A cold and windy night couldn't deter people from coming. Had they known I was taking the group then they probably would have stayed away. People have told me I am very detering or alluring. I can't remember which. My aftershave says I am a boss.

Escaping storm Gareth, our trainer, Sarah was in Majorca, on a package holiday, drinking cocktails and watching reruns of Only Fools and Horses in bars.

Minh joined us for his first run with GoodGym. Give him a cheer. He had been cajoled in a pub to come along. And a drunken promise is a promise. On a separate note, if anyone wants to buy a pet snake from me, then email separately. (That was a very boozy night.)

This was the first group run since the Big Half and the afterglow (and some of the hangovers from Sunday) had not passed. It seems we've adopted the Big Half as our home run with so many involved. It was special day with so many people running or volunteering.

A special mention to:

Jenny P who completed her first half marathon. Jen was overheard later in the evening talking about next time. Mwah ha ha!!! There will be a next time.

Vic who missed her pb by a second. Grr. How frustrating! Here's some uncalled for advice, Vic: Make your wee, on the start line, quicker in future. ;-)

Pieter, Kat, and Mridula who were manning the water station at 8 miles, and gave everyone such a mental lift, and a bottle of water.

And Sara who was harnessed in a lorry. No further explanation offered.

Please give them all a cheer.

Tonight's task was going back to the Royal Hill Community Garden for the last time. :-( So, it definitely was with some mixed feelings. Daryl gave the group the background to the story. In short, the land has been reclaimed by the council, so the space has to be clear by the end of the month. We were there to move stuff (as we do it so well) and salvage as many plants/shrubs/trees as we could, so they might be redistributed elsewhere.

We split up into small teams, and armed with spades, forks and troughs went to work. There were little duels going on all over the garden. Ollie won his personal battle with a bush that was reluctant to leave. Hayley was particularly proud of conquering the beast (see photo). Life is but small victories. The beast had proven to be a real stick in the mud, and thorn in Hayley's side. However, enlisting Dan and Sara's help turned the tide. (I am sure Hayley will embellish the story in years to come as she regales the story of when she uprooted an oak tree with her bare hands!)

When we finished, the overall effect was the garden was looking a lot barer. It was sad to see. However, we took comfort in that we are likely to see many of these plants again, just in different settings. The beast never dies!!!

Given we were on Royal Hill, as the street name suggests it is quite a hilly area, so the group badgered me to do some hill sprints. We ran to Hyde Vale and did some fixed point repetitions up it. Hill work is speed work in disguise and great for improving your form.

Well done everyone. Thanks for coming out in the elements. Sarah will be back next week and with a tan! Don't give her a cheer!!!

14 awesome runners ran 3k to put up bamboo fencing at Christchurch School!

Well what good luck we always seem to have on Wednesday evenings in Greenwich eh! We narrowly missed the rain which allowed for super fun fence erection session!

Before we got going, we chatted about the pancakes we enjoyed 24 hours prior. From the lovely classics of nutella and lemon and sugar to the not-so-typical tuna and cheese combo... I wonder if Sean will be making those at his pancake party on the weekend...???

After working up a bit of an appetite it was time to run! We did a little warm up then headed off to the school. We were greeted by the lovely Fiona, Patrick and Rich who gathered us together to explain the task at hand. The main job was to put up a bamboo screening around the outside of the Forest School area. This involved pulling away any old fencing that remained, cutting back the branches and twigs that were in the way and then unravelling the bamboo and wiring it to the main fence!

We assembled into teams, grabbed some loppers, forks, secateurs, fencing, wiring.. basically anything that was available and got straight to it! Rich being super organised as ever got everyone in position each doing vital tasks. We had some people cutting and clearing the areas, and then once it was clear, the fence could go on. Once the fence was on and it was flush and straight and taught, it needed to be secured in place with some wire rope... and Jenny was just the woman for the job! We certainly trusted her not to get her wires crossed!

Time was a-ticking and after 30 minutes, the area had been cleared and most of the fencing was up! It was just time to secure it all in place. Once the final bit of wire was in, we gathered up all the tools and bits of old bamboo to bring it round to the front of the garden and it was time to head back to base!

Another successful task at the school! NICE WORK!

We had a group photo and said farewell to the team. Hopefully we will be back soon to do the rest of it... because it's going around the WHOOOOLE woodland area!!!

Time for a sit down

We headed back for a quick (although not as quick as I expected) fitness session which involved one simple thing. A wall sit. Everyone's favourite. I have been doing this in all of my sessions with various running groups and gym classes this week and not a single person has managed to hold it for longer than 90 seconds.... yet pretty much everyone tonight did.. AND THEN SOME! Holding that position for one minute is good, holding it for 2 is great, holding it for 3 is verging on crazy, and, well, holding it for 4 means you must have some superhuman special powers or something! After 4 and a half minutes it was Andy and Lee who were the victors... very well done!!! Those are some seriously strong quads you both have!!!

We slowly limped our way over to the pillars for a stretch and called it a day!

Well done everyone! Great work on the task! It was quite a fiddly one but you did a great job and the guys were so pleased with what you got done! Hopefully see most of you on Sunday for The Big Half!

24 AWESOME runners ran 3k to help out at Christchurch School Garden!

Firstly, I cannot go any further without admitting sin; yes, ladies and gentlemen of GoodGym Greenwich, I am a thief, a taker of things that are not rightly mine. What’s this? You all collectively shout! Yes indeed, what has been said is true; whilst a thief, I am not a liar. Today’s incredibly punny title was not of my original thought, but that of GoodGym Matt’s. For this, I rightly award 2 good deeds to Matt; a great hoorah all around, I think you’ll agree!

Sadly, I do not have the authority to apply these bonus good deeds, and so these are merely words. But, don’t forget, words can change lives in an instant and say a thousand things with but a look.

And so, we move swiftly onto the run and task. We all gathered on this balmy February evening (thanks to climate change) and welcomed two new runners to GoodGym Greenwich, first timer Jen and Tower Hamlets good-deeder Dave. Welcome to the crew you two, hope you had a good run with us!

Our run leader, Sarah, then began proceedings by asking everyone to introduce themselves to the group whilst saying their favourite colour. Unfortunately for GoodGym HQ, ‘red’ was not the only colour mentioned, with ‘turquoise’, ‘blue’, and ‘yellow’ all getting their 2 seconds of fame. Sarah, sadly, said her favourite colour was ‘grey’, which perked us all up a treat. Even as a bonafide red-green colour blindness sufferer, I’m glad that GoodGym didn’t choose ‘grey’ as their brand colour.

We then dropped our bags off and headed over to Christchurch School which is full of vegetable patches, a learning-Gazebo, and plenty of fresh green space. On a side note, it’s wonderful to see a purpose made green space for children to enjoy right in the heart of grey (Sarah!), smoggy London – keep up the amazing work Christchurch School!

Before we could get cracking, we were led over to a gaping hole in the ground and were briefed on the evening’s to-do list. The hole, it transpired, was a pond which needed some further muscle power to dig to the required depth; classic GoodGym Greenwich fodder. Other tasks included wheel-barrowing sand over to said pond which was to be laid as a foundation underneath the tarpaulin, moving spiky American plants, removing old plant boxes, and a general spattering of flower pot watering and any necessary litter-picking.

Not needing telling twice, the group disassembled and got to it. Alongside Matt and Marta, I helped to transport sand to the ever-deepening pond. I can only wonder what this motley crew of runners looked like from the road, quickly digging their way down into a hole in the ground. Maybe, Time Team meets Grandstand, or rather, a very special edition of Bob the Builder: Can we dig it? Yes we can!

In really no time at all, the sand was put down with Gareth making sure that it was good to go, and the tarpaulin added with Pieter leading the way. Alongside this, other good-deeders rushed about the garden making sure that it was in tip top shape. In fact, we were so efficient that Ben took a few of us out for an extended run, leaving the remaining few to finish up the pond.

We then re-assembled at the Naval Colleges for a final set of stretches before saying our goodbyes and stealing each other’s puns.

Brilliantly wonderful work tonight everyone, your work made a huge difference to the garden, which is fast becoming one of our go-to places to help out and maintain. See you all next week you lovely lot!

22 awesome runners ran 4k to help clear leaves at Ballast Quay Garden!

What a fabulous turn out last night! And we had a whopping SIX new runners join us! So big warm welcome to James, Chloe, Natasha, Jennifer, Paul and Sean! We also had the lovely Jane all the way over from GoodGym Kingston! Nice to have you all with us last night!

After a bit of a shaky start with various run ins with the university security, we managed to do a brief uninterrupted warm up before getting on our way!

Within a few minutes we had arrived and were greeted by the lovely Diane and her dog Tom! Diane has looked after the garden since 1962 and I'm sure you'll agree it's a fab little spot with the most spectacular views over the river. During the winter when all the leaves come off the trees, they tend to make their way onto the flower beds and can inhibit their growth. Obviously it requires a fair bit of bending down to clear them so that's where we come in!

Diane had various brushes and brooms at the ready, everyone got stuck in and began to explore all corners of the garden! A pile of leaves began to form, which we then bagged up and emptied over the wall into the river. This felt a bit wrong but Diane assures me she has been told by Greenwich Council that it's fine as it will all decompose.. fair enough!

After about half an hour, almost every single leaf had been plucked from the garden, nice work!! We took a lovely group photo and then set off again on our run. We did a little loop around the area and stopped for a fitness session which this week was a little leg circuit. Spending even just a few minutes on some strength and conditioning work each week will not only make you a stronger runner with better running efficiency, it will also help prevent injury so it's super important that we all do it! And I'll be the first to admit I don't do enough of it, I would much rather just spend that time on another run instead but take the time to do it, your body will thank you for it!

Anyway enough of my lecture... we did 2 rounds of 3 exercises. Step ups (single leg exercises are great if you have any imbalances), reverse lunges with a knee drive (help with balance and strengthens glutes/quads) and squat jumps (for explosive power)... after 2 rounds, plus the fact that it had started to drizzle meant it was probably time to head back! We had a quick little stretch and called it a night!

Useful links and things I mentioned yesterday...

Facebook Group - to those who are new, we have a GoodGym Greenwich Facebook Group where people often post about races or other running related stuff going on nearby!

Community mission in Charlton - here is the mission for Crisis UK I was talking about. Limited to 10 runners, no need to be DBS checked!

Great work last night everyone! Diane was so pleased with all that you achieved, you've really helped her out so well done! See you next week