A fine weathered day led to a great turnout at GG! Leanne saw us all waiting and thought 'nah, those lot look too charming and fun' so went to join the walking crowd taking Laurie and the litter picking equipment with her. Martin arrived with his trombocinos which we all obviously identified on sight, and DJ Andy recreated his favourite 00's popstar moment. I gave the runners the choice of three distances and we settled on the middle one, Rich leading us out with such aplomb that Paul wondered when since his last task that we had started to hit it so hard! We paused our Endeavour at the Endeavour for comedy's sake.

The race was on against the sunset clock and we all worried about Ben when he took a tumble trying to do a heel click! Fortunately he was fine, must be something to do with the socks which Rob would be proud of.

We met up with the others and spied the womblers had already picked six bags! Still we have keen eyesight and a will to do good. As Heidi, Kate and I debated what art was (Banksy doesn't, GoodGym run report photos do) we got to work. As we got closer to the river and the new bridge, which looks lovely, we split into two groups. Drinks on Jess as she found £50 and Sallyann had already had those drinks with a pile of smirnoff bottles. Fay complained about having to take photos of the Hokey Cokey boat, but then leaped at the chance to photo me by a 'Fat earth dave.com' sign....funny that.

As twilight descended, Russell led us back to base for a 7km overall run - 1/3 of a great north run (entries now open!). Next week is painting the town red with our shirts and painting some benches so sign up!

A new location, a new task and a huge turnout!

Maybe it’s the back-to-school vibes around, or maybe everyone just wanted a good look at the meat and fish bazar over the road, but FOURTEEN of us turned out on Wednesday and ran 3.5 km to St Luke’s Church in Moulsham Lodge.

We welcomed a couple of new faces at the gym and they’ve already proven to be good ones. Robert outdressed us all – despite not even having a GoodGym top yet – with his snazzy matching socks and shorts in unloseable multicolour.

It was also Heidi’s first time joining us and she lay down the marker immediately in a Parkrun 50 top. She didn’t mention a post-Parkrun fry-up once, and she’s also doing the Great North Run this weekend with Robert. Folks, we’ve found ourselves a runner.

David was run leading and had represented us with Laurie at a garden party earlier that day. We’d been invited in thanks for some of the gardening work we’d done, so thanks to the organisers, and apparently the shortbread was “excellent.” They also met Rich’s dad, who is absolutely lovely and wasn’t surprised at all that Rich spends most of his time with us just having a chat. In fact, he was so lovely that it could steer a big decision: there’s still time to put money on baby Chatterjee being called Keith…

Walkers were out in force as we also welcomed Jane back to GoodGym. She definitely helps to keep her husband in line, and also managed to stop him getting lost somewhere behind Lidl.

With 14 people, weeding the paths at the front of the church (or the top of the church…?) didn’t take long, despite stopping for a photo break. They were cleaner than celebrity skin in a razor advert by the time we were done.

Neither newbie seemed scared by Joe brandishing a screwdriver and asking if anyone needed their cracks seen to – it’s like they’ve been here for years. Jess even suggested that be tonight’s headline. St Luke’s have already shared the photo and other churches in the area are already interested! Send us an email to request us, just put “GodGym” in the subject line please. And while we’re talking support, if you’re a Marksies Spender then you can link your Sparks card to us and we get some funding every time you shop there. Win-win!

Thanks for a great task, good luck up north to Heidi and Robert, and see you all next week!

We rendezvoused at our usual spot, Erin concerned her legs might not work after spin class but they ended up doing good, and most of us had a light jog down the highstreet to Meadow View Cottage (not Rich who got competitive with the local youth and took off in a sprint).

Sallyann joined us there armed with her trusty gloves and we divided into two groups to tackle some light weeding at the carpark and small jungle clearance at the back of the garden.

David enjoyed making hoe jokes - but not when Laurie was in earshot. We found out poor Martin can't eat chocolate, distracts himself with courgettes and cheese.

The Peaceful Garden was full of anarchy as Joel and Richard showed us what could be done with the power of love pure rage. Richard especially wasn't going to call it quits until every last stalk had been hacked down.

Good luck to Meadow View on their open day on Wednesday! Hope the weather holds out for you and thank you for inviting the Goodgymers.

Have a great week, enjoy parkruns and pizza until next time.

August means quiet turnouts generally, but there were still a decent handful of members around to welcome Baton to his first ever GoodGym! What a night to join. Beaulieu Community Centre is our furthest task area from the meeting point and it was extremely muggy, so we followed the motto “we get there – eventually” and took it easy on the way up. Andy even managed to find the cut-through we stumbled on last time. We arrived to find Team Car already on site and briefed to clean the windows on the community centre. Martin immediately got put to work on the top bits and swapped a now-traditional backpack of courgettes for a bucket and cloth. Sallyann was absolutely delighted by free courgettes – almost as much as Martin was at managing to actually empty his weighty bag. Fay seemed much less interested, but held off on fish and chips this time (or if she did get some for the drive home, she resisted sharing a photo this time!) A group upstairs were blasting dance music, but the downstairs karate kids were far more discreet. So it was a huge surprise for Joe, mid-squeegee, as the curtains of a now extremely clean window opened and he suddenly had an audience of confused-looking children. The run back from Beaulieu is downhill all the way, but Rich was livid it couldn’t have been downhill to get there as well. In fairness, he’d done a 100 mile bike ride on Monday – the hottest day of the year – from Norwich back to Chelmsford and was clearly still feeling it. Top tip for recovery – a huge amount of pineapple juice, apparently. The weather looks great this weekend so expect some of us at Parkrun, others at the Basildon Inflatable 5k and maybe a deciding grudge match of Poohsticks to settle Joe and Andy’s one-all draw from last weekend. Stay tuned…

Run Happy

Joe