An amazing 7 GoodGym runners met to give the previously neglected East side of Market Rd Gardens some attention. Continuing the hard work of Octopus Communities and the mighty GoodGym Islington, we swept away some rubble from the paths, got rid of litter and collected lots of leaves for the compost heap. The area looked much tidier after our hard work and we hope it will be especially enjoyed by the children and families that use the Hayward adventure playground at the back of the garden.

For Latoya, Liz and myself this task marked the completion of our GoodGym/RED January challenge where we have been active and done a GoodGym good deed every day this month. I've enjoyed every one of these tasks, being outside and working with such an incredible team.

21 incredible people joined me in Camden to run 8km and help at Antrim Allotments!

As GG HQ work hard to find you the right replacement for Paul, little old me will be looking after you and trying to bring some balance to the force over the next few weeks.

The king is dead, long live the... interim king

It was a week of new things with me in charge, meeting Helen the new chair at Antrim and the following runners joining GG for the first time: a big GGC welcome to Anna and Paul!

After confusing everyone by turning right out of the Crick we did the usual briefing, warmed up and went through the news:

• Congrats to all that took part in the penultimate GG Big Six race of the year at Bath Two Tunnels. Don't forget the final race is in September in Edinburgh. Details here!

• GG is turning TEN! Come to the party at City Hall and tell us what GG means to you here!

• Finally get the 5th September in the diary, it's the date of the next GG social. Also get the 8th November saved as I hear its going to be a special social!

On to the night at hand, with one task tonight we ran in a big group with Louise middle-marking and Abi and Rosie back marking (thanks!). Its a decent route to Antrim but hills are unavoidable! We worked hard and everyone put loads of effort in. Once we arrived at Antrim we met Helen the new chair of the allotments and she showed everyone the tasks! The allotments were looking particularly lush but there were still patches that needed work. The order of play today was mainly weeding and clearing with a healthy dose of digging too!

We had a strong 20 mins of hard work sadly the insects were hard at work too and sadly not many escaped with out bites. Must remember that citronella spray next time! Before we knew it the time had passed and so we returned our tools, said goodbye and posed for a group photo!

We took a different route home and split into a Rosie group and an Other group. The other group took a more leisurely pace but also conquered Primrose Hill (sorry Abi) whilst the Rosie group hurried home at pace.

After a stretch outside the Crick we siad our goodbyes and headed home, as ever a trusty, or should that be thirsty group headed for 'impromptu' drinks at the Somers Town Coffeehouse.

Thanks and see you all next week - task is being confirmed but you can sign up here!

Pritesh

35 GoodGymers ran 4-6km to help Story Garden & Coram Fields - woop woop!

Another awesome week but unfortunately my penultimate week, I hope you can make my final run next week and the beers & pizza afterwards! Waaaaah!

Welcome along to newbies Lydia, Kenny, Emma, George and Lynton.

In the news this week:

1. Go along to the social tonight on the Southbank! Pritesh will be there chatting all the good - more details here.
2. August's long run is going to be led by Simon Fitzmaurice, starting on Greenwich High Street, and finishing in the Olympic Park, Stratford - 10km or 25k options. Sign up here
3. Well done to Hayley who did the Ride 100 on Sunday - awesome! Plus big up to all the Camdenites and GoodGymers who had lots of fun at the GG Olympics on Saturday - yay!
4. Last thing - join the Unoffical GoodGym Facebook Group here and the GG Camden FB group here.

Corrrr what a fun evening of good, time trials, woodchip and 35 people! Nice! We split into two teams, with Frances (Loves a Mission) Powrie leading a group of 20 people to help the wonderful Coram Fields, which is the largest playground in central London. They'd just had there BIG Play Day so our task was to pack up after that and then sweep up debris, leaves, moss and anything else that's around. Great!

Moss Bros

Meanwhile I led a team of 14 team to help the Story Garden, which is right next door to the Crick Institute. We've been helping this community garden grow and develop over the last three months and it's really blossomed into a brilliant space. Martina said we have been 'instrumental to the garden's opening and growth!' We were split into four teams:

• Scraping away woodchip under planks of wood to make a disabled access pathway
• Litter picking around the entrance!
• Shifting woodchip into uncovered areas near some of the newly constructed buildings
• Filling up planters with soil in the pollytunnel

After 30 minutes we were done and Martina was very pleased! Pritesh led a group on a canal run to Granary Square, meanwhile Frances run her group over from Coram Fields to the same meeting spot. We all met there played on the minute for a minute and then did my final time trial with you awesome people. Hanry broke the record with 2.42 (course was 50+ metres longer)!

After a good stretch we went to the pub with drinks and fun. Lovely jubbley.

Sign up for next week here when we'll be helping Kentish Town City Farm!

PB out.

Southwark News

• We are as of today at the top of our league for the January challenge with 104 good deeds done so far this month and 832 collective kms run and it is constantly climbing. Blimey! That deserves a big pat on the back

• Next week we're going to Southwark Tigers on Burgess Park to fill a skip. It's a 6km run overall sign up here.

• We just turned 3 years old! In that time we have done some form of good 3580 times, including 1038 coach runs and 249 missions. That's a huge impact on the local community you should be proud to be a part of.

That's enough of the business

Saturday was a MASSIVE day (hence all the photos)! It started at 9am sharp with GoodGym tshirts dotted all over the place at Southwark parkrun. Dom marshalled and caught some snaps of some very happy runners. Nice one Dom!

We then gathered at the rather cosy Southwark Park cafe for a hot drink and in some cases a sausage sandwich. Gradually people began to arrive for the starter session and at 10.20am we started the briefing.

At GoodGym we get fit and do good in three special ways

Those ways are: Group runs, every Wednesday we meet at Old Spike Roastery on Peckham Rye at 18.45 to run to a local community project to do good. Missions: one off tasks done in an isolated person's home that improves their wellbeing eg. changing a lightbulb. Coach runs: pairing you up with an isolated older person in the community for weekly social visits.

After a warm up and intro we set off for the 1.6km to Surrey Docks Farm. On arrival we sought out Rachel who provided us with brushes and shovels and showed us into the goat enclosure. Our mission? Collect up all the poo! The scooped poop then went over to the steaming (literally, steaming) muck heap.

Scooper pooper GoodGym's gonna find ya

Having cleared the area and dumped it on the muck heap we had an opportunity to feed the goats. Some were more patient than others...!

Surrey Docks Farm is a working community farm in Rotherhithe, SE16 that aims to educate local people about where their food comes from and promotes getting active outdoors. From Old Spike Roastery it's quite a long run so we don't get to go too often which Saturday the perfect time!

'You've goat to be kidding!'

Could be heard when a goat chomped Lucy's feedbag in half right out of her hand. We also coo-ed over the gorgeous Oxford Sandy and Black pigs, the sheep and Hermione the donkey.

Time to stop mucking about, we needed a goat-o-shoot

Finished up with feeding, we went back into the enclosure for a team photo. The highlight of this being the moment that Emily leant down to stroke a curious goat and it began to wee - very narrowly missing her!

And now, a song:

Right on the Thames was a lonely goatherd

Lay ee odl lay ee odl lay hee hoo

'Help with this task!' could her loud cry be heard

Lay ee odl lay ee odl-oo

Folks from GoodGym came to help the goatheard

Lay ee odl lay ee odl lay hee hoo

Scrapin' and sweepin' all that lovely goat turd

Lay ee odl lay ee odl-oo