*Social walk *

Thanks to a weather front bringing air from the Arctic it certainly didn't feel like a late April evening ! Although lovely and light and luckily not windy, there was certainly a chill in the air!

We all convened and went straight out armed with litter pickers and bags. We headed west along the prom picking up stray litter as we went before arriving on the beach at the far end of the lido. With the tide out this meant that we could get under the structure of the Lido and then the pier to do a scavenger hunt for rubbish that had been dropped together with other debris that accumulates along or shore line.

With the team partnering up then mixing up it provided a perfect opportunity to have a lovely relaxed walk and enjoy social chit chat and banter with each other.

Sue had just returned from her travels and it was lovely to catch up on her news together with her Jurrassic walk and Kilimanjaro climb that are both fast approaching! She is under the watchful eye of coach Barbara !

It was also good to hear all about Ricky running and work progress together with his race plans. ! Good luck Ricky!

Sarah pulled a practical joke on her partner Ryan when she found a discarded parking ticket and planted it on Ryan's car before photographing it and presenting it to him. The phrase 'Gotcha' springs to mind when I saw his face ! Luckily Sarah fessed up just as Ryan headed off to do battle with the traffic warden! Craig was much kinder presenting Sarah with a rose instead !

After the beach we headed through the gardens to our finish line. With some light hearted competitiveness in the group led by Daisy and after careful consideration of the weight and size of each bag, I announced that John and Ryan had won Daisy's competition!

On our return to the start point we played a new game of GG inspired hoopla with a cone and the litter picker rings which had held the bags in place. Thanks Paulfor helping to pick up the rings whilst I was photographing ! Ryan was victorious in this 👏👏👏 . Very well deserved especially after the shock of the phony parking ticket just a few minutes earlier !

Lovely evening ! Thanks everyone 😀

A storm in a tea cup

Wow the weather nearly wiped us out tonight! With torrential rain, wind and a tornado like wind just before we were due to meet , we all hunkered down in our cars or homes a little bit longer than planned.

Luckily it blew over very quickly and the sun came out so we all met a little later but the task was back on.

We were met by the Head teacher Helen who pointed us in the right direction of the pond and raised beds where we were carrying out the task of clearing the 2 remaining raised beds ( we did one of them last time ) together with some further pond maintenance carried out by our resident pond team consisting of BelindaPaulJohn and Barbara

Paul literally waded into the pond with his wellies on to remove a lot of weed whilst John assisted with his long pond tool. Paul also assisted when the end of John's tool fell off and Paul rescued it. What a hero! Barbara and Belinda was also assisting where necessary as well as pruning around the decking in preparation for the little people to investigate their natural surroundings.

Meanwhile - at the raised beds the team were tusselling with some very overgrown and neglected shrubs whose roots had grown well down into the earth below the timber construction. Ryan and Sarah braved the weather ( surprisingly brave - Sarah !! ) together with Paula Daisy and Gillybean who all worked tirelessly to try and shift the shrubs, weeds and grass all deeply embedded into the earth.

in the last 10 minutes committed members of the pond team joined to give some much needed help on a final push to clear the beds. We then returned to the pond to admire the hard work and spot the living world underneath the water.

Many apologies for the late report- blame Teddy!

Next week there will be 2 tasks - 1 in Ferring and one meeting at Splashpoint. I will share the details on what's app today.

Have a great ( rest of the week)

Julia xx

Monday fun day

What a great turn out we had on a crystal clear star lit sky. Anne led the running group withSarah and Paul I led the walking group with Ryan,Daisy,John and Barbara. Special mention to Barbara who has returned after a horrible six weeks of injury and nasty illness - it was great to have you back!

Star Gazing

John and Barbara forged ahead walking whilst the runners caught up the remainder of us and paused to do some star gazing whilst en route to the task.

Anchoring Down

We arrived at our regular task - Anchor Gardens with 1 mission, to have a really good tidy up and litter pick of this prominent seafront garden that is so visible to all that walk past along the seafront and also the road alongside it.

Sarah and John set about doing the litter pick, entertaining themselves with a ' name the chocolate bar ' game whilst the rest of the team bagged up all the debris that we had cut down last time and which was still sitting in the big white grab bags looking an eyesore. This was all sorted with some lovely mulching compost re distributed over the beds too.

We have some nice events to look forward to with a drink food on Monday 26th after GG at the Railway Inn plus a plan in the pipeline for a downs run and roast later in March. More details to follow! Have a great week.

What a lovely hour or so we enjoyed having a chat and catch up with our fellow GG buddies together with doing a great litter pick through Denton Gardens, outside Splashpoint LC ( much needed) and along to Anchor Gardens.

It was a beautiful sunny morning and pure gold by the sea !

Worthing GoodGym kicked off the new year in style by supporting our parkrun friends in putting on the bonus New Years Day parkrun. This is parkrun’s 20th year - I’m sure we’ll be involved in various of their events through 2024.

We started, and we finished

As usual GoodGym provided support from start to finish. John took charge of setup, taking particular care to ensure that the funnel was set in favour of the number checker - he didn’t want the number checker to have to move further than absolutely necessary.

Belinda took the “brief” out of the briefing with an unusually long winded and rambling tale entitled “The history of all what I have done at parkrun”. It was all in a good cause - to celebrate the 100th volunteering of someone instrumental in the setting up of Worthing parkrun. The importance of these early drivers of the events can easily be forgotten as they become established.

Sue’s role was much more than a token gesture. The delivery of those finish tokens plays such an important role, especially on busy days like today when keeping the runners moving through the funnel is so important.

The rest of the GoodGym gang dived in to help with the clear down after running. It was important that we achieved this as efficiently as possible - speed was of the essence to enable the defibrillator provider to stand down. (Big thanks to South Downs Leisure - a great supporter of both GoodGym and parkrun locally).

Sarah began her good deed year in her own particular style - accessory holding whilst Craig completed the “dismantling the flag” task. Ryan and Ricky headed off to gather in the tape that feeds runners towards the finish line - well, that’s what the runners are told. It’s really a short cut prevention method.

More reliable than Accuweather

Ricky seemed particularly delighted to see Sarah! “Why?” He was asked. “Because it’s obvious it won’t rain then…….” And well done on your PB Ricky!

Holding out for a hero

As Run Director Belinda oversaw the processing of the results - some dodging, dropping and ducking created a few challenges. The number checker was declared hero of the day for their immaculately recorded information enabling correct times to be issued.

How many?

With our support a whopping 465 runners achieved their fastest time of the year.

A great way to de- combat stress

10 of us came along to participate in the annual soldier walk which is a 4 km walk from the east of Worthing to the west and back gain...... ending at the pub!

It was lovely to see Rosalind Belinda Sue Sarah Barbara John Daisy Craig and Ryan walking and chatting and posing for photos at every soldier. Barbara seemed particularly fond of each soldier:)

When we got to the pub we were joined by Natacha, Tamsin and also Ricky who had bought cakes in celebration of his 100th different park run area (132 parkrun's in total) We spent a really pleasant hour or so chatting and catching up with our fellow GG buddies.

Wishing you and yours a very Happy Christmas and here's to a great 2024 in the planning ( or planking ) We will be kicking off the New Year with a daily plank challenge. More details to follow.Lots of fitness and tasks will be winging your way during the year too!

See you on the other side

Julia xx