Somewhere over the rainbow way up Pride 🌈

15 runners ran with Pride this evening to hand out leaflets in order to let everyone know about what’s going on in Cardiff on the upcoming Bank Holiday Weekend - We don't want them missing out!

It’s Tuesday which can mean only one thing… It’s GoodGym day! Yes it is… and with this in mind many of us wake up with the same feeling on Tuesday mornings, that very same feeling you get waking up on Christmas day.

We meet at 6.15pm at the Big Moose Café on Frederick Street for our runs, and when the clock strikes 6.30pm we make our way outside for a quick warm up. This week, we did some warm up drills, our head count (We didn’t lose count this week either!) and we each stated said what our favourite colour was on the rainbow pride flag too! Here's a fact for you! In the original eight-color version of the pride flag, pink stood for sexuality, red for life, orange for healing, yellow for the sun, green for nature, turquoise for art, indigo for harmony, and violet for spirit. Athough there wasn't any new faces this week, it was AWESOME to have Harvey join us again this week for his second GoodGym run - He was wearing the GoodGym t-shirt too.

With our warm up done there was no further time to waste! Gian was ready and waiting for us down Cardiff Bay with a handful of flyers so we began running away from Big Moose at a pace that would actually outrun a moose – I think?! It's not everyday I get chased by them...

Which way shall we take to Cardiff Bay? Let’s take the Smart Way

If you didn’t know before, you do now. There is a route in Cardiff called Smart Way! It definitely is the smart way as it provides a shortcut over a railway line. There is also a bridge called Smart Bridge, however contrary to its name not everyone who passes over this bridge is smart, many cyclists completely missed the 'cyclists dismount' sign which was written in BIG BOLD LETTERS. We then continued our run down Lloyd George Avenue with some intermittent sprints thrown in.

”Thank you ever so much for coming! I’ve got a task up my sleeve for you, not actually up my sleeve as I don’t have any, but I do have a task for you.” (Gian said something along these lines :) )

Gian told us all about the Pride Cymru ethos and mission; Pride Cymru works for the promotion of the elimination of discrimination. Whether this be on the grounds of sexual orientation, gender, race, religion and ability. They work towards this through an annual celebration of equality and diversity, an event called Pride Cymru (Historically known as Cardiff-Wales LGBT Mardi Gras) You can find out more about this wonderful event and charity by clicking here.

Ben, Lucy and Mikey all said, "We went to the Pride Cymru event last year and watched the parade and it was so much fun!"

GIan then told us what our task was for the evening. Right GoodGym, in teams of three I need you to hand out as many of these Pride Cymru flyers as you can to members of the public... They want to know about this event which they currently don't know about, so you'll be doing them a favour! :)

Without any further deliberation, hesitation or procrastination everyone got straight to it. Emma, Aimee and Sue began running towards the first person they could see, their flyer poised at the ready. Emma and Sue took to the lower promenade deck and Emma, Adam, Harvey, Rosie and the rest of the squad handed out flyers around the shopping areas and by the Wales Millennium Centre. One team came back who had just visited Sunflower and I and mentioned about how they had bumped into a group of people who actually met one another at the Pride Cymru event 5 years ago and continue to meet and socialise to this very day.

Needless to say, the task was a success! There were many confused members of the public curious and bewildered about why there were a group of people running around in red t-shirts handing out flyers like it was a competition. This confusion prompted the joe public to take further notice of the flyers - This could only be a good thing! Members of the public thanked the runners for making them aware of this event which they said they knew nothing about)! One store even asked for posters and, if possible, a pride flag to be delivered to their store.

Time to run back!

We thanked Gian for an AWESOME task and then gathered together to allocate a lead runner and back marker for the return run back to Big Moose.

Deciding to take a scenic route back we ventured off Lloyd George Avenue and followed a different path… Just like a dentist would say, it’s a root canal! – Yes, this is was one of my awful jokes! – We actually followed a really scenic and quite discrete along a Canal Route to get back. There were some bridges we crossed over and one of the bridges was called Burpee Bridge and upon crossing this bridge one must do 10 burpees! Disclaimer: It is very unlikely it was actually called this name and such a rule of doing 10 burpees is also likely to be completely made up

It wasn’t long before we were running through town and arrived back at the Big Moose Café. We warmed down and then Ben opened up a pack of lollies for everyone (How very sweet of him!)

Next week’s run will be to help out at the Samye Foundation. It’s another task not to be missed, so click here to get signed up!