Hedging our bets for a jubilant Jubilee

With a three day working week, everyone was in high spirit! Sam had arrive at Old Spike Roastery fairly early as he does, but this time sporting a Union Jack bowler hat. Of course! It was the start of the Jubilee weekend.

Javier (Old Spike Roastery manager) and Sam were talking away when Daryl and Gemma walked in. Daryl had mentioned Gemma many times, so it was great to see that she actually exists 👀 It was a pleasure to have Gemma come along for her first Good Deed on a special group run. To add to the celebrations, Saskia arrived shortly afterwards for her second group run/good deed in a row! Benjamin, Emma and Nelly also meet us at Old Spike and Anna joined us for the last of the warm-up before our introductions...

Our ice-breaker question tonight was to do with the Queen's Platinum Jubilee. He wanted to know: What is your favourite thing about the Queen, the Royal family or if you are a "republican"; favourite thing about Britain?

We started off with Coronation Chicken and ended with her dedication to serve the interest of Britain in a role she was thrown into. Others provided: the Jubilee weekend, Meghan Markle and her beloved Corgis.

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Secret Escapes

Our group run, which was led by Sam and backmarked by Emma (thank you) both ways covered 4k in total, but the outbound run took us to our favourite hill to get us to Camberwell in the shortest amount of time as our run was covered in 15 minutes.

Alex and Anna (who had cycled there after our warm-up) were already in the Secret Garden with Cadence. Noticing that Emma was missing, Cadence gave a background to the Secret Garden whilst she took out the tools from the shed. After a few minutes, Emma finally found her way and we all set off to plant some hedges.

Cadence gave us some tips about planting hedges before we all took a shade (or fork) each and 1-2 hedge saplings to plant. With some "Best of British" playlist beltering out, we planted and watered the hedglings within 10-15 minutes. We still had 20-25 minutes on the clock, yet Cadence had a few tasks up her sleeve. She got half the group to weed outside the entrance of the Secret Garden whilst the other half took the smallest shades they could find to shovel some woodchip in a tonne bag to bring it back to the Secret Garden.

Sam being a stickler for the time called the session at 19:55 giving enough time to put away tools and take a group photo before the cyclists and runners split off. Yet, most pf us met back at Old Spike due to the social we had afterwards.

No HIIT or Squat session this time around due to the social, but it will be back next week!

Our social was supporting our (Old Spike's) neighbour, Bo Kiri, by buying can drinks (alcoholic and some non-alcoholic) before we walked over to find a "sunny spot" in Peckham Rye park.

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Thank You to all the GG-ers

A personal thanks from me to all those who came and ran tonight! Our traditional route with the added incline (Grove Hill) was back! It's a pleasure to get the numbers that we had as the task owner (this time, Cadence) can really see the benefits of GoodGym. Thanks to all those who stayed for the social in Peckham Rye Park too!

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Thank You Cadence

GoodGym is all about getting fit and doing good! We praise the runners/cyclists/walkers who come to get fit and help out, but we often forget about our task owner. I would like to take this opportunity to thank Cadence for thinking on your feet after we completed the main task that we came over for within 10-15 minutes. It is always a delight and we're looking forward to our next session in a month or two.