Digging for (Olympic) victory

Two blog posts this week: First, one from Richard Foster from last night 10k to E8:In the shadow of the Olympic stadium, with a capacity 80,000 crowd cheering us on (well, there might have been something else happening in East London, but I’m sure they were behind us right?!) a tired group of GoodGym runners arrived at the Hackney tree nursery to help weed, shovel, barrow and spread bark chippings on the paths around the community growing plot.It was a (almost) 10K run tonight with some serious work in between, but every runner rose to the occasion and – with the Olympic Stadium poking above the trees near our destination – raised their game in both the running and the work at hand. However, unfortunately, we were slipping into Silver position as a swarm of midges were threatening to out-perform us, but then, at the final hurdle, Ivo remembered the insect repellent and we cruised to victory having laid six beautiful new bark chip paths to Olympic bark-chipping specifications.The return run was harder for some (me, that is) but the GoodGym team grouped together to get us all back to the familiar surrounds of Victoria Park. We split in two with one group lead by Ivo upping the pace and the distance and my group aiming to beat them to the meeting point and save face – but we ended up arriving at the same time and the group once more rejoined together for the final Ohuruogu style sprint back to the Arch Gallery. A brilliant warm-down by the lovely Ade and we were all flat out, sweaty, exhausted – but happy at another successful GoodGym mission in the best Olympic City EVER!  5,000 metres and a visit to the Victoria Park Aquatic Centre:  Blog Post by Lauren Garland  There were two options for tonight’s GoodGym run from The Arch Gallery; a 5k to the boating lake at Victoria Park or a 10k to a community garden. I opted for the 5k after a hard run this weekend & ended up as back marker, making sure no one got lost as we wound our way through Bethnal Green to Vicky Park.As we arrived at the park Mark decided we just weren’t tired enough and got us following his lead, sporadically bending down to touch the floor or jumping up in the air. I’m not sure how much effect it had on our heart rates, but it amused passers-by no end.We arrived at the Victoria Park boating pond which most of us didn’t know existed until this evening to meet the Park Ranger. Today we met Alfie a part time park ranger, part time registrar to get our instructions. Our task was to clear the weeds from the surface of the pond & dig up any grass that had grown through the concrete around the edges.Rakes and hoes were divvied out and we set to work. It soon became apparent that actually clearing the lake wasn’t going to happen. The rakes only reached a couple of metres into the lake and the water wasn’t exactly tempting anyone in for a dip. Alfie advised us that if we clear the edges then the weeds in the centre will float into the gaps & can then be scooped out at a later date. I can see another visit on the horizon!We were surprised at how much we enjoyed raking out the weeds, though it might have had something to do with the upbeat music accompanying us from Victoria Park Live. The weeds were quite smelly and looked worryingly like matted green hair, but there was something bizarrely relaxing about scraping it across the surface & through the reeds. Plus, we got a good core & upper body workout scooping it out as it was seriously heavy!