The Goodgym January Challenge is heating up and GGHaringey is still working away, trying for a Top 10 finish. At the halfway line, we are still sitting pretty in the 13th spot with 75 good deeds and over 700kms covered this month. A good innings so far but we'll have to push on for the second half of the month if we are going to make the Top 10. We can do it!

Kudos Galore

Check you out Rhiannon and Madeleine, crushing the ten deeds mark with such aplomb, I'm frankly gobsmacked it's not closer to 50 - GGHaringey DNA through and through, you are. Boom! And it was lovely to have Sam visiting from GGIslington - we hope we haven't scared you away!

A not so terribulb night

16 wonderful Goodgymmers congregated at GGH HQ, where their frankly shambolic trainer harassed them with shouts of 'Brave New Worlds' and scary fitness sessions. In true GGH stoic fashion, no-one complained and got on with some nice dynamic warm up stretches.

Before you knew it, we were traversing the streets of Tottenham for a '2 or 3 kish' run. Our stoic goodgymmers didn't even bat an eye. We ran past a lovely lit Bruce Castle before turning right on Tottenham High Road towards HQ. It was around this point that Ke-On shouted "have we just run in circles?" and reader, yes we had. But there was method to the madness.

Our hosts for the night were the wonderful Friends of Tottenham Green back at HQ where we planted bulbs to our hearts' content, to the melodic strains of the "Tottenham Lullaby" (as Mo explained, the sound of the police sirens going by).

Laura from FOTG let us loose with spades, forks and plenty of future award-winning flowers and our goodgymmers planted what I'm guessing were hundreds of flowers (they were very busy planters).

We then had a rather active fitness session in the shadow of the Bernie Grant Arts Centre that didn't turn out so scary in the end, and I might even add, some enjoyed.

Julie then led a nice 1kish run around the block, stretching her legs and getting ready for her BIG 100! We said goodbye to rock star Sarah for a few weeks, as she's popping over across the world for a wee run. We'll be cheering you on so you better win it - no pressure!

Then it was home time for some well deserved rest.

Not a terribulb night at all.

Join us on Saturday, for our taster session. Come and meet loads of new runners and walkers and plant trees at the Westbury Banks Nature Reserve.

And I'm still trying to find a task for next week but it's Julie's 100th as mentioned above so you have to come. And then join us for a nice, sedate* social afterwards.

Peace!

*Disclaimer: It might not be too 'sedate' but it will be nice :)

16 festive Goodgymmers visited the homeless shelter at Cranwood Hub and hosted a full chicken roast dinner for the guests. They even attempted to sing!

A GG Haringey Christmas Carol

Noisy night, crazy night,

All is hectic, all's alright,

'Round yon Grandpa whose worries piled

as GG Haringey rampages wild

Sleep in heavenly peas

Sleep in heavenly peas.

Noisy night, crazy night!

Chicken roast, oh what a sight!

Christmas crackers, who needs caviar;

When GG Haringey hosts ya!

Peas and potatoes galore!

Peas and potatoes galore!

Noisy night, crazy night,

we tried singing, it wasn't quite right

didn't matter, our hearts full of grace,

murdered Last Christmas, but who cares

T'was a Goodgym Haringey night

T'was a Goodgym Haringey night

Happy Holidays!

What a wonderful night we had at the homeless shelter in Cranwood Hub last night. We cooked a chicken roast for all 14 guests, some of whom joined us in the dining room as the GG Haringey Christmas Choir regaled them with some truly earth-shattering performances of all your Christmas classics. What way to end the year!

And it's been a massive year for Goodgym , reaching it 10th year milestone, and for us at the GG Haringey - although it's been a period of surviving the new management (!) - I think I can speak for most of us in Haringey to say we have had a magnificent time embedding ourselves into our community that we love so dearly and being able to help in whatever small way we can to make it a better place for all of us.

We head onto a new decade and we face uncertain times perhaps, but as long as there are foodbanks that need stocking, gardens that need pruning, homeless shelters that need torturing by carol singing, community centres that need painting... our red t-shirted Goodgymmers will continue pacing the streets of Haringey, trying to do our bit. We can't wait to get going again.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year from all of us at Goodgym Haringey!

Festive Boom!

Just as you thought it was getting too cold out there, 11 intrepid Goodgymmers and a couple of random nude artistes spotted in the wild came out to confound expectations in Haringey.

Award Ceremony Thank You Speech

Big love and woop woops for every single one of our runners last night. It was cold, dark, dogs were angry, letterboxes almost frozen shut AND YET the lovely Goodgym Haringey lot sang through the night. Adam, Nurjehan, Charlie, Rita, Kapil, Sarah, Kandy, Cathy, Madeleine and Dave - absolute heroes!

The Naked Truth

Let's not dwell on it but also let's get it out of the way from the start: A lot of nudity, chest hair, and hairdryers were witnessed during this group run. If that floats your boat and you want more details, send questions on a postcard.

The wonderful New Tottenham Singers Choir have been hard at work practicing and honing their performance for the forthcoming festive concert on the 14th of December and we were lucky to play a little part.

We had a multitude of leaflets to hand out and our 11 goodgymmers did a stupendous job.

Sarah led the walking group down the High Road, leafleting as they went. I huffed and puffed with the runners until we arrived at St Mary's Church (where the concert will take place) and we proceeded to flyer the surrounding streets. Our runners leapfrogged each other on the doorstep, singing carols as we went along, and soon enough our walkers had joined us too. All in all, within about half an hour this crack team had managed to distribute all the leaflets we had with us.

We ran back to HQ the long way as some of our runners were yet to hit their daily mileage target and by the time we got to HQ, the walking team had reached HQ too.

Sarah kindly led us on a very lively stretching session, followed by the now seemingly customary 'roast the trainer' session -(this time it was about my running attire - it is still short weather, sorry).

After our Haringey GG High Fives, we said our goodbyes. As always, it was a great night.

Don't believe me? Come and join us next week, when we'll be visiting the Haringey Foodbank.

Also, don't forget about the Goodgym Xmas Party on the 6th December.

AND SAVE THE DATE FOR OUR GOODGYM HARINGEY CHRISTMAS SOCIAL - 18TH DECEMBER AFTER OUR LAST GROUP RUN OF THE DECADE - More details to follow

Peace!

We had a lovely evening visiting the wonderful folk at All People All Places (APAP) and we loved it so much we broke the 20 GoodGymmers mark for the first time in years. Boom!

First Stop: Kudos Central

Everybody make some noise for Kristina, Eve, and Luc who all shined last night during their GGH debut. Amazing!

Next Stop: We Will, We Will Mop You

One by one, our intrepid goodgymers made their way up the very very steep hills that led to our one-off rendezvous at the Muswell Hill Roundabout.

We made our way to the homeless shelter where Conor and Duncan from APAP welcomed us with open arms and a multitude of tasks. Good thing there were plenty of us to go around!

Some of us gave the kitchen a good scrub and left it looking spotless; some of us cleared a couple of rooms, moving some tools and bit and bobs to a different floor; some of us hoovered and mopped the main hall; there was bed airing, shelf-making, we even managed to get ourselves trapped in a stairwell for a while!

We crammed ourselves into the main hall for a quick fitness session, where a misguided attempt at a burpee game was followed by a more appropriate suggestion from Latoya and Louise to play Sally Said Sit Down. Everyone loved it - LOVED IT - and it's sure to become a GGH regular*.

By the time we left, the APAP folk were a bit dizzy at the energy and general get-on-with-it-ness of our Goodgymmers and I was a proud trainer.

We then ran down the hill and through awesome Ally Pally into Wood Green for our social but we got unlucky trying to find anywhere with an open kitchen so some of us got hangry and tried to put me in a bin.

It was an ace night.

Next week we're doing a bit of leafleting and playing for the very first ever GGH Scavenger Hunt Cup. I really think you should join us!

Peace.

*I'm allowing myself some poetic license here, regarding the level of love towards the game or amount of goodwill towards Latoya and Louise in the room afterwards :)