Dear friends, family and work colleagues

Thanks for taking the time to visit my JustGiving page.

When contacted me some weeks ago and suggested I join him on the fifth and final leg of the charity bike ride from to , how could I say no! The charities supported by the BBC's Sport Relief (Sport Relief, Help for Heroes, Leukaemia Research, PRA Benevolent Fund and DebRa) and the Dallaglio foundation (Cancer Research UK) - further detailed below, are ones I have been touched by and relate to personally from the inspiring experiences of my friends, family and work colleagues. Your support is really important to me but more importantly to all those people who critically need the support of the charities both now and in the future to enhance their life experience.

The challenge - a mere 550km in one week, up the coast of Ireland starting in Rosslare, through Dublin and Belfast and across the coast of Scotland from Stranraer to Edinburgh. In hindsight this was a brave decision indeed, particularly as the last time I went on a bike ride was in the cub scouts, which was more years ago than I care to remember!

As those of you who know me well, my biggest fear is not the social fitness including the evening guinness recovery programme, but the physical fitness challenge and the public ridicule of being seen in lycra (you will be able to evidence this by the photograph!). This inspires me to put in the hard yards of training, get fit, have some fun and lose some much needed pounds.

My aim is to raise in excess of £10,000 and I hope you are able to contribute in any way you can to such wonderful and impactful causes. So please dig deep and donate now.

Cheers

Darren

 

JustGiving

By the way, donating through JustGiving is simple, fast and totally secure. Your details are safe with JustGiving – they’ll never sell them on or send unwanted emails. Once you donate, they’ll send your money directly to the charity and make sure Gift Aid is reclaimed on every eligible donation by a taxpayer. So it’s the most efficient way to donate - I raise more, whilst saving time and cutting costs for the charity.

Further details on Charities supported

The Dallaglio Cycle Slam in February is being organised by BBC’s Sport Relief and the Dallaglio Foundation, with the proceeds benefitting the following organisations:

• Sport Relief: brings together the worlds of sport and entertainment to raise money to help vulnerable people in both the UK and overseas - www.sportrelief.com
• Help for Heroes: a charity for the wounded in Britain’s current conflicts - www.helpforheroes.org.uk
• PRA Benevolent Fund: provides financial support for players who have been forced to retire from the game due to serious injury - www.prarugby.com
• Leukaemia Research: the only charity in the UK dedicated exclusively to researching blood cancers and disorders including leukaemia, Hodgkin’s and other lymphomas, and myeloma - www.lrf.org.uk
• DebRA: working on behalf of people in the UK with the genetic skin blistering condition Epidermolysis Bullosa (EB) - www.debra.org.uk
• Cancer Research UK: the Foundation's major beneficiary