The Great Brent-ish Bake Off

Five runners headed out on a 5km round trip to Roundwood Community Centre, which offers a wide range of activities for local young people, to help clean the kitchen and pack up equipment.

It was lovely to see a couple of new faces at the Queensbury on an almost spring-like Monday evening, Claire, covering for the lovely Ellie, welcomed Andy, who has worked his way East to West via a mixture of other GoodGyms along the canal, and first-timer Sam. Coralie and Dan also joined the gang.

We set off down Walm Lane and Willesden High Street, and once everyone was nice and warmed up, stopped in Roundwood park for some high-knees swing-kicks and jump squats to make sure the blood was really pumping before we arrived at our task for the night – a toasty hot kitchen in Roundwood Community Centre!

We followed our noses to the wonderful smell of Greek Easter Cookies emanating from the oven, and set to work with spray and cloths to wash up and get the place spick and span, before having a chance to sample some of the goods ourselves, and getting a tour of the facilities, including DJ studio, as we offered the freshly baked cookies to the local young people and community workers – they disappeared like hot cakes – no surprise there! We had a good chance to socialise as well as we helped to pack up some sports equipment, tables and chairs, but it was a bit sad to see the services being cut and a bit of uncertainty about the future as we left, we wish them lots of luck in finding funding to enable them to keep providing excellent services for local young people.

Then it was time for us to sign out and head off into the night again, but not without a quick abs session in the park, with imaginary bicycles, scissor legs, ab-twists and a bit of hanky-planky on the grass. We reached the infamous Uffington Road with enough puff still left to get to the top, building speed and intensity as we went, until we were giving it 100%, before taking it back to the Queensbury at a more comfortable pace. Dan put his newly acquired run leader training skills into action and led the cool-down stretches, before we all headed off home.

Great job, team Brent, thank you!!!