A midsummer nights team of 8 runners gathered together with the express intention of ridding a river of rubbish. We were tonight meeting Karen of Pitsmoor Pickers fame and a couple of extra wombles she was bringing along to help out. There is a section of riverbank along the Don that has needed clearing for some time and Karen felt that this evening was the perfect time to tackle it given who was to be in attendance!

The evening's run was also one of special celebration... one of GoodGym Sheffield's most stalwart and prominent volunteers was on her 300th deed. This of course meant the obligatory cape had to be brought out from the GG vault and bedecked with the requisite sequins denoting '300' for Rachel to don on the run to the Don.

We all gathered together outside the Showroom, had a brief briefing and count up of runners (so as not to lose any again) and set off to Cobweb Bridge. The leading group had a totally intentional detour courtesy of the good folks at GoogleMaps but soon re-merged with the others to run on to the five weirs walk near the arachnid filled underpass.

Bin there, Don that!

Arriving to see a brightly coloured Karen waiting to welcome us, we distributed the kit consisting of pickers, hoops and bags she had brought for us. We then heard a little about the precise areas to focus on and set about making this section of the Don sparkling!

We found the usual array of objet d'art by the riverside consisting of wrappers, cigarette butts, cans, bottles and shards of glass... with some oddities thrown in too such as a length of board wrapped in metal... an old road sign perhaps?

After a good 50 minutes of picking there was no more terrible trash to be found in the vicinity. We collected the bags together for a group photo with them, said our goodbyes to Karen, and set off a tiny way down the path for a rapid river workout activity. Just a quick wall sit this evening- it was gone in 60 seconds! The activity got the thumbs up from everyone... well apart from a couple of folk.

After this we had a short and steady run back to the grass outside the Showroom where we stretched off and heard announcements before heading inside to indulge in some confectionery that Rachel had brought along for us all to share!

It was an enthusiastic crew of GoodGymers who braved the Sheffield drizzle to join new task leaders Dave and Chris from Sunnybank community centre to kickstart the community garden. the garden had been unkept for a good few years and the community is keen to develop it into a beautiful resource.

Local residents also joined us and within no time Dave and Chris had us getting into the wilderness with spades, forks, loppers, shears and...spoons. * we cleared the border of one of the plant beds * we dug out pesky sycamore seedlings * we cleaned the paved area of its moss and weeds * we cut back the big bush by the gate to its border * we cut back what used to be a lawn and had long overgrown.

After 45 minutes, the paved area looked good enough to sit on and picnic, the gate had been freed up of its invasive bush and the plant bed had been edged around.

There is still plenty to sink our teeth into before this jungle turns into an oasis and we're keen to come back!

The evening stayed dry for our run back to Heeley People's Park, where we were set to task aerating the main grass patch and lopping back the trees around the edge of the green.

This is all in preparation for the free to attend Pax in the Park music festival happening this weekend. Make sure to check it out if you are around and support HPP.

Big shout out to Becca who completed her 100th good deed - amazing work! And it was also great to meet Stephen on his first run with us. Welcome.

Following the task we congratulated Becca, got a run down of upcoming events from Rob and headed back to the showroom via UMIX where we split into two teams, and took turns lap running and bar hanging / leg raises. Then we finished off with a 50 m sprint.

Six Sheffield GoodGym runners joined legendary Pitsmoor litter picker Karen to tackle steep and litter strewn Andover street in Burngreave.

After sharing the roles, the litterpickers and the bags, we split into two groups in a pincer action move to get to grips with the grot, Jono, Marianne and Celine on one side and Ash and Rachel on the other. Michelle was tasked with honing in on cans and tins, to mercilessly crush them. Karen then goes and recycle them later.

What a can do attitude!

All of us "crushed" it, filling our bags up with all sorts of rubbish. Special mention must be made of the two huge cardboard rolls Ash rescued - they were bigger than him! - and I was very pleased with my monster truck bike chain guard. It changes from the plastic wrappers and take away paraphernalia!

It was heart warming to hear so many of the residents stopping by to thank us or to ask how to get involved. If you are ever free and want to get stuck into making Pitsmoor and Burngreave the lovely areas they deserve to be, join the Pitsmoor litter pickers, who meet around 7pm on the second Monday of every month on the high street.

After a solid 30 minutes of picking, scraping and let's face it serious chatting away, we said our goodbyes to Karen and went on our way back to base where a few of us indulged in well-deserved drinks and snacks in the Rutland Arms - thank you Rachel for the too good to go goodies, all of you for the great chats and positive vibes!

With all this sun we've been having the greenery has EXPLODED!

Good thing the GG SHF crew are around for some lopping and a chopping on Well Road!

Parky Rob was at Heeley Peoples Park to meet and greet us and give us instructions for this weeks task which was to lop, chop and prune the overgrowing foliage on Well Road which was starting to get a little un-ruley and was getting in the way of prams and most definitely mobility scooters!

We got straight to it after a brief lesson from Rob in good pruning practice, cutting just after a node has bifurcated from the main branch into a shoot, to ensure good growth is maintained, very interesting!

Splitting into two teams we quickly made good the path and filled tonne bags with cuttings and disposed of them at the back of the park for composting.

On return to The Showroom we re-hydrated after the hot eve and Rachel was kind enough to share her too good to go bag whilst we watched passer byers of DOCFEST which was going on at The Showroom.

Until next time, happy running :)