Tonight's task was visiting Hayden Court, which is a sheltered housing scheme for the elderly. The task was to clear up as many leaves as possible!

Yet again, a fantastic turnout and was great to welcome new GoodGym runners Rich and Chloe.

The 1st Mission Run in Norwich took place on Sunday so Catherine kindly said a few words about the momentous occasion. Hopefully this will kick start lots of Missions Runs in the future.

Katy turned up with what I thought were giant flippers... but were in fact leaf collectors that you kind of wear as gloves. Oh what fun it would have been if all 24 of us would have been running through the city of Norwich wearing a pair of them.

It was a relatively short distance of around 1.5km tonight so I had a little treat up my sleeve for afterwards ;-)

After a warm up (with no rude interruptions from random people this week!) we had a nice stroll to the task.

On arrival we put people into pairs and with a bin bag and off they went to clear some leaves. Fortunately I brought some extra bin bags and these were needed after about 10 minutes as you well know, the GoodGym-ers don't waste no time.

After 30 minutes we then took all the bin bags full of leaves to a little compost area. Delores, one of the old ladies who is a resident at Hayden Court was at her window thanking everybody... I think Laura was about to adopt her!

We then headed to Chapelfield Gardens for a running fitness session, not before doing a round Tricep Dips & Push-ups on the way back though, which of course everyone was thrilled about.

It was then time for a 10-minute relay session in CG. We had teams of 4, which were spread out in a triangle route and each person just runs to the next point and tags their team mate who was waiting there.

To finish up we had a gentle jog back to The Forum.

We decided we'll be going to the pub after next week's run.

Sahara one night sand

On a day when the weirdest thing was the weather a small but select group of GoodGym runners met at Splashpoint. Tonight we welcomed back Lucy for her second GG task together with Duncan , Gill and Beth. Special mention to Belinda on a well earned holiday and massive GG healing vibes to Sue who has broken her knee after a horse incident. GG visitors coming your way next week !

This hurricane has my head swirling

Sailing close to the windy coastline of Worthing we opted for a sheltered route for our warm up through the precinct before arriving for our first visit to 'Stepping Stones' which is one of Worthing churches homeless projects. We were warmly met by Alistair who tasked us with a garden tidy up.

Weeding around the bush

After a distribution of tools we set about raking,weeding and pruning with a warm glow of head torches illuminating the garden.

To Dark up the wrong tree

30 minutes later and despite the darkness the beds had a complete makeover. Gone were the tall weeds and overgrown bushes to be replaced with smart looking earthy beds. The team were as energetic as follows

Duncan - Hoe hoe Lucy - Don't go raking my heart Beth - Weeding lights Gill - Pruning streak Alistair - All weeding aside

Lost but not least

After a tidy up and cheery goodbye we headed off west incorporating alternate tree and lampost sprints before hitting the seafront for some wind assisted running. It was all going so smoothly until I realised that I needed to be reunited with my car key that I had left at the task . So the girls made a slight detour back to the task to pick it up whilst Duncan set off on a wind assisted effort run back to base and then adding extra mileage in his legs by running back to meet us. Unfortunately Beth and I managed to misplace Lucy and Gill who literally went 'around the houses' looking for us and also driving Beth and I around several blocks trying to relocate them ! My fretful state was thankfully relieved when we all reunited along the precinct along with Duncan too. Happy times returned ( Phew !)

** As blind as a boot**

As we arrived back at my car there was another funny moment of madness when I was standing by the wrong car ( same colour and shape) trying to open the boot. Imagine the hilarity when we looked down the line of cars to see mine standing perfectly wide open!

The boot is on the other foot

Duncan experienced what it was like to stand in my shoes for few minutes with some amusing post run moments of trying on my Hoka's accompanied by Lucy's sloe gin and vodka making stories that would 'make your hair sand on end'

Although the nights are dark you are always assured of a bright welcome at GoodGym Worthing. Hope to see you next week

All the best

Julia :)

Tonight took us on a 3.2km each way run to a local independent charity shop to do some weeding and general tidying up around the grounds of it.

A big occasion this week as 5 of our runners were taking part in their 10th GoodGym Norwich group run. So a big shout out to Robert, Samantha, Catherine, Katy and Carl. A fantastic achievement considering we're only on our 15th run!

Catherine had asked me to give everyone a "chocolate finger" when we got back to say thanks.

Bill volunteered to be back runner this week and Simon has the most amazing Head Torch known to man, although it dazed me for about 5 minutes!

Dan Harris has now completed his Leadership in Running Fitness training as well as his GoodGym Run Leader training - I'll explain more in this week's fitness email. To mark this occasion Dan sported an amazing Xmas Light outfit for tonight's run #legend... check out the photos of Rudolph.

On arrival, Hilary gave me a quick overview of what needed doing and everyone got involved straight away as they always do. Simon, Michelle and Catherine took me up on the offer of trimming the bush as it had overgrown.

It was such a thorough task, not a weed left in sight! I'm not sure if Katy standing in the garden waste bin to flatten it would have passed my Risk Assessment haha.

After a group picture we headed back to The Forum with a few fun activities on the way back. The 1st was a wall sit competition to see who could hold it the longest. It got down to Tim and Dan left... with the latter being crowned the champion. The strain on Rob Riley's face will never be forgotten though!

Further along the journey back we stopped for a pairs strength showdown to see who was the strongest. It included a pushing and pulling contest.

Another great turnout and you can sign up to next week's run here.

On a breezy late summers evening in not so sunny Worthing 7 runners set off for a warm up run to and around the pier before arriving just opposite Anchor Gardens for a ground force style garden makeover in double quick time.

Weeding around the bush

In a digging weeding and pruning frenzy of activity we found a plethora of hidden rocks, gems, gnomes and other buried treasure .It always amazes me just how much work a small and committed GoodGym team can achieve in a such a short amount of time and tonight was no exception.

Makeover makes perfect

Duncan got stuck into the digging describing his Go Ape adventure over the weekend but there was no monkeying around this evening !

Michelle applied some brute force on some stubborn remains of a tree as well as hands and knees weeding with our host Chrystabell .

Flowerbeds transformed from weed ridden to freshly dug over soft earth. Nick did some fine pruning on the evergreen bush known as 'Lemon Cypress Wilma' and even managed to provide Belinda with a shower of green highlights to compliment her recent haircut ( She almost got an extra trim ! )

Gill didn't need to make a besom ( broom ) this week so instead attacked the ivy with the same energy as she does bindweed with an impressive few bags of results.

Beth seemed to be keeping a low 'rafael ' this evening with intricate weeding thinly disguising some mobile tennis action :) However her GG superpowers are steadily growing.....

Efforts make us fitter

With some very happy faces and humble thanks we waved goodbye and headed off on another shortish run to Homefield Park for the fitness session centered around the outdoor gym.

This proved fast and fun with tag teams alternating with sprints around the park and circuits on the equipment. As the efforts on the running got harder I did observe that the seated options on the machines appeared to be particularly popular.

Some chin up strength work completed the fitness element before the group split into 2 for the run back to base and stretches.

Fun times ahead

We finished off with some planning for a GoodGym social. Watch this space for more details coming soon .

Thanks so much for your hard work and dedication team . Tonight was the complete essence of a good deed.

Julia :)

Tonight we welcomed Good Gym Ipswich Trainer Ian who was leading the session in preparation for their launch next Monday.

There was me thinking I'd get the night off but everyone else was like "you can join in tonight then".

We had 2 new runners so Richard and Henry were welcomed to the group.

Ian continued with the rest of the intro and then took us through a warm-up.

Catherine, Samantha and Michelle chose to be back runners.

We then headed off to Sprowston Community Hub, which consisted of a nice 5km+ run in 28 degress heat.

A couple of regrouping occasions on the way saw us doing some wall push-ups... and yes I did join in that too :-)

Once we arrived at the the hub, Task Owner Mike talked through what jobs he had for us, which were 1) Sawing off branches from the Leylandii 2) Shovelling soil into wheelbarrows to unload on flower beds 3) Hoeing the soil on the flower beds.

Everyone split into different groups for the task with Laura being the only hoe-er... there was only one hoe to use.

Ian set the task time for 30 minutes and everyone got hard at work.

It was definitely an evening for Innuendos but I won't go into that!

After 30 minutes of hard work, we collected the tools in, Katy handed out biscuits to everyone and we got ready for the journey back.

Just before we got to The Forum we finished the session with a 100-meter (or so) sprint up Gentleman's Walk.

A massive thanks to Ian for coming along and leading the session and I'm sure he'll make GoodGym very successful in Ipswich.

You can sign up to our next week's run here.

Another super long run on the cards tonight... 11.5km in fact!

We welcomed new runners Jonny, Jane and Holly - you picked a good one for your 1st ever GoodGym run :-)

Considering the distance tonight of this evening's run, I was very impressed with the turnout of 18 runners.

We did a little squat based warm up... not sure what everyone thought of the 'in & out' squats though!

Dan volunteered to be back runner this week and so we headed off to Bowthorpe Heritage Community Gardens.

It was good to see David aka Stick Man return and he duly found a stick to run with again this week :-)

So we arrived at the task, in quicker time than I anticipated actually and were greeted by some lovely volunteers of the gardens. It was a very pretty site and they talked through what jobs were in hand for us to do. the group split up so some were weeding the stoned path area, some were weeding general flower beds and the others weeding the camomile bed.

Now to a lot of people's amusement (and bearing in mind my herb knowledge isn't the best) my ability to try and pronounce 'camomile' wasn't the greatest. Attempt 1 = Calamari, Attempt = Cannelloni. If the pronunciation wasn't difficult enough, there's even 2 ways of spelling it! The Americans spell it Chamomile.

Apologies for any funny pictures - I was in a bit of a selfie mood this week!

After 30 minutes of hard and impressive work, we got together all the weeds etc. we managed to collect and there was a lot there! the team got treated - I supplied cookies while they were working and then the garden volunteers provided everyone with some juice before we left for the long journey back.

We all headed back and the run started with a lovely uphill section to get the legs going! Once we got to Earlham Road I let everyone push on for the stretch of road leading up to the bridge, where we all regrouped before the last part to The Forum.

I know next week is Bank Holiday but it'd be great to see some more of you make it to next week's run.

As I arrived towards The Forum I was praying several Good Gym runners would also be braving the rain this evening... it pretty much had been raining all day in Norwich non stop and it wasn't looking like it was going to disappear anytime soon... but of course the weather doesn't stop our runners at GoodGym, we go out in all conditions and in fact we had our 2nd largest group run so far!

It was great to welcome new GoodGym runners Catherine, Carl, Karen and Melanie.

Tonight's task was to move a big pile of wood at a Scout Group in Lakenham

Our run took us through the picturesque Lakenham Way, a route I myself have never been down before. Tonight's pace was pretty fast too, I was impressed with every runner and back runner Laura ensured the newer runners were well supported.

On arrival we saw a big pile of wood and were thinking "we ain't going to get all that moved surely!"

Alun greeted us and explained where it all needed moving to, our GoodGym volunteers got there Gloves on and there was never wasting time, they got stuck straight in.

The wood was in all shapes and sizes and my favourite quote of the evening was Lydia's "I've got a really long one".

The guys smashed the task and were getting a little excited that they might have an early finish (shame they didn't know what I had in-store for them).

Once we packed up and said thanks to Alun, we started to head back and this was when I announced we would (well they would) be doing a circuit session in Chapelfield Gardens when we got back... cue several moans and groans and offers to do other tasks at the Scout Group hahaha.

We arrived at Chapelfield Gardens and I did a quick head count to make sure no-one skived off. We started with a continuous circuit (AMRAP) of burpees, saints, star jumps and bear crawls :-) this was also the time where I was no longer anyone's friend. After this everyone thought it was all over... but I had other intentions so to finish up they had to do the 600 metre perimeter of Chapelfield Gardens as quickly as possible.

Another fantastic turnout and a great evening with an awesome bunch of people.

Details of next week's run ... get signed up :-)