Tonight was a perfect GG York task with absolutely zero skill required, just hard graft and the ability to break stuff! But before we got stuck in to the session we celebrated the previous week's happenings with J, PK and Leanne having completed a via ferrarta course and a couple of p.1's at parkrun for Matt and Ed (not that it's a race, of course!)

So off to the task, with Vicky and Babs being our biker gang, Laura leading a steady group and Ed leading the main group with Amy backmarking.

A very enthusiastic welcome greeted us at Glen Allotments and some excellent instructions which basically boiled down to "move stuff from here and chuck it in the skip. Oh, and here's a hammer if you want to bash it up a bit"! There was also the promise of some baked goods at the end, (but only if they'd earned it - Ed)

We soon got into the swing of things with a one group staying in the allotment and handing stuff to our runners and then brining it over to Mitch and Michael who were on skip organising and smashing duties. There were all sorts of methods for breaking the items down including chucking it on the floor, kicking it, bashing it with other stuff and eventually making use of the aforementioned hammer 🔨

Before long the skip was full and the allotment plot was looking a whole lot clearer, even if there was still a bit left over that we couldn't fit into the skip. Still definitely worthy of some cake, but only after fitness....

This week, the group were organised into 4 teams with members of each team coming up to collect a card from Ed which corresponded to a particular exercise. The team that completed the most exercises and therefore had collected the most cards would be first in line for cake. This clearly spurred on Max's team who completed a whopping 15 exercises and had first pick of the rather excellent flapjacks and rock cake 🎂

The set-up went so smoothly that we headed out straight after to deliver our Move Mates newsletters.

You know that it would be untrue,
You know that I would be a liar,
If I was to say to you,
GoodGym never plays with fire

Come on, baby, light my fire,
Come on, baby, light my fire,
Try to set that shed on fire

The time to hesitate was through,
No time to wallow in the mire,
The second shed we had to lose,
To get the flames even higher

Come on, baby, light my fire,
Come on, baby, light my fire,
Try to set that shed on fire

David, Stef and Laura were joined by several of new local residents to help with the upkeep of Holgate Community Garden. It was great to see some new local residents getting involved and there were some great ideas for improving the garden discussed. David and Stef moved and rehomed a compost bin and compost which had been put on a flower bed and the weeded along the bed. Laura weeded the long bed and set people off with planting broad beans and radishes in the raised beds. It looked a lot better by the time we finished.

Goodgymers delivered Move the Masses Supported Walkers Newsletters to home addresses all over the city. Vicky kindly addressed and grouped the newsletters making it easy work to divide them up and get them delivered.

A dynamic duo of Goodgymmers returned to Acomb to help with the clothes swap. Despite Jo demoting me to teaboy last night, there was no tea making required as York Neighbours had taken over the café to sell cakes and promote the awesome work they do. That meant it was a full 90 mins on the shop floor for me and Mikael.

With a steady stream of people through the doors, there was a lot of clothes to put out but the clothes swap is a well oiled machine so everything went smoothly.