10 people ran 7k to do a litter pick on the canal for the Canal and River Trust

After last week’s big freeze, it was lovely to have what felt like virtually tropical temperatures tonight! We welcomed Hasnain for the first time tonight, please give him a cheer!

After a slightly delayed start due to difficultly sourcing our litter pickers, we got on our way. Once on the canal we split up into three groups, each group covering around a 400-metre section on the water’s edge. The groups spent around 15 minutes filling bags full of rubbish. Once done we all headed up to Aston Lock to drop the bags off. After the obligatory picture of us showing off our good deed we headed to Millennium Point.

In honour of Sir Rodger

It seemed quite fitting that the fitness session planned tonight was the 1-mile time-trial. After the passing away of the first sub 4-minute miler Sir Rodger Bannister on Sunday it was a great way to pay tribute to the running legend! With little wind, no rain and thankfully no snow, it was a great night to target a PB! Everyone set off, Richard powered to the front looking like he was aiming for a sub 4-minute mile. He was followed by Hasnain who put in great work on his first GG run, finishing the time-trial in 6.42! Morwenna put in a great shift to beat her previous best by 10 seconds. Laura, Karin, Charlotte and Elizabeth pulled each other along to some fantastic times. Charlotte and Elizabeth making their time-trial debuts! Overall, although we didn’t quite achieve any sub 4-minute miles it was another fantastic team effort with everyone running inside 8 minutes 30 seconds! I’m sure Sir Rodger would approve!

After all that effort the group still had the little matter of the just over 2k slog back to base, so we unsurprisingly had some weary legs when we reached 1000 Trades.

Next week we will be out doing good again, it would be great if you could join us sign up here.

12 people ran 9k to get shown around and brainstorm some task ideas at Free@last

It was great to have a dozen runners at tonight’s run, on the coldest GG Brum night yet! After a flurry in the afternoon the white stuff kindly stayed away throughout the run. Once the intros were done we were out into the cold and got on our way rather quickly! Nobody wanted to be standing around tonight! We ran the 4.5k to Free@Last and were happy to get into the warmth on arrival. James welcomed us and showed us around the whole facility. The climbing wall was especially impressive. Richard and Luke especially enjoyed climbing across it! We were shown DJ booths and even recording studios, it really is an impressive facility. Once our tour was done we had a brainstorm on what we could do to help the facility next month, it was decided we would take a fitness session for the facilities’ attendees.

The run back

Once done, we had time for a quick photo, David seemed to enjoy lying in the snow I'm sure he would have been up for building a snowman if there had been a little more of the white stuff knocking about! We ran in a few groups all running slightly different speeds. Everyone worked well supporting each other to get the job done in quick time.

Next week we will be out doing good again, it would be great if you could join us sign up here.

13 people ran 8k to give out fruit to the homeless

Tonight, it was great to welcome three newbies to GG Brum, we had Elizabeth, Joana and Dave joining us for tonight's run. It was great to have you with us!

After the intro's we were ready to go on what was a virtually tropical night compared to recent standards. Tonight's task was a bit different. Normally we help a specific organisation, however tonight we were running around the city centre giving fruit, mainly bananas, though Karin (who also thought up tonight's 'pun') brought some nectarines along as well, to the homeless. We split up into two groups, I led one group along the canal, before coming out at Brindley Place, while Rob was the 'big boss man' of the other group running more centrally through the city centre. We then arranged to all meet outside the town hall at 6.55pm.

Banana man!

Once we met at the town hall we ran together to give the remainder of the bananas out. Luke the 'banana man' was very keen, running in all directions to give out his copious bunches of bananas he had brought along! By 7.25pm we had given everything out, so on the way back to base we quickly stopped in Cathedral Square or Pigeon park as many know it, due to the amount of feathered friends in the vicinity to do a very quick Bootcamp blast! It was a little mixture of high knees running, jump lunges and tuck jumps. The group put in great effort as usual. Joanna put in some great work on the high knees, Morwenna got nice and low with the jump lunges and David got the knees right up in the tuck jumps!

Once that was all done, it was just the small matter of the 1k run back to 1000 Trades.

Next week we will be out doing good again, it would be great if you could join us sign up here.