This week's task was led by fellow GoodGymer, Paul, who had signed up to the Surfers Against Sewage Million Mile Clean - equipping us with some professional litter-picking garb and turning us into bona fide citizen scientists. The mission? To clear (a corner of) Finsbury Park of litter, and play a bit of brand bingo - submitting data on which brands were littering our park.

Steph Ducat, Louise, Da Marcus, and Mehmet ran down from Arsenal Community Hub together, meeting the others at the South East gates of Finsbury Park to get started on the task.

Since becoming a run leader, I've wanted to re-start the old warm-up ritual of doing a register, each person saying their name and then answering a random question. Finally, it began last night - and with a question that turned out to be more apt than I'd realised: "what's your favourite drink?".

Paul, who's preferred tipple is JD & Coke, managed to find not one but three (sadly empty) bottles of Jack Daniels littered around the park's borders; and Louise, who favours Strongbow Dark Fruits, also hit her jackpot, as did Da Marcus with a can of Iced Tea. Sadly I didn't find any kombucha bottles littered around Finsbury Park... 😆

We were treated to an incredible red sunset, and even attracted some questions from other park users about how they could get involved and host similar litter picks in their areas.

Altogether we collected 5 sacks of litter, collectively walking 5.6 miles as we picked - in Paul's words: "legendary stuff 🙌🏻!"

There was lots of excitement for next week's session building paths in Caledonian Park - see you there?

Great to be back at Nightingale Estate for this special session for the launch of our Workout for the Future Campaign. We were joined by Deputy Mayor Mete Coban, who visited to see the impact of GoodGym's work in the local community. And welcome to new runners Gemma and Suzi

It started with Denzel , Dan, Louise, Katie, Robert and Ivo running 2k from Usual Objections, a running shop that provides top quality running clothes. Definitely check them out if you are in the area, you can even see the clothes being made in front of you.

After a catch up and a warm up we ran to Nightingale Estate. Cheered on by the local school kids and a nice sunny run through the Hackney streets and Hackney Downs Park.

We arrived to join our fellow GoodGymers and got introduced to the Nightingale Parklet which is an important green space for local residents on the estate. After a briefing by task owners Nicky and Alice we set off to clear weeds, tidy up the green space and some of us helped a resident clear their front garden of weeds and a metal wired fence which is a bit of an eye sore.

Deputy Mayor Mete Coban joined the team to help with trimming foliage and lifting garden waste. Good job everyone!

We ended the session hearing from residents about why these green spaces matter so much to the estate. It was a great way to kick off our new campaign.

Great job all, see you next time.

A light and easy, feel-good lunch time task, helping to clean up after the weekly foodbank collection session - stacking shelves, sweeping floors, and folding tables. There were lots of volunteers on hand, including three from GoodGym - many hands made lite work. And we all got to go home with some surplus mangos and fresh bread - bonus! (the photo is from a previous session, I failed to get any pics!)