A briar engagement

14 runners met last night to clear a huge patch of brambles on behalf of Ealing Transition Community Garden!

Lovely to see lots of regulars and some returning faces but we also had one new runner with us, welcome to Emily who got stuck straight on her first GoodGym task!

We started our evening off with a short run through the parks, we'll soon have to say goodbye to our beloved Walpole and Lammas for the year as the nights quickly draw in so we took the opportunity to squeeze an extra lap before the task while we still had the last of the fading light. And beautiful it was! There's something so lovely about catching the final bit of sunset when the parks are empty, very therapeutic! It was a great opportunity for the group to open up and run at their own pace with both mile and half mile loop options to suit everyones fitness level too, ah I do love a bit of Lammas!

A ramble for a handful of bramble

We then met Vanessa in the community garden which is situated at the top of Lammas Park, she was armed ready with all the tools we needed to tackle the big patch of bramble we had in store! Double gloving was advised and we all grabbed our weapon of choice and got snipping! Working in little teams it was time to shine with our head torches lighting the way task at hand.

It didn't take us long before the patch was clear and all the remained was a huge pile of briar, a great centerpiece for a triumphant victory group picture! I'm sure we'll be back again next spring as these brambles don't scare that easily but we can rest safe in the knowledge that we've tackled them as best we can this year. Now the garden is a safer space for the groups of children that come in and use it as an education space, great work everyone!

Witness the fitness

Just a short jog back and a quick stop off to get our hearts racing and legs burning with a brief fitness session. We had lots of options and variations for everyone to work at their desired level and we kept all the half marathoners safe ahead of this Sunday's Ealing Half race! So all the remains is to say good luck to everyone running on Sunday and I'll see you in the pub afterwards!