A thriving outdoor gym in East Barnet is growing, with £6,000 worth of new equipment ready to be installed.

The ‘al fresco fitness’ area in Oak Hill Park is soon to have a rowing machine and twisting equipment added to its seven exercise machines.

Such is the success of the Church Hill Road park gym that Barnet Council last year agreed to install similar equipment in six of the borough's other parks.

The East Barnet Residents’ Association and Friends of Oak Hill Park organised grants and charitable funding for the new equipment, the first of which were installed three years ago.

Gerry Smith has used the equipment regularly since it first opened. She said: “It’s great because you obviously don’t have to pay for it, but it’s fresh air as well and I find it more pleasant than indoor gyms.”