Twenty One inspired Hackney GoodGymers ran 4K to the HUG garden on Hackney downs to dig flower beds, rescue the vandalised Williow tunnel and fill the dug flower beds with soil.

On a warm and muggy evening in H-Town it was great to see so many new GoodGym faces both touring and starting out on their GoodGym adventures. The timing of the session could not have been better as we managed to squeeze the group run into the only dry patch of a drizzly day. There were a number of runners with slightly stiff and sore bodies after everyone's magnificent efforts at Run Hackney Half Marathon on Sunday so we eased our way into the session with some gentle mobilisation work to get us all going and flush out the muscle soreness for those that needed it. A few high fives and a skip and a hop later we were on our way on the 2k run to meet Myra at the HUG garden. We split into 3 groups first got to work returning the Williow tunnel to it's former glory after it had been vandalised at the weekend. April showing some amazing core strength to hold herself in the air while digging a hole. The tunnel was soon back to its former glory after some seriously tough work plunging and bashing a pole into the ground to create the space for the Williow to go back into then some overhead knot mastery to knit the tunnel back together. The second group were busy cutting into the turf and creating 6 more beautiful pieces of landscape art or flower beds. The group worked in 3 pairs with one digging the turf out while the the other runner speedily carrying the turf to create some more landscape art surrounding the Williow tunnel with elevated shapes and a tear drop shaped flourish. The third group had their hand full with a 500kg huge bag of soil! The group got a slick production line of diggers and pushers going. With the diggers piling the soil to the Wheel barrows at a super rate while the pushers charged to fill the beds to the brim then stamped the soil down to get all the air out. Even with a poorly barrow the group stormed ahead and finished filling the beds with time to spare after I final push carrying the whole bag over to dump the last of the soil into the beds.

After 40 minutes of top quality action we had completed our tasks and look forward to returning next week for some more adventures!

We said our goodbyes to Myra and then got stuck into a 10 minute circuit blast with one group running while the second group dominated a series of conditioning upper and lower body exercises then switching when the lead runner returned. Seems like the half marathon has had only a very positive running effect on Clare as she stormed the running section leading her group powerfully back each time.

After the big energy expenditure of the circuit we had chilled 2k run back to base lead brilliantly by Chris B where we rounded the session off with a series of static stretches.

Obviously after monumental efforts of Sunday a celebratory evening out was in order so was great to have 15 of the crew head out to our favourite Tuesday refuelling venue for a well earned feed.

Look forward to seeing you all again next week for another addition of running fun! Please sign up here.

Stay Silky Smooth

Joel