As Good as Goldsmiths

Running out into the dark, twenty two of Lewisham's finest took on 8km of running, a whole path's worth of weeding, sweeping and clearing and delivered a few hundred flyers to neighbouring houses.

That's impressive isn't it?!

Joining us this week for their very first group run were Rosemary and Nakisa, with Sophie sampling the delights of Lewisham, having ventured over to Hackney previously - we hope you enjoyed our south eastern brand of good-doing! If you click on their names, you can give them a cheer, there's nothing nicer than waking up to a cheer-alert :)

High-five!

Our warm-up took us out of the cosy warmth of the foyer at Glass Mill, into the darkness of Lewisham central, autumn is most definitely here. After a name-check, some jolly high-fiving and some dynamics, we were off, no messing about! We had 8km to run! Thank you to a top team of back-markers, Stephen, Velile, Chris and Nykolette - who was sparkle-fresh from her birthday weekend in Brussels, where she did a moonlit night run to celebrate! Perfect.

It's been a long time since we visited Goldsmiths Community Centre, so some of our newer runners were a little confused. As I say each time, it's nothing to do with that other Goldsmiths, the one in New Cross, it's a lovely community centre over in SE6! Our run was long, it had twists and turns, it had long, straight roads and it had plenty of chatter. It's amazing how quickly you tick off the miles when you're talking to the person next to you. We tried to stay together, regrouping as and when we could but, it seems inevitable on these longer runs that we should become separated. Great work then from our back-markers, who kept our runners motivated and arrived around the corner shortly after the front runners.

Teamwork

We were met by Lucie, the new Community Development Worker at Goldsmiths. While I waited for everyone to arrive, Lucie took the group to collect some tools and showed them through the building to the sports court area (this place is huge, there are two halls and very many other rooms used by all sorts of groups throughout the week). Alongside the path are flowerbeds, which needed clearing of weeds, in preparation for the after-school club using the space. At the front of the building we had Team Flyer, delivering cards for Blenheim, who had requested that we spread the word in this area, perfect timing! Working in pairs, with direction from Caireen and Kim, our top posties covered neighbouring streets, distributing a few hundred cards in a short space of time - excellent work and thank you team leaders (and to all those who helped to carry the flyers, Kim, James, Stephen and Vic).

With our run being longer, time flew by even faster than usual, but this was just fine, because the flyers had flown and the weeds were no more. It was great being able to take on an outdoor task, with floodlighting and Lucie informed us that there will be plenty more to do in the coming months - we'd better get in training for those long runs!

Those of us who have done this run before know that the return leg is so much easier...down hill!! Weeeeeeeeeee! Well, I say down hill, you do have to run a bit before you get to that downward incline, but it feels great to fly back to our start point. En route I had a lovely conversation with Sarah, who told me that she and Ali had been inspired to revisit Lewisham Irish Centre at the weekend and help out at Foodcycle, where surplus food, that would ordinarily go to waste, is put to good use at a community meal. How wonderful to hear about our runners extending their volunteering beyond our group run (and Ali was full of all-round energy and enthusiasm, having ventured to Hilly Fields first thing to try her very first parkrun)!

You may have noticed in the past few months, we have paused along the way to take photos near our rather pretty local murals. We have the 'Welcome to Ladywell', the 'Hither Green' and tonight we ran past a new and marvellously colourful mural popping up just by our start point, lifting a normally dreary bridge. We just had to add it to our collection! Next week we will run back this way, returning to the Lewisham Irish Centre to finish the painting (we might also have a second task, to be confirmed - keep an eye on Twitter @GGLewisham). Good luck to our very own Spartan, Nykolette, who is taking on her most epic challenge yet at the weekend, be strong Nyk, you inspire us all!