Lights! Camera! Action!

Last night in Hounslow we were the (slightly sweaty) stars of the silver screen as the council had come along to make a little film about being active in the borough.

But before we could learn our lines and hit make up, we had our usual hellos and well dones. Hat tip to all that did park runs this week - way to go Matthew and David - and to Andy who is topping both the distance and good deed leagues. Have a look at the heroes boards to see where you are. But now Natasha has stopped her Strava flat lining who knows what will happen in the rankings!

After a quick warm up and some Chariots of Fire style shots of the group running, wind in our hair, past our starting point at the Town Hall, we set off on the 1.5 mile run to Waterman's Arts Centre. Dave took us on a lovely route under Kew Bridge and along the tow path. We must have looked quite the team with every single one of us in our red GG tshirts. Lovely stuff! Before long we made it to the centre - Waterman's is an amazing independent charity where all the money made is ploughed back into the organisation to allow the whole community access to arts, bringing them together through cultural participation.

We cracked straight on with our task, which was to weed the outside pathways which had become overgrown. We were given gloves and a range of tools including one which we could not work out - please see picture and if anybody can shed any light on it then let us know! There were also snails, lots of snails, which Remy and Natasha rescued.

Within half an hour the pathway was looking lovely and clear of weeds, so we set off back to the park to do a quick round of upper body, legs and core workouts. It was a speedy run back - well done team. We started with the arms - three rounds of tricep dips, wide arm press ups, and diamond press ups before moving on to legs, which involved doing lunges, mountain climbers (argh) and then a squat hold. We had a little break as a lovely person came over and asked what we were doing - we must have been a great advert for GoodGym! Then we finished off with a third round of core exercises featuring, of course, planks.

Next week we are off to help out Roger and the homeless shelter he runs at Ealing Road Baptist Church, which you can sign up to here which is going to be followed by a super special first ever Hounslow GG SOCIAL! I know. There are more details on the Hounslow GG facebook page or email me. Can't wait to see you there!

28 runners ran 5km to clear the garden at the Charlton United Reformed Church!

Well yesterday was the hottest day of the year so far and it was also the longest! Double whammy! And what a beautiful (read:sweaty) evening it was. I think between us we must have sweated enough to fill Charlton lido! Well I certainly did anyway. So big well done for coming out and running in those sticky conditions, you did GREAT!

It was also a special day because our very own Ben Cooper (aka Mr Greenwich) turned 50 last week (50 good deeds of course - you don't look a day over 25 Ben) so it was the perfect excuse to have a social after our run! And probably was the only thing keeping some people going by the end!

New recruits!

We were joined by 3 new runners yesterday... Vickie's friend Sarah, Brin's girlfriend Kerry and Scott who has run with GG Bromley before! WELCOME ALL!!!!

We did a little warm up in our usual spot, not that it took much to get everyone warm..! The two Bens led a faster group to the church while the rest of us attempted to take it easy! We went through the park, up a pretty awful hill (sorry) but everyone did it WITHOUT STOPPING which was AMAZING!!!! A little rest at the top, and a sweaty photo by the nice tree then we pushed on.

On arrival at the church, we met Andrew who took us through to get some water and some fake squash to Vickie's disappointment. It was definitely hotter inside than out so we got out of there pretty swiftly and cracked on! Group 1 had already got stuck in, hacking away at the garden and filling bin bags with weeds. There were plenty of tools to go around so we handed them out and got to work on the other side of the church!

We had a bit less time than I anticipated due to all my faffing and photos so the decision was made to skip the fitness session and stay a bit longer at the task. After 25 minutes, the place was looking AMAZING! Mission "sign Ben's card" was well under way and seemed to be more difficult than the task itself! Especially when Steve takes up 50% of the card with his sentiments!

A big group photo in front of the church and then we were ready to head back. We ran home as one big group which was lovely :) a nice little stretch on the grass and then that was it!

PUB TIME!!!

Alex had kindly booked some tables at the Old Brewery and I had totally forgotten about their outside space and it was LOVELY! Andy was spotted taste testing one of Mridula's INCREDIBLE cupcakes! At the run a few weeks ago, I asked everyone's favourite cake so she could make Ben's favourite... and of course he went for BLACK FOREST GATEAU. I remember seeing Mridula's eyes roll back so far into her head that day, but what an amazing job she did, they were DE-LISH!

The twins had kindly prepped a quiz for Mr Greenwich about all things Greenwich and I think it's safe to say that everyone was blown away by Ben's Greenwich knowledge! Lots of food and drinks later and we headed home. What a lovely evening!

Thanks so much for coming everyone! Hope you had a nice time and well done for coping so well in that heat! For those of you who are new or who haven't yet, please join our GoodGym Greenwich FB group! See you next week where we are helping out again at Neil's school!