After weeks in the planning, Storm Babet had other plans for Alex and the staff of Temper as the task of gardening for Thames Reach in South Bermondsey had to be switched with an indoor task. Luckily, Sam and his GoodGym run club on Wednesday night had visited Dawson's Heights Community Centre to put on a first coat of paint and the task owner, Thai would happily welcome a second group sooner rather than later. The stars were aligned!

On Friday morning, Sam arrived at Dawson's Heights Community Centre for 09:30 to see Landen, one of the Temper staff, sitting outside. An eager beaver full of beans ready to take on today's volunteering task. He would have happily painted the whole community centre room by himself, but as we got closer to 10:00AM, the rest of the Temper staff including Alex (the General Manager of Temper) showed up.

As Sam does with his running club, he started the intros off with his GG speech explaining how to get involved with GoodGym before asking his ice-breaker question for today, which was: Since we're in Autumn and the weather is getting colder, what is your favourite type of soup?

We had a generational difference of opinion regarding having soup.... but those who did answered spicy lentil, chicken and mushroom, a hearty garlic soup, Thai chicken soup and even the original Heinz tomato soup to name a few!

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Don't 'palette' with me; I'm feeling 'brushy' today

After our intros and answering the ice-breaker question, we got down to business as everyone made their way into the community centre, picked up a brush or roller and choose a wall to get started on. The main room had the first coat of paint up on by the GoodGymers who came on Wednesday night, but there was one wall near the kitchen that still needed a first coat as well as the ceiling. With some 90s tunes banging through Sam's speakers, everyone got in the mood for painting.

Everyone focused on their section as they worked as a team to transform this community room in the hour and a half that they were there. Brushing away and turning the pale yellow walls into bright white, they not only added fresh coats to the aging walls but also breathed new life into the heart of the community. This was the much-needed facelift this place needed.

Sam hopes that the act of volunteering itself fostered a sense of togetherness and unity among the Temper staff as it did bring a smile to Thai who could see the instant aesthetic improvements. A truly heartfelt thank you!

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Thank You to Temper

A personal thanks from me to all the Temper staff for coming and experience a GoodGym session with me! There were plans to get you dirty with a bit of gardening, but with Storm Babet lingering around Alex and I opted for a soothing painting task instead. All the best with your future endeavours and possibly, see you at a GoodGym session in the near future

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Thank You to Thai

GoodGym is all about getting fit and doing good! We praise the runners/cyclists/walkers who come to get fit and help out, but we often forget about our task owner. I would like to take this opportunity to thank Thai, who opened up the community centre and prepared the paint for us. GoodGym sessions wouldn't be possible without the task owners, so a massive thank you again!

Having the beginning of Storm Bebet arriving in London on Wednesday night deterred a few GoodGymers, yet we still managed to get 8 weathered GoodGymers to come along for tonight's group run including newbie, Sander! Welcome to GoodGym and for claiming your first good deed! He saw us advertise on MeetUps and thought he would come along and check it out.

Since Sander was the newbie, Sam did the full GG speech for him and opted to do the ice-breaker indoors before going for the warm-up.

Sam's ice-breaker for tonight was in relation to him seeing a BBC News segment where they interviewed an arctic kayaker who spent 5 days in a two person tent waiting for the weather to turn and only had a crossword book to entertain him and keep his mind in a positive state: If you were stuck at home in a storm, the electricity is gone, what would you do to entertain yourself?

2 out of the 7 of us said they would have a book and read, others would have a game or puzzle book, Sander would workout whilst Daryl would drink and finally, Gemma would ensure she had a cat to keep her company.

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We're painting Dawson's Heights white

Not the town red, but after our quick warm-up in the alleywall, Sam lead the way whilst Paulinbackmarked as we ran along Peckham Rye Park to reach Dunstan's Road as our slow climb to Dawson's Height began at Underhil Road. We took it in our strides as we reached the top and met Sheena and Thai at the community centre. They were happy to see us and welcomed us in with open arms.

Sheena and Thai had prepared the paint and tools, but some of the walls still needed to be scraped and cleaned. Yet, the main task was to get the first coat of white paint on the walls of this community centre within 40 minutes!

Everyone grabbed a paint brush or roller and picked a wall to get started on. The noughties tunes were banging and then a surprise appearance from Benjamin, who hadn't shown up since March/April. He told us he was busy with life, yet that's the beauty of GoodGym....you can come and go as you please and we'll still welcome you on your return!

After slapping on a first coat of paint, some areas got a second layer, but since we didn't want to peel off the old paint (as it hadn't dried), we ensured we covered as much as we could leaving the ceiling and a wall by the kitchen for another day.

As 20:00 approached, we called it a night and said our thanks to Sheena and Thai for having us. We dashed down the hill with Maria backmarking this time. We met Benjamin, who cycled to Dawson's Heights back at Old Spike as we went for a couple of Guinness at Old Nag's Head.

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Thank You to all the GG-ers

A personal thanks from me to all those who came out tonight! It was pouring down with rain, but you decided to come out for a run and to do good! Another welcome to Sander for coming for your first good deed and I hope you enjoyed your evening with us!

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Thank You to Sheena and Thai

GoodGym is all about getting fit and doing good! We praise the runners/cyclists/walkers who come to get fit and help out, but we often forget about our task owner. I would like to take this opportunity to thank Sheena and Thai, who opened up the community centre and prepared the paint for us. We did a second coat with the corporate group on Friday, so there's no need to come back. Yet, I am sure Ellie from Arbor will let us know if we're needed again.

Walking over from the Roseberry Street site, Daryl, David, Lindy and Sam met up with Emma outside Barnards House, right next to Surrey Docks Farm. This sheltered accommodation has a lovely communal garden, which Ellie from Arbor helps out on occasion and needed us GoodGymers to help out one of their keen resident gardeners - Ben. With just 50 minutes left due to their lateness, the main task was to turn over soil and get rid of the weeds (especially dandelions).

As David, Emma and Lindy used the main forks to turn over the soil, Daryl and Sam used a small fork and rake, respectively to take out the weeds.

There was a method and a process in place, but with time against them and the resulting rain that came pouring down, they called it with 10 minutes to go! During the quick 35 minute session, we managed to take care of around a quarter of what was left.

We waited outside for Andres (Javier) to close up Old Spike before heading in for 18:30. Yet, Sam had arrived earlier to do document checks for Diego and Becky. Diego is just getting back into the swing of being active, but Becky was up for joining us on our group run tonight! Welcome Becky!

On a warm and muggy day, waiting inside Old Spike wasn't ideally as we welcomed Alastair, Alex, Becky, Daryl, Emily, Emma, Gemma, Paulin, Mikhail Nathan and Tim as Sam quickly went through the GG intro speech before heading outside to get warm on the Green!

After our warm-up, Sam's ice-breaker for tonight was a two-way (split into three questions) question, which was: Two days ago was World Entrepreneur Day, what would you be an entrepreneur of / who is your favourite entrepreneur? or Since the Fringe is on, who is your favourite comedian?

Many went for the comedian question of which I remember Kevin Bridges, but we now know Tim would be an entrepreneur of weird and wonderful ice-cream flavours and Alex's favourite joint entrepreneur and comedian is Elon Musk...

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Ugly? No, just brutalists

With Daryl leading the way, running along Peckham Rye Park before heading up Dunstans Road and heading up the hill on Underhill Road, we just made it to the top at Ellie was arriving. We also met Steve and Magda who had arrived by foot and bike, respectively.

Ellie was so glad to have so many GoodGymers come along tonight as she had plenty of tasks. After saying all the tasks, we split the group into activities with newbie Becky, Nathan and Steve taking the woodchip moving and weeding task. Alastair, Gemma, Mikhail and Tim were on water-running duties as they filled water cans and buckets from the tap near the estate to take it to the orchard to water the growing apple trees and saplings.

Meanwhile, we had the rest following Ellie for sanding and painting duties: Emily and Emma were helped paint a cage yellow to beautify the community centre whilst Magda and Paulin sanded wooden blocks/planks that will be used as planting signs when the planters for the allotment have been built. Alex and Daryl were in charge of painting these wooden signs with blackboard black paint.

The 40 minutes seems to zoom by as we called it at 19:55 as Ellie had a surprise for us. On Wednesdays, the community centre has a once-a-week food bank and not all the food was taken, so to ensure there's no food waste, she offered it to us. We took home a variety of breads, apples and courgettes.

Since we were at Dawson's Heights, we couldn't resist to walk over to Dawson's Hill to see the amazing views of London before running back with our bags of goodies to our starting point just on time for 20:30 (after a quick stretch).

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Thank You to all the GG-ers

A personal thanks from me to all those who came out tonight! Firstly, a massive thank you to my taskforce team, especially Daryl for leading the run after my injury (did I mentioned that yet....) on Monday night and to Paulin for backmarking the runs. Thank you to the rest of you for tackling the uphill run to the task before taking on heavier tasks than others, so thank you for gritting through it all. You were all thoroughly rewarded with food and great views at the end of it!

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Thank You to Ellie

GoodGym is all about getting fit and doing good! We praise the runners/cyclists/walkers who come to get fit and help out, but we often forget about our task owner. I would like to take this opportunity to thank Ellie for having a variety of tasks for us to do from watering to weeding and painting to woodchip moving! Also, a big shoutout to you for tackling food waste as the GoodGymers enjoyed the added bonus of a snack / meal for the journey home. We will be back to help support the allotment project if not in September then in October.