No lino down on the job!

Defying the cold, 24 hardy souls trotted merrily through Lewisham, covering around 4km and carrying out a whole host of tasks over at Crofton Books.

I think extra kudos should go to newcomers who choose this time of year to make the leap into all things GoodGym, none of this waiting until it gets warmer for these tough cookies! Lewisham Love then goes to Miriam and Adriana, who joined us for the very first time. It was great also to see a few faces who haven't been for a little while, you're always welcome to come along :)

Tonight's pre-run briefing was all about how much we can challenge ourselves in January. It's a tradition here at GoodGym to see just how much GOOD we can do as we start a new year. Looking at the stats for the past few months, Lewisham is hugely active in missions, coach running and we're also pretty good at covering the distances. Let's set ourselves a goal and see how far we can race past it! If you are already using Strava, you need to link it to your GoodGym profile and, if you're not yet tracking your activity, then get tracking and get linking! Easy.

It's so important to keep your warm-up dynamic, especially in this colder weather, so we had a head-to-head knees-up, heels-up, side-stepping kind of jaunt around the grass before heading over to Crofton Park to see what was in store tonight. It really was a-buzz with activity, with the Christmas trees being delivered, to sell between now and Christmas Eve and people coming in for a meeting in the children's library (sorry if we were a bit loud!). Jason introduced us to Storm, who is currently renovating some rooms within the building, to be used as work spaces for the community. Tonight's busyness meant there was a huge array of activity going on, including:

• sorting through, pricing and shelving books

• adding a bit more Dulux Denim Drift to the walls

• moving boxes of books, papers and so on from the top floor to the basement

• moving filing cabinets into the basement

• hoovering the dusty basement

• laying lino in the newly decorated rooms

• wrapping and moving Christmas trees

• acting out scenes from the early 90s with a giant mobile phone

We've completed some epic tasks in our time, but you have to agree that that is a big old list of achievements!

Usually, when we venture this way, we treat ourselves to some hill repeats on the way back but, as we stayed a little longer at the task, we simply ran up and over Hilly Fields (enjoying the lovely new paths, thanks Lewisham Council!), admiring the stunning view over the city and down the hill towards home.

Push off!

Or should that be push up? Day 27 of GoodGym York's press-up challenge, or maybe we can now claim it as Conroy's press-up challenge? Yes, he's still going strong! We all joined in, adopting various positions, some on their knees, some using the wall and some professionals using their toes. Good effort!

On Friday it will be December - yeeeeaaaahhhhhhh! Which means a few of us will be taking on the Run up to Christmas - this isn't a run-every-day challenge, just a nice little motivator to see us through the party season (with a shiny medal for our efforts). December also means another starter session, our pre-Christmas race and, of course, our Christmas social. Click on the links to sign up and join in the fun.

In the meantime, why not get into the Christmas spirit by joining us next Monday, as we head to our friends at Seniors, to put up the decorations, ahead of their get-together on Tuesday? This session will be led by Conroy, in my absence, but I will be back the following week for our last run before the big day. Be good!