December 19th, 2011 Ivo
We are pleased to announce that next year the Good Gym is expanding to cover the Olympic Host Boroughs.
We’re working with the Olympic Park Legacy Company to increase our capacity and reach out to cover a large area of East London, centreing on the Olympic Park.
Its been an exciting last year for us with hundreds of you coming out running with us on our group runs and around a thousand individual runs taking place. We’ve had a lot of great press coverage too, including the Financial Times, Wired magazine and Runner’s world.
Next year, with the support of the Legacy Company, we’ll be building on this and aiming to get hundreds more people running every week and doing good in their area. We’ll be working with community centres, local groups, the NHS and local authorities and continuing to support isolated older people. We’re also aiming to form more partnerships to allow us to develop our technology so that anyone can set up the Good Gym in their area.
If you want to find out more, come running with us, or work with us, email us at getinvolved[at]thegoodgym.org
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December 13th, 2011 Ivo
Last night our team of runners tackled two missions. Firstly some heavy sheds at Stepney City Farm, and secondly the unkempt courtyard of a community centre. We headed straight down Cambridge heath road, crossed Whitechapel Highstreet and ran along the cobbles of Stepney Green to arrive at the farm, home to a rare breed of Jacob sheep and at least two cows, as well as numerous alotments. We were however mainly dealing with the poultry housing.
Firstly we rudely kicked the cockerels out of their nice big shed, then we got ready to lift it, shoving some timber underneath to make some room for our fingers:
Having done this then surrounded the shed and picked it up – carrying it a few meters to a newly created paving slab foundation.
Then we went to wake up the ducks. Dutch Runners – quite elegant. While the ducks took a stroll around their pond, we picked up their house and moved it to its new home.
Richard said thanks and we ran off to task number two.
Arriving at the Poplar Harca community centre father Duncan greeted us warmly and briefed us on leaf removal, sweeping and planting bulbs.
We duly set about getting it all sorted and the discussed the rights and wrongs of waste disposal.
We were not stopped by a decent smattering of rain and got the whole lot done in about 20 mins.
By the time we got back to York Hall, we’d racked up about 8.64 kilometres in 53.58 minutes with 2 stop-offs. Our average moving speek was 9.61 k/hour.
Tessa from poplar Harca just emailed saying:
“Thanks for the 20 minute blitz… you guys managed to do a lot in a short space of time! Duncan sounded very pleased…”
Photos by Cairi Jacks
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December 12th, 2011 Ivo
Here’s the map of this evening’s run. We’ve got to lift two hefty sheds in Stepney and then run to help out a community centre in Mile End.
We need your help, because the sheds look really heavy. The run is a nice leafy one too.
Here’s the details of the run:
Start Location:
York Hall
5-15 Old Ford Road
Bethnal Green
London E2 9PJ
(York Hall is close to Bethnal Green Tube)
Time: 7pm, Monday 12th of December, 2011
Other stuff: York hall has changing rooms and shower facilities. We’re not planning to do anything dangerous, but the Good Gym takes no responsibility for your safety during group runs, you participate at your own risk.
More information: is available on our frequently asked questions page.
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November 15th, 2011 Mark
A group of hardy November runners headed out into the darkness tonight to tend to the garden of a woman with learning difficulties. Her Occupational Therapist had reccommended we help her out so Mark went and scoped the place out and thought we could handle it. The garden was about 40ft long and about 3 feet deep in brambles. Arrving after a long run down St Paul’s Way we arrived at the house, set up our snazzy new lights, and then got to work.
Chop chop chop.
Weeding and getting all the stuff into the bags was the hardest part. In the end the place was levelled and the piles of foliage neatly stacked or put in bags. We were kindly thanked by the next door neighbour and it was time for the run home.
In total, once we’d done a customary run back along the canal and past some falling leaves in Victoria Park and talked about canal boats we’d clocked up about 10.7k. Some of the advanced party did a sprint finish back to York Hall. A bit much for us after the tiring chopping. Here’s a rough map of the journey. Sorry about the gap at the beginning, poor GPS management.
All in all, felt pleased that the lights had worked, that no-one had chopped their fingers off and that Angela can get out in the garden again.
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November 14th, 2011 Mark
Good Gym Runner Nick Bright is in this month’s Runner’s World – have a look at p29 and you’ll see the story about him running a whole marathon with a broken leg. (article by GG Runner Simon Cole, photo by Chris Brock Photography)
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November 10th, 2011 Ivo
At the beginning of next month a very special event is happening. The Ritzy Brixton is hosting Reggae Roots, the first event of its kind, bringing together different generations with some big live acts such as Tighten Up Crew and Sly and Reggie. We’re going to head down for this special early evening session and hope you can make it too.
They’ve got everything in place for older people too, so do bring any older folks (strictly 18+ though). See you there.
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