazing the amount of leaves that fall in late October, this lawn needs constant care and you sure guys gave it that. Within 40 minutes you guys had filled seven bags of leaves and the lawn looked BEAUTIFUL!

After a group picture, we packed away and said our thanks to Susannah from Cecil Sharp House.

If you guys at Propercorn are interested in coming to GoodGym here are the three closest to your office (plus there is another 20 in London):

1. Monday - GoodGym Islington meet at the Arsenal Hub by the Emirates Stadium at 18.45pm.
2. Tuesday - GoodGym Hackney meet at E5 Bakehouse near London Fields at 18.45pm.
3. Wednesday - GoodGym Camden meet at Living Centre within the Crick Institute next to St Pancras at 18.45pm.

Thanks for coming guys - see you soon.

PB out.

After last week's mini heat wave we were business as normal again, and a good job it was too.

A cracking team of eight runners met in Chiswick, and we had the pleasure of no less than three ace new members join us. People of GoodGym, please put your hands together for Adam, Natasha and Andreea who all came on their first Hounslow run with us last night. Give them a cheer!

Special bonus points go to Dave, who had a weekend of running, with no less than TWO races. Runspiration! Hat tip also goes to Andreea, who did the same 10k race on Sunday. Way to go guys.

After a few warm ups, introductions, and a quick interrogation to find out what was everybody's favourite biscuit (we nail all the important things in Chiswick. Top choice was rich tea, if you're interested.), we set off on a short but sweet little run down to the Water and Steam Museum.

This amazing place has no funding, and relies on the help of volunteers to keep the museum running. It is chock full of incredible things, and needs support so that everybody is able to go and see them. We were met by Penny, who led us through the museum to the outside area, where we were introduced to Ed and eight brooms. Our job tonight was to sweep up all the gravel in the area into piles, to stop little hands from dumping it in the water displays. This was an upper body and arms work out of epic proportions - which was a good thing, as we runners often neglect this area which can make our running form less efficient.

We each took on a different section of the huge yard, and after half an hour of hard brushing, we had made a big difference. It was one of those impossible tasks where you can't just walk away...just one last bit. 'I won't be coming back here without my brush,' said Adam. Tough work, gang, but there was no grumbling at all, despite a few blisters. After all, champions train, losers complain!

We took the run back to Turnham Green a little faster, and finished off the evening with a blast of circuits that included lots of horrid things like plank rotations, press ups and squat holds. We attempted a half pigeon in our stretches afterwards, watched by the actual birds behind us doing 'full pigeon', as Andy pointed out.

Next week we're going to be conducting a load of surveys for Hounslow Housing services to find out how they can improve the lives of the older community in the borough. A very worthwhile job indeed. You can sign up to help out here. See you then Team Hounslow!

As well as lovely Hounslow regulars Claudia, Dave and Andy, we had some excellent GG tourism going on last night in the shape of Debs all the way from Bristol, and Jo and Ella from Wandsworth. You are all marvellous and deserve a cheer!

Well done to Dave, who did Osterley Park Run last weekend - apparently it's a good one if you like running on grass - and to Jo who tackled (a frustratingly short) Southwark. Good luck to Debs, who has a 10k race coming up this weekend. Check out these speed demons! Don't forget park runs are a great, free way to improve your 5k time; they are all over the country and are really friendly events.

While we were doing our warm up, we discussed which famous person, dead or alive, we would like to take out for a drink. We got David Attenborough, Al Pacino, Terry Pratchett, Bon Jovi, Thierry Henri and Stephen Hawking. Now that's a dinner party I'd like to attend!

We set off for Ealing Road Baptist Church at a nice trot, with Andy and Dave leading the charge. We usually help the pastor, Roger, out with the homeless shelter he hosts every weekend for local men, but this week we were doing a few jobs in the church building. While Ella and Jo got to work shifting a whole load of chairs (and haing a philisophical discussion about heartbreak with the pastor), Debs, Dave, Andy and Claudia were led down the stairs into a small, dusty cellar. You brave people. The job there was a tough one - to clear the cellar of junk and debris. It was really hard going, dirty work, and a bit confined, so we swapped over halfway (apart from poor Dave who heroically did both shifts!). Well done team, you earned your stripes tonight.

Cleaning up done, we set off back to Turnham Green to do a quick but intense fitness session. The run back was quicker than the outward leg, which is great going. We kicked off our session with a quick game of chase the hare. The idea is that nobody knows who the hare is except the hare themselves. Everybody sets off on a loop, and at any point the hare makes a sprint for home, and the other runners have to chase them back. Jo was our speedy target, and everybody made a jolly good effort chasing her down. It's a great way to do a little speed work. If that wasn't enough, we then took on a round of upper body circuits. These included press ups, both wide arm and diamond, tricep dips, side planks and regular planks for 45 seconds at a time. This is a difficult session, but really effective for toning up those upper body muscles.

All that was left was some nice stretches and a quick relax on the grass to end off the night. Well done to everybody who came from near and far, the goodest of gymers! Same again next week? You can sign up here

12 GoodGym-ers ran 5k to help C4WS Camden make beds for the homeless or 16 ran 10k to help in the Abbey Community Centre garden!

With regular trainer Paul still in Kenya getting even faster at running, it was Frances’ turn to take the helm at GoodGym Camden this week. We had 28 runners, including Enrica, Heather and Amy who all came along for the first time!

Frances led a group to the American Church in London, helping with our regular task of making the beds for the homeless shelter they provide. We got it done in record time – less than 10 minutes! As it would take around an hour for the staff to do it themselves, they really appreciated the help as always.

Record times!

With the task done, we headed to Granary Square for a fitness session. This week we split into two halves for a group fartlek session, each heading around the square in a different direction. Fartlek is Swedish for speed play, and basically means playing around with different paces – like an interval session but more fun. The twist was that each person in the group got a chance to pick the pace and how long the group did that pace for. Would you give your fellow runners a sprint, or a nice relaxing recovery pace? Both groups did a great job, covering three laps of Granary Square and mixing up the speeds nicely.

Then we headed back to base for a nice stretch and awaited Pritesh’s group, who had been on a 10k run to Abbey Community Centre for some gardening.

Abbey Community Centre

Pritesh and his merry band of 15 GoodGymers went 'long' this week and headed over to Abbey Community Centre in the heart of Kilburn. It was a lovely night for a run and despite the hard slog the view that greeted the runners at the top of Primrose Hill was certainly worth it. The challenge with the trip to Abbey is maximising time, the time it takes to run meant only twenty minutes were available to do the task. Laura from the community centre explained to everyone what Abbey does and then showed us the work that needed to be done in the garden. We split in to two groups, one group taking on the pesky weeds between the paving stones and the other turning over a flower bed so that the community centre members could get some planting done in the next week. Everyone worked super hard and Laura was extremely grateful and impressed with how much we got done. With that we said our goodbyes and then headed back to base before a good stretch after that long run. Great running and tasking everyone and thank you to Rosie who led the run back!

Lovely to see you all, hope to see you back again soon, you can sign up for next week here, Pritesh will be leading in the last week before PB is back!

Don’t forget the next time trial in Regent’s Park on 26th March – in a bit of a twist, it’ll be a handicap race this time!

13 Goodgymers (and one phantom runner) hit the street, ran 2k and made good headway on the task at Bruce Grove Youth Centre

Shouts out to Helen and Naz who made it down to their first GoodGym session… your help was much appreciated guys! Give them a cheer folks.

The Task

This week we were heading over to Bruce Grove Youth Centre the task was to refresh the centres careers office which has seen lots of use especially after the local prospectus office closing down some years ago. The walls of the office were in need of some GGH TLC so we did what we do and got our paint on.

a little flakey

After a quick briefing we were off on a 1k run to the task location at Bruce Grove. On arrival Akin the task owner and manager of the centre greeted us at the entrance before giving us a little intro. He then lead us to the office we’d be decoration. The room isn’t huge and the floor space was limited but it was a snug fit for all of us and this only seemed to add to the good vibes and banter that ensued.. along with a fair bit of graft too, mind. The teams split into little groups with some getting paint, brushes and all we’d be using unpacked and ready to go while others used filler to err fill the walls which had become a little flakey / chipped.. along with others getting rid of blu tack left on the walls and spreading dust sheets.. people wasted no time in getting started with this and everyone was super enthusiastic. We managed to get lots done before having to clear up. We’ll be returning next week to get more done.

The Fitness session

Before the fitness session could commence everyone pilled onto the football table for a quick match of everyone’s favourite youth centre game. A few people had clearly spied the table on the way in and there was no way they were leaving without a quick whack. This week we chose to do our fitness session in the hall at the centre and the human beep test was on the cards.. this went down well considering most had not done this for many years.. school years to be precise. Everyone did a really good job in staying within the beeps but hats off to the girls who took it to the next level.. an International Women’s Day win for the ladies.. nice! After a quick breather and a round of high fives we were off into the night again. With a sprint along the home straight (Louise has clearly been working on her sprints – well done!) and a quick warm down we were done for another evening of goodness but not before mentioning Paul’s playlist which we had been listening to on the little boombox.. his playlist contained some pretty cool floor fillers and of course some Chaz and Dave.

Great session but I'm left wondering what happened to our phantom runner.. 🤔

Oh and thanks to FRP for the paint 👊🏽

Sign Up For Future Sessions Below!

Sign up for our next Wednesday nights group run & task Here, and join us at Chicken Town afterwards for a bite to eat.

We also have a task and mission this weekend check them out here Saturday and one Sunday

Don’t forget to stay in the loop over on our social media pages – Facebook / Twitter

Until next time folks - do good, stay fit & look out for the light

A massive 41 GoodGymers filled planters, wheelbarrowed, hoe'd and cleared twigs for three Camden charities

Corrr blimey what a lovely night, it was wet, it was windy and definitely not Spring BUT we had a massive fourty-one people down at GG Camden, the most this year so far! Thanks for coming!

Welcome to the newbies – Katherine, David, Claire, Emma, Kimberley, Tom P, Ellie, Alex, Susana,Rosa and Tom - great to have you along.

In the news this week:

1. Steve Lee hit 50 Good Deeds last night, earning himself a black t-shirt – wahey! Give him a cheer!
2. Lina did her first 5km time trial at the weekend with GG Race Team, sign up to the next one here.
3. Well done to the Brighton Half Marathoners at the weekend, Jacob got another PB and Damian got a post-shoulder surgery PB – nice one guys!
4. Its GoodGym monthly drinks tonight down in Lewisham, Pritesh will be there with a wonderful speech and a smiling facing. Go on down – sign up here.
5. Lastly I am going to Kenya for the next three weeks so me and my beard won’t be around. The wonderful Polly, Frances and Pritesh will be covering for me while I am gone. Don’t miss me toooo much.

After all that news, a headcount involving three Steve’s and two Chris’ we got warmed up. After raising our heart rate nicely we split into three groups, we were helping the following organisations:

1. St Luke’s Community Centre – this is a fantastic centre that runs lots of projects and programmes for the community, including having an amazing green space!
2. Alara – this is a wholefoods provider that also runs various green projects, including Kings Cross Orchard Project.
3. Castlehaven Community Centre – nestled in the heart of Camden Town this centre runs projects for both young and older persons, plus they maintain two parks.

St Luke’s Report:

Frances led 15 runners for our second trip to St Luke’s Community Centre, to help our friends at GoodGym Islington finish off their mammoth task of filling the planters with soil.

10 people got straight to the task, shovelling, wheelbarrowing and turning the soil until the job was pretty much done. Another five strong-armed people helped move bags of compost out of the shed – with a human chain formed, they got the job done quickly so they could help everyone else finish the planters.

Shed photo!

After a quick shed photo, we hit the roads back to base, missing most (but not all) of the heavy rain showers.

Alara Report:

Polly led a group of 12 runners to go and help Alara, with this being just a 1km a way they had a nice warm up before tackling the task.

Splitting into groups the team wheelbarrowed compost from THE HUGE PILE into the Permaculture Garden and did some hoeing around the space to make sure it’s spread evenly.

Cookie Fuelled

Fuelled by Alara cookies the group smashed through the task and then headed to Granary Square for a loop and some conditioning exercises.

Castlehaven Report:

PB led a group of 10 runners North along Royal College Street, past Camden Overground station and to Castlehaven which is just behind Camden Lock!

Once equipped with gloves and bin bags from the Des Res we split into two groups, with Meredith’s team heading to the north park and Jess’ heading to the south park. The aim for the night was to bag up any and all twigs, branches and wood that was left over from Storm Doris last Thursday.

Upon first impressions there didn’t seem many twigs about, but after 30 seconds we realised we had our hands full. Over the course of 20 minutes we filled eight bags of debris and there was still plenty more to do – we’ll be back!

Canal Vote

After a quick vote we decided to head west along the canal and not the road, it's a bit of an experience in the dark but sticking together it’s quite the adventure. We ran a mile along the canal and met Polly’s Alara crew before heading back for a group stretch.

Once again thanks for coming along, sign up here for next week, the wonderful Polly is leading!.

PB out.