OK now I've got the Great North Bike Ride done for another year I am moving onto my next cycling challenge, I was going to do the official 300 miles in September for Cancer Research but I've decided to ride for Charlie instead...........

I'm asking for help not for me but for a local family whose life has been turned upside down by a hit and run driver! Emma and Brian Burridge are the founders of North East Homeless Charity.

They work tireless day and night to help, feed, clothe, home and support the homeless and vulnerable of Newcastle and Gateshead. Youve probably seen Brian at the city centre out reach project making sure donations of food clothes toiletries are given to some of our most vulnerable members of the city.

What you probably don't know is that not only does Brian have a full time job for the local authority supporting adults with additional needs, but he and Emma are also juggling being parents 4 children. Antonia, Ben, Archie and Charlie their daughter who is a very poorly little girl.

Charlie suffers from the following life limiting conditions....

Symptomatic Epilepsy,

Severe learning disability,

Choreoathetoid movements,

Variable Abnormal Tone,

Cataplexy,

Narcolepsy,

Gastrostomy Fed,

Hetrotopic Grey Matter adjacent to right Lateral ventricle (it’s the way the brain signals to body)

Hard to read? Now imagining living with this.

Very recently after months of scrapping and saving Emma and Brian managed to purchase a little van they were able to have adapted so the family could share days out. So that in an emergency they could get Charlie to hospital. This little van is the only way Charlie can share what we know as a normal day out with her brothers. Charlie can't use public transport as any infection could kill her.

Not only that but The Burridges use the van not just for them but to travel up and down the city collecting donations for their charity.

Well a few days ago this was all cruelly taken away from them by a ruthless hit and run driver!! The driver didn't only write off their vehicle (insurance company say too old not valuable enough to repair) but she took with it the little bit of pleasure the family could share together as well as their safety net and effectively a community vehicle!

Now Brian nor Emma will never ask you for help for themselves but I will!! Just last week Charlie was admitted to hospital again with serious respitory complications. But in between all of that Brian still went out with food water and sleeping bags to help a young man sleeping rough.

I'm not asking for much just enough to get their little girl mobile again. If we could raise even enough to buy back and repair the van I know this family would be truely grateful!