Rake me up before you go go

First up, a massive hello and welcome to Asa and Sinead. Give them a cheer, because tonight they came to their very first group run. Hooray!

News Round Up

Our GoodGym Tooting parkrun takeover happens this Saturday! We still need a few roles filled, such as token collector, run report writer and pre event set up, plus pacers for sub 20 and 30+. Please sign up here if you can make it and let's turn Tooting parkrun GoodGym red!

To finish off a lovely weekend of running volunteering, why not sign up to help out at the City Runs Fulham 10k this Sunday. As well as basking in a satisfied glow after spending your weekend helping other runners, you will also benefit from a medal, Adidas top and 50% off future City Runs events for your trouble! The only catch is that you have to sign up by Wednesday. Here’s the link to follow

Bus' a move

Tonight's task was at Leonard Chesire Disability centre - an organisation in Battersea which support individuals to live, learn and work as independently as they choose, whatever their ability. Led by people with experience of disability, they have a focus on community life here in Wandsworth.

But before we set off, we headed outside the BAC to warm up. It's particularly important at this time of year because starting to run without properly warming up cold muscles can easily lead to injury. It's just as important as the stretch afterwards -no excuses team!

After some dynamic moves to get our hearts pumping, we did our weekly poll. Tonight's burning question - with only six group runs left before Christmas what do you hope to find in your stocking (or other seasonal celebration)? You better be good boys and girls for the next few weeks if you want to find puppies, gin, a winning lottery ticket or Spice Girls tickets there!

It was a short run down to the charity, and we got there in no time at all to find tools, bags a washing equipment there ready and waiting for us to get stuck in. So, dividing up into teams, we took on three jobs:

Raking up the masses and masses of leaves around the building

Pulling up the weeds in the pathways and giving it a good spray with weedkiller

Washing the mobility buses (brrr!)

After 40 minutes of hard work, the place looked a lot tidier. Frank, who manages the centre, is always really grateful for the work we do here, and sends lovely emails to say thank you for our time and energy. This week he even left us a sweet treat int he shape of biscuits and water to "keep our energy levels up"!

With a sugar high imminent, it was a good time for us to run over to Battersea Park to knock out a tough fitness session. We started off with shuttle runs, which test both our endurance and pacing, before playing a quick game of 'What did you do this weekend?' - with either squats of sprints depending on our answers. It sounds like some of you had some very interesting Saturday nights!

After all that there was just time for our weekly plank minute before running back to the BAC to stretch it out. Brilliant work everybody, you all kicked off your week with some great running and a dose of do gooding too! Next week we have more of the same, so sign up here for more Monday fun.