Our excellent 8 took on a sea of invasive cherry tree saplings at Everton Park.

After rethinking the session - original to be held in the orchard area of the park but changed for lack of fruit! - we met John from Friends of Everton Park with a boot full of loppers. Once everyone had found the meeting spot, we chose our tools and headed towards an area overrun with self-planted saplings and got to work.

We lopped and we sawed and we carried felled saplings for close to an hour. While we did a fine job, sadly we didn't quite beat back every tree. Luckily, we visit Everton Park regularly so can keep this on our to-do list for now.

Extra kudos to everyone who ran to tonight's session but thanks and well done to everyone.

We're back at Everton Park on 21 September and you can sign-up here.

11 mighty GoodGymers (or a dozen if you include Penny-Flo the Whippet) laughed in the face of torrential downpours to run together in Char's fave park.

Being based in a city at the edge of the country and in a flattish area, Liverpool sadly isn't the best place for trail running enthusiast. However, the 2.75km trail around south Liverpool's Calderstone's Park offer a 15 minute break from the concrete jungle and a leap into greener (and muddier) terrains.

We arrived just in time for a rain shower of Biblical proportions and took shelter under the trees to wait it out while waiting for the final few to arrive. As if by divine intervention, the showers ceased and there was even some blue sky, as we set off on our first lap.

It had been a while since most of us had run together, plus for many, it was their first time at this park and/or their first time trail running. All of these things combined made for a really fun time. Things got muddy, shoes and legs got dirty, but that just added to the fun!

After one lap a handful headed home while the rest of us went for the double, clocking just under 6km in total.

Big kudos to John who ran after Emma (who'd walk ahead with the puppy) to get her car keys and caught her AND the worst of the rain!

Thanks for so much fun folks! Don't forget to sign-up for Let's All Run An Ultra, if you haven't already ;)

7 GoodGymmers visited Liverpool’s Irish Centre to help with their post lockdown renovations.

Despite the gardening tools being locked away and the key missing, each member of the team was given a task so we could stay socially distant and maximise our efforts with what we had.

Claire was pruning in the garden with some mighty shears (scissors), Christine painted behind the bar with Tim paining in the office area behind the bar. Char attacked a spiderweb laden vestibule area before paining and Sam rescued a bee (it counts as ‘work’). Lorna and Pauline cleaned out the courtyard area that was covered in Leaves and dirt!

The team then chipped in to move a big pile of peat and branches to the bins to be taken away. Good job team.

5 GoodGymers freshened up this beloved cultural centre.

The Pagoda Centre is a hub for Chinese culture and community in Liverpool, a city with the oldest Chinese population in Europe. The centre is slowly trying to reopen as lockdown eases and to welcome back members who access their many services.

Our task for the morning was to freshen up the place for their returning members by painting the lower half of the walls in the centre's main hall. With John and Lorna on one side, Eimear, Pauline and I on the other, we managed to complete the task in just over an hour. Smartening the place up and making it feel clean and welcoming.

Centre Director Zi Lan offered us all a packet of face masks so say thank you. This was a first! We are often offered biscuits, but this new gift sure was a sign of the times! Luckily, dispite the pandemic, we're now able to get back into the community and offer some GoodGym people power.

Great work team!

Find out what's coming up over the next few weeks here.