And a Holly good time was had by (St Stephen's) Hall!

What a perfect night to be doing Goodgym! Although a little balmy there was some leftover seaside bank holiday magic in the air and Brighton and Hove felt like the perfect place to be going for a run!

We had 5 new recruits tonight. A big welcome to Tabitha, Cara, Hannah, Becky & Harriet.

During the intro speech we shared the news that Goodgym now has 4,000 members and that Rachael & Helena have paid their first visits to their new coaches. If you are interested in being paired with an older person to visit to motivate you to go running then bring in your documents and we’ll get the ball rolling.

We had 2 tasks tonight to cater for those who wanted a longer run of a whopping 10km and a shorter run of 4km.

Helena led the group to BHT’s (Brighton Housing Trust) First Base project at St Stephen’s Hall and here follows her report.

*BHT * This week 14 runners ran 4km to clear a yard for BHT's Day Centre. There was weeding, clearing rubbish and a general tidy up.

Thank you to Becky who used her florist skills to explain to us the different plants we found in the planter; including thyme and potatoes!

A big shout out to Hannah who must have the strongest stomach in Brighton. She helped empty a very smelly bin that resembled a festival loo...

After helping Andy at BHT we pushed on to the Hove Lawns to get our fitness on! We split into pairs with one runner doing planks, squats, crunches and star jumps while their partner ran two widths of the lawns. We took in the sunset as we ran back to YHA along the seafront, singing along to the music playing outside Brighton Music Hall.

I received the following text from task owner Andy

Tara,they were amazing- thank you and them so much from everyone at BHT and Firstbase’

Ingrams I led the smaller group of 6 brave runners to Ingram’s Crescent Community Garden all the way over to Hove/Portslade border. What a fantastic project! It’s a huge garden in a square in the middle of the Ingram’s housing estate. It was previously maintained by the council but had been seriously neglected in recent years. But now a community group led by Lee is taking over the maintenance and its providing a social hub for the estate. There is so much to do here so tonight we just concentrated on clearing one bed. There was a lot of stubborn holly and ivy to clear and after half an hours hoe, hoe hoeing the work was done. Lee and his team were delighted with what we achieved and we hope we can make regular visits to help them get this garden back to what it once was. A shout out to Lydia on choosing the harder option and completing your longest run in several months.

Lee, the task owner tweeted

’thank you very much for the fabulous work done tonight, it made a big difference’

Next week are all staying together for one task at Exeter Street Hall so sign up now!