Things we found out last night:

1. GoodGym Wandsworth love plastic ponchos. They even customise them to maximise efficiency when painting, and to flatter the figure. Check out the photos of Will modelling this winning Autumn ’16 look.
2. Runners have a natural flair for carpentry, specifically sanding, and a head for heights atop stepladders.
3. There will be no playlist that satisfies all GoodGym tastes although the most requested is, unpredictably, Britney.
4. GoodGymers mostly keep inside the lines when painting, even if it’s in the Gents’ loo.
5. Tom is good at history, and knew that London was once the capital city of six countries during WW2 (Poland, Belgium, Holland, Norway, France and England) thereby solving this week CoRUNdrum.
6. GoodGym Wandsworth love holding squats, and want to do lots and lots more.

OK, that last one might not be true, but the others are definitely FACT.

The night of the many discoveries began when we met at our home, the Battersea Arts Centre, and welcomed some ace new people. Hello Zhiqi He, Gemma, Tina and Penny – lovely to meet you all.

It was on to our heroes next, with David taking an early start in the good deeds leader board, having kicked off the month with an amazing double mission last week – way to go. Hat tip to Jack, Kylee and Matthew who are all racking up some impressive mileage in October.

It was off then to Omnibus to do some painting of walls and sanding of benches. The first group was dispatched to give the theatre walls a good lick of paint. The lucky ones were given rollers, the not so fortunate had somewhat smaller tools, but all tackled the task with characteristic finesse. The sanders braved the cold, and took to the benches outside the building and left them looking as smooth as our sprinting technique.

We’ll be back at the Omnibus theatre to finish the job in a couple of weeks, so we took to the common to smash a tough fitness session. We buddied up and there were a series of fiendish exercises to do while each twosome completed a sprint. The combination of conditioning and cardio is such an effective one - not letting your heart rate drop between exercises is brilliant for increasing stamina and fitness levels. The most hated station was the back to back squat holds, which is fantastic for your glutes and quads. Impressively, not one pair toppled over despite some noticeable differences in height (good job Dave and Sophie!).

It was a nippy run back to our starting point, with Tom, Luca and Matthew leading the way. Shout out to the lovely Sinead who proved her commitment to GG Wandsworth last night by taking a slightly circuitous route from central London via Croydon to be with us. So great to see so many of you last night on the run. You are all making Wandsworth a better and happier place to live. You are also working hard and getting fit. And we all know what that means – more biscuits. Sign up for next week’s run here, runners:

https://www.goodgym.org/happenings/do-good-and-get-fit-in-wandsworth

It was set to be Wandsworth's longest run yet, with a meaty 5k run down to the task and the same again on the return leg. But that did not put off the 23 runners who met last night to help out the wonderful Work and Play Scrapstore.

This charity has, for the past 30 years, promoted the re-use of materials for environmental, community and artistic benefit and donated clean and re-useable waste materials otherwise destined for incineration or landfill to schools, charities, community groups, arts organisations, students and families.

There were a few new faces who bravely took on the challenge of a longer run – huge hellos to the lovely Leanna and James, and welcome Dennis, our ace visitor from Tower Hamlets!

This week’s tough CoRUNdrum comes courtesy of Will, who kindly sent a set of three quiz questions in advance of the run. Thanks Will. Which is the only underground station that shares no letters with the word ‘underground’. Tricksy! But it was clever Danni who nailed the answer a mere mile into the run, with the correct answer – Balham. Go Danni!

With a good downhill section on the outward leg, we arrived at the charity to be met by the lovely Rachel, who led the team into an Aladdin’s cave of brightly coloured materials, glitter, fake fur, baubles, boas and beads. This was our most beautiful task venue yet, and the team quickly dispersed into the warren of shelves and different rooms to tackle the tasks. The painting crew led by our very own Van Gogh Jordan set off to paint a bare room (check out the before and after shots!), while other small teams stacked rolls of material, scrapped carpet samples, sorted bottle tops, cut swathes of paper, trampled boxes and sorted fabric swatches.

The minutes flew by, and before long, our allotted time had passed and we set off into the night. Shout out to Jack and David who joined us despite having run the gruelling Cardiff half marathon the day before. What a heroic effort. Well done to everybody that completed the race, you make GoodGym proud!

Back at the Battersea Arts Centre, over 10 kilometres completed, we celebrated like only runners know how. With cake. The mega-talented Sally made a fluffy and delicious lemon cake in honour of our birthday girls this week – huge happy birthdays to Sarah and Kylee!

Next week we are transforming the Omnibus theatre with an epic paint job. Come and join the fun by signing up here:

https://www.goodgym.org/happenings/painting-the-omnibus-theatre

It was laundry day in Wandsworth last night, as 26 GoodGymers met at the Battersea Arts Centre ready to help out Love to Learn - a project aimed at supporting local young people and families from refugee backgrounds.

But first we welcomed some lovely new faces – hello Dagmar, Lulu and James. Nice to see Chris who was visiting us from Camden as well. We had some huge shout outs this week. A round of applause to Jack, who not only helped out at missions on both Saturday and Sunday but also is smashing the Wandsworth leader board with a huge 10 good deeds so far in September. Way to go! Well done to Lucy and Sophie who are not far behind him. We also wished Jack and Tom the best of luck for their half marathon in Cardiff this weekend – we’ll be spurring the whole GoodGym team on from here in London!

We were under some serious time pressure to pick up a load of laundry from Love to Learn and get it to the launderette, which was staying open an extra ten minutes just for us lucky lot. So with the wind behind us and the Challenge Anneka theme music in our heads, we covered the mile to the charity in record time. One human chain, and a quick pick up later, most of the team were back pounding the pavement to the launderette whilst Asifa, Lulu, Jack, Tom, Roshan and Dagmar stayed behind to do some tasks.

We reached the laundrette as the owner was standing on the doorstop with his cycle helmet on his head ready to go, and all but threw ourselves over the threshold. It was with a giant sigh of relief that, free of bags of washing, we made our way to a darkening Battersea Park for our fitness session.

Whilst waiting for the rest of the team to join us after their marathon cleaning session, we played a quick game of British Bulldog, with Sarah emerging as champion on the first match, and Matthew reigning supreme the second time. Then the fitness session. It was always going to be a hard one, but with a few ABC (agility, balance, coordination) exercises, some intervals, the plank challenge and a monster relay later, it still wasn’t over. We split ourselves into three groups, and set off back to the BAC, stopping at our favourite hill for a couple of hill sprints to round off the evening. And despite some colourful language, everybody faced their nemesis and smashed it.

Of course, the night wasn’t over without the weekly CoRUNdrum. It seemed fair enough – what stone fruit sits atop the towers at St Paul’s Cathedral? Pineapples. However, there was some dispute over the wording, with the upshot that Will is going to come up with a better London based quiz question next week. Good Luck, Will, make it a good un’!

It was Sophie’s birthday (Happy hill sprint birthday, Sophie!) this week, so we all took ourselves off to the bar for some cake and drinks to finish off a tough but fun evening. Special hat tip to Dave and Sarah who both made it to the session despite both having taken international flights that very day. That’s commitment, well done team! Congrats also to Kylee who nailed her fitness goal in record time, and to Daniel who ran his first parkrun this weekend in a great time. Keep it up everyone.

See you next week for a longer run to Tooting – sign up here you lovely lot:

https://www.goodgym.org/group_runs/tooting-charity-needs-our-help

The weather was against us last night, but like Nicholas Cage in every film he’s ever done, we laugh manically into the face of rain and wind. For we are runners.

After a quick rundown of news – well done Sally for a great half marathon last week, and congrats to Cath, Sophie and Hannah for most deeds – we welcomed our lovely new group runners. Hello Jenny, Emma, Kylee, Luca and Frances! Not forgetting our weekly CoRUNdrum – what are you allowed to do if you are granted the freedom of the City of London? – we set off for Wendelsworth Community Garden in Wandsworth.

We’ve been to Wendelsworth a few times now, and it’s great to see how the gardens are changing and the difference our work is making. We met Martin, the man in charge, who dispatched us to various plots to dig deep, whilst a few runners ferried Jurassic sized branches across the garden.

Martin set us a challenge – the first group to finish digging their bed and covering it with leaf mould wins a prize. Furiously we forked, turned and excavated. There was a brief pause as Danni discovered hidden treasure – a priceless (ish) antique (ish) tiny bottle that is going to serve as our Wandsworth trophy at the end of the year. Then, storming to victory, it was Sophie, Danni and Lizzie who finished digging their bed before all the others. As we finished up, Martin gathered us together to let us know the great news that he is inviting GoodGym to plant a tree in the garden that we can visit and check on every time we come to work in the garden. Danni, Sophie and Lizzie’s prize is that they can choose our very own GoodGym tree. They will come up with a shortlist and the rest of the group will vote on the winner. Looking forward to hearing your list, ladies! Something Poplar, though, right? Like a Syca(run)more, or maybe some Runflowers? Sorry.

We ran back in the direction of our starting point, the Battersea Arts Centre, but stopped short, right next to a fiendish little chinscraper to do some hill bashing. The group took some convincing that ‘hill-bashing’ was not actually a cruel and unique punishment, but in fact a legitimate training drill, but soon set off, one by one, to tackle the challenge. Every single runner managed three hill sprints, well done team, that’s something to be proud of. Hill training improves muscle strength, is great for your cardiovascular system, and makes your stride more efficient.

We finished up with some stretches, including Tom’s masterful half-pigeon and Sarah’s graceful full pigeon, which was actually more royal swan than common London sky-rat. Sticking with the animal theme, the answer to this week’s CoRundrum was that you have the right to herd a flock of sheep over London Bridge if you’re granted the freedom of the City of London. Why not?

Fantastic job, Wandsworth. You’re making your borough better and yourselves fitter. Next week we’ve got a great task for a fantastic charity, doing laundry runs for the Katherine Low Settlement. You can sign up here: https://www.goodgym.org/group_runs/helping-out-the-katherine-low-settlement-with-some-laundry-runs