A dark and chilly Wednesday evening, with headtorches at the ready and lots to celebrate – it could only be a GoodGym Hounslow group run! 🎉🏃‍♀️

Before a single sapling had been wrestled or stake hammered into the ground, there was a roll call full of brilliant achievements. First up, a huge round of applause for Beth, fresh from conquering the Tokyo Marathon and jet lag. What a run! 🌏🏅 Lucy smashed a half marathon at the weekend – clearly the marathon training is going well. And then a massive cheer was for Ariane, who tonight completed an amazing 50 Good Deeds. That’s fifty times showing up, pitching in and making our local area better – a brilliant achievement and very well deserved 👏 Not only that, Jon quietly cruised past the 200 good deeds mark. What a serious amount of good done and a real contribution to the community.

If that wasn’t enough excitement for one evening, we also had a brand new group session location - Baron's Ponds. While some GoodGymers have visited the site before for tasks like planting daffs (and we could see the bright and beautiful results of that hard work tonight), this was the first time we’d descended on it as a full group on a Wednesday group run – and there was plenty to do.

The task list was long. It included clearing an area of willow saplings, hammering stakes firmly into the ground and the small matter of moving a four-metre dead hedge. With so much to do, it was an all-hands-on-deck situation. It didn't help that it was dark, the ground was uneven, and there were plenty of brambles - but none of that slowed the team down. Headtorches flashed, saws were pressed into full use, branches were shifted, and gradually the transformation began to appear.

By the end of our 45-minute burst of effort, the area looked completely different. Mark and Pete, the volunteers who manage the site, told us it would have taken them at least half a day to achieve what the group managed tonight. A very satisfying result. 🙌

This weekend there’s another mission at Baron's Ponds, with plenty to get stuck into if you fancy more muddy fun. And next week we’re either back helping out at Chiswick House or teaming up with Wild Chiswick for more community impact.

There’s no stopping GoodGym Hounslow! 💚🏃‍♂️