Oh what a big hill to get to tonight’s task! All the way to the top of Elm Grove! But we made easy work of it especially Laura who claims that prior to her first Goodgym run 2 weeks ago she’d never been for a run! And yet she was right at the front of the group, chatting comfortably all the way, despite revealing that she’s not too many years away from being eligible for a mission! Great work!

Our task was helping the residents of May Road reclaim a neglected area behind some flats that had become a target for anti-social behaviour. A local resident told us it had got really bad so the neighbours had got together and organised a clean up. They’d made massive progress and one end of the area was clear and ready for planting spring bulbs. So that was the task for half the group whilst the other half continued with clearing dense brambles and generally tidying up. Perhaps the trickiest job was getting the long, tangled mess of brambles into bags but we persevered and by the end all the brambles were cut back and bagged up.

A few suggestions for the pun were made before previous pun of the month nominee Lydia suggested sticking with the Star Wars theme from last week and the pun was done!

See you next week for an indoor task and a big fitness session!

Tonight the force was truly with us as we formed an alliance with our fellow ‘get fit and volunteer’ force for good Hove Prom parkrun!

Much of Brighton and Hove’s pebble beach was last week deposited onto the prom by force of nature Storm Eleanor. This meant that Hove Prom parkrun had to cancel the run last Saturday as the course was deemed too dangerous. But tonight Goodgym Brighton came to the rescue and swept vast quantities of pebbles back onto the beach where they belong.

As there weren’t enough brooms and shovels for you all to work together we paired you up with ‘A’ sweeping hard for 3 minutes whilst ‘B’ completed a minute of exercise and then had a bit of a rest before swapping over. We did this for 8 rounds so each of you had a full 24 minutes of hard sweeping and shovelling and 8 minutes of strength and conditioning to add to your 4.5km run!

For anyone reading this who doesn’t know about parkrun then check it out here.It’s a free 5km timed run that happens at parks all the across the country and the rest of the world at 9am on Saturday morning. It’s very friendly and inclusive and is for everybody regardless of fitness levels. It’s the best way to start your weekend and I for one hate to miss it.

This Saturday 13th Jan we will be having our monthly Goodgym Brighton parkrun meet up at Hove Prom so we can feel great seeing all the runners enjoying the course that we swept free of pebbles tonight. Let us know if you are coming hereand don’t forget your barcode! And there is a Goodgym starter session after that you can sign up for here.

Tonight we welcomed Adamand Lee for the first time. Great to have you on board and hope to see you again!

You all worked incredibly hard tonight, you are fitter than you were yesterday and the world is a slightly better place! Be proud!

Fourteen runners ran 5km to Bloomfield Allotments (the seedy end of town) to help Virginia move some compost.

Frost things frost...

No new runners on this cold winter evening, but there were plenty of familiar faces this week, including Emily visiting from London. The run was led by Sam who's enthusiasm for squats was matched only by his determination to get us lost. We ran up the Holloway (again), which at least kept us warm in the almost freezing temperatures.

Lettuce Begin

We managed to find Virginia in the darkness, she had several tasks for us, and we split into groups to tackle each. Emily, Sam, and Steve found building a new compost bin more pallet-able than shifting the smelly tank of compost tea. Joe, Mark, Chris, and Dan set to moving some flagstones - Mark managed to break his second shovel in three weeks, well done Mark. Mary got her hands on a saw and the rest of us moved the compost tea and built a new fence with the remaining pallets.

Coming Up

The Christmas Party is coming up on 16th December, so get signed up.

Everyone's been booking flights for Budapest, it's not too late to join.