'Delayed Onset Gardening Gratification'

Every Wednesday Camden GoodGym meet up and run to a community group that needs help with a physical task. We get a fun social workout- and they get some help with a tough job. The perfect combination! On this week’s Group Run we ran to help out at Kingsgate Community Centre’s Gardening Club.

"Kingsgate Community Gardening Club... aim to get the whole community working together to spruce up the area"

The Centre is brilliant, offering a range of diifferent services for the local community. The gardening club aim to get the whole community working together to spruce up the area and recently entered the Britain in Bloom competition. Co-ordinator AJ hopes the GoodGym crew can inspire others to get involved- and we managed to draw a large audience to Kilburn Grange Park where we broke up the earth in one of the many flower beds.

"Despite a mini long cut (and stop to consult the map) we made it to the Park in just over 30mins, covering between 5-6k in the process"

We set off from Kentish Town Community Centre and slalomed our way across North London to Kingsgate. Despite a mini long cut (and stop to consult the map) we made it to the Park in just over 30mins, covering between 5-6k in the process. This meant we didn’t have a great deal of time to get the job done, so quickly set about breaking up the ground with whatever tools we could lay our hands on. We did learn that rakes aren’t particularly good at smashing up parched earth....

"we quickly set about breaking up the ground with whatever tools we could lay our hands on"

While waiting for some extra spades one group performed some balance exercises while the others got stuck in- brushing up leaves, loosening soil, and lugging around big buckets of water to feed the plants. We were a blur of activity- constantly swapping roles and dashing to and from the tool shed to pinch extra spades. As the clock struck 8pm the park warden starting ringing his bell and came looking for his tools. Despite trying to ignore his ringing by making a last push to get it all done we eventually had to down tools and start our run back to the centre.

"We were a blur of activity- constantly swapping roles and dashing to and from the tool shed to pinch extra spades"

We broke into small pace groups and headed for home, covering the distance quicker than we managed on the route out! Over the course of the evening we managed to cover 11k- not bad at all. Antanasios will have to take back his claim that he wasn’t much of a runner now! Great running by everyone- embrace the DOMS y’all...sorely ‘Delayed Onset Muscle Soreness’ for those who aren’t boring. Nice one!

"Great running by everyone- embrace the DOMS y’all"