In last weeks post I didn't mention all the support that the runners and walkers are giving each other.
It's been amazing, we have our regular posters and our first timers, we have those who have been on FB for ever, and those for whom it's all very new.
What we all have in common is our desire to keep exercising, keep motivating each other, sharing our triumphs but also our down days. We don't expect everyone to feel chipper every day, it's ok not to be ok too. 
Sharing how we feel is so important, we have never experienced anything like this before, restrictions on our movements, being cooped up with family all day, like a very long Christmas but without the cheer! Maybe we are still working and have the fear of getting too close to our colleagues.

This isn't normal but we are trying our best to normalise it, some of us will find it easier than others, we might be able to draw on previous experiences, but nothing has ever been quite like this for any of us.

We are having to make up the "rules" as we go along, making daily adaptations as new news or restrictions come in to play. We can only see those members of our family that we live with, what about the others? Parents. grandparents, children, grandchildren, siblings, cousins, friends, the list goes on and on. it's hard, but we need to do this to keep us safe.
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We have several front line key workers amongst our number and we applaud them, going out every day to keep the country moving, taking care of the sick, stocking our shelves, removing our rubbish, cleaning our hospitals and other places where we have no choice but to go.

​In an effort to get everyone up and active, even if some of us weren't  feeling it, we launched Challenge Tuesday this week. The challenge was to get as many Km's done on Tuesday as we could, this wasn't meant to be a few runners doing huge distances, although we did have some who achieved that,  it was to get as many of us out there as possible, doing what we could.
We could run, walk or cycle, this allowed everyone an opportunity to add to the total. We had k's from family walks, we had k's from injured runners walking or cycling, we had k's from "lapsed" runners starting back on couch to 5k. It was a team effort, there was no pressure, every metre counted, so nothing was too small to be counted.
As you can see from the picture below, we managed a fantastic 276.18 k (171.61 miles) and 47 people took part! We hope that even more will take part this week, and we will see what the total is, will we smash it? You'll have to come back next week to see..... 

As I am typing this I have just heard that Matt Hancock has said that if people don't take the exercise recommendations seriously they will have to stop people leaving their houses for exercise. www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-52172035  so please, please, follow the guidelines so that we don't have to stay in to exercise!

Until next week.........STAY SAFE

Well, it's been a bit of a week hasn't it?

We stopped our running and walking groups around 2 weeks ago. It wasn't possible to keep the recommended 2 metres apart, so with a very heavy heart we decided to postpone our groups until this is all over to keep everyone safe.
Happy Feet Fitness is our beloved business, we really do live and breathe it. What would we do? What would our clients do? Every one of them feels like a part of our family!

Our Facebook group has always been strong with a great sense of community, now was the time to take it up a gear, this was our way of staying in touch, motivating the members and most of all supporting them through this as best we could.

So we have started online classes, these are done live because we want to see what's going on. Rhiannon, who is also a Personal trainer, has a lot of experience teaching classes and knows how quickly things can go wrong, she watches us and can correct our technique if she needs to. It's ace!
The other benefit is that although she can see us, we can only see her, so when we are going in the wrong direction, or using the wrong leg, no one else knows we are going wrong. At the start and end of each session, we all get a chance to have a natter too, it's fab!

​We are using the "live" facility on Facebook too, I have never used it before, Rhiannon always does it normally. Well, what do you know, I did my fist one and now I'm hooked! The feed-back from the group when we go live is that it's good to hear our voices, its strange what you miss isn't it, they don't usually like to hear our voices when we are saying "it's only a small uphill....."

I'll leave you with a few photos, and will be back next week.
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Stay safe everyone x
Reasons to keep active From a BBC article

A short video for International Women's Day 2020 on Sunday 8th March.
Our women are strong, determined, motivated, kind, supportive, I could go on and on...
They are also great role models for women of all ages, both those they run and walk past in the street, and their own families and friends.
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