Myself and Ivo had a lovely time with Mr P.

Though we both we were both travelling by bike from Bethnal Green, we were not organised enough to coordinate doing the journey together! When we arrived, Mr P had all the tools ready and showed us what needed to be done. The main task he wanted to focus on was cutting back the branches of his tree in the front garden.

Mr P gave me a masterclass in how to use a telescopic lopper, so I tackled the high up bits with that while Ivo went for the lower hanging branches with a garden sheers. As we finished up with the tree, the shining sun gave us the energy we needed to tackle some weeds afterwards and leave Mr P with a tidier looking front garden.

Unfortunately most of the photos we took reveal the address so I've just left some zoomed in pictures of the tree before and after.

We had a great group of 16 runners gathering at Hollybush tonight, braving a very chilly (but thankfully dry!) evening to take on a truly mulch-needed mission, shifting a massive new delivery of mulch and transforming the space in record time 🌿❄️

It was lovely to see a mix of familiar faces alongside some new ones, including Justin, who joined us for his very first GoodGym task, a huge welcome to you!

Meeting on site, we quickly broke out the tools and got straight to work. Our task was to spread the fresh mulch across James Middleton Community Garden, giving the beds a smart new layer to protect the soil and prep everything for future planting. At the same time, some of the previously laid mulch had broken down beautifully and was ready to be dug up and reused in the planting areas, a great example of garden recycling in action 🌱♻️

With Margaret and Michael expertly leading the charge, we soon formed a slick production line, shovelling, barrowing, spreading, and smoothing. Despite the cold, everyone kept moving as the mulch piles steadily disappeared and the garden visibly transformed before our eyes.

In just 45 minutes, what had looked like a huge job was completely turned around. The beds were freshly covered, the planting areas prepped, and the whole garden space was looking smarter, tidier, and ready for the next stage of growing.

We wrapped up with our new group photo method: everyone forming a circle, bending over and facing the camera on the ground while someone captured it in .5 mode, (Thank you to Emma for the idea) resulting in a wonderfully ridiculous (and very GoodGym) moment to end the session on

All in all, a brilliant evening of teamwork, community support, and a seriously mulchtastic transformation, huge thanks to everyone who came along and made such a difference despite the chilly temperatures!

High energy, positive vibes and a big impact - it's all in a night's work at GoodGym Westminster!

It was amazing to welcome members of North Paddington Youth Club to our session last night. Waleed, MJ and Husan have all been making some incredible stuff happen, from foodbank collections, to walking cricket for the elderly, big cleans ups and more. Why not check out upcoming sessions and join them?

We also gave a big welcome to Vita who came along to her very first group run - great to meet you Vita!

We met up in a busy Hyde Park with no sign of the predicted storm, and found a place away from the army of bikes streaming in for our warm up. We tested our brains as well as muscles which was a challenge - and resulted in some 'interesting' high fives! After a quick discussion about our chosen super power (super strength rated very highly, although you all already seem to have that) we set off for the task.

The Abbey Centre in Victoria is an important resource for local people, offering support in the form of hot food, legal advice, somewhere warm, therapy and classes. Our job was outside in the garden, so we made our way through the building and divided up the jobs.

Laura and Catarina got straight in making sandwiches for rough sleepers, Waleed, MJ and Hussan grabbed gloves and cleared the weeds (I think that geranium survived!), Kush gave everything a good water, Ciaran and Vita were in charge of clearing and sweeping, Emma and Lydia were on banister and fire escape duty, while Jacob worked with photographer Simon to capture some fantastic shot for the evening. You can see the whole gallery here - what a lot of happy, energetic faces!

Before long the jobs were done and the place was transformed - brilliant work everybody. That wasn't all though - there was just enough time for a fitness challenge which saw us test our balancing skills. Turns out they were very impressive, even when I threw in a few dynamic exercises to test you all! We finished off the night with a leg burner in the form of a progressive squat.

While some of us went for a delicious curry, others opted to add a few miles, and we also managed to catch the Under One Sky Team to hand over the carefully prepared sandwiches. They had run out of food to hand out to rough sleepers, so we were there in the nick of time!

Great to see you all last night, thanks for all the effort and smiles. We run as a group every single Tuesday in Westminster at the same time. Next week we're off to the oldest youth club in the world to help out - would love to see you there!

GoodGymers arrived from all parts of Bethnal Green and Mile End. And not just from there. Nia came all the way from India, partly to do the task, but also because she was greatly missing our lovely January weather. Mile-End-Emma arrived from Australia, quite recently, and new-boy Gabe (welcome Gabe) claims to live outside Tower Hamlets altogether, over there in The City. Even though nobody lives in The City. And we all arrived bang on time - except for the usual tardy suspects, of course...

Nia, Lobo, Gabe and Bethnal-Green-Emma, were using their artistic talent to paint chairs (Bethnal) green, as well as varnishing a table and chair. Lucinda and Mile-End-Emma were filling gaps in a brick wall, doing a great job (according to Mile-End-Emma). Several miles away, at the other end of the estate, Ilana, Ciarán and Bethnal-Green-Emma were restoring a graffiti-covered wall. Closer to home, Rohan and I practised for our future potential careers as dentists pulling teeth, as we yanked nails from planks of wood, using the back ends of hammers

All this vigorous work was our best bulwark against the cold. But January isn’t over yet - there’s still a special Tuesday task at Ocean Youth tonight, then Saturday lunchtime at Rocky Park, and the usual Felix Project tasks the same day. Be there or be somewhere else!