On Sunday the 21^st of July I will join 15,000 amateur riders to cycle the 20^th stage of the 2019 Tour de France, an alpine stage between Albertville and the ski resort of Val Thorens. The route covers 135km, but it’s the 4,500 meters of climbing that will be the real challenge. To put that into context the summit of Ben Nevis is 1,345m!

In case you think that this might be a nice jaunt with stops for the good life, vin rouge and fromage en route, think again. There is a minimum time to achieve and every year roughly 20% of riders are booted off the course by the broom wagon and sent home with tears in their eyes and possibly blood on their knees.

Further details about the route here - www.letapedutour.com/en

If that doesn’t sound like fun, you may be thinking why?

10 years ago, out of the blue I was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukaemia and the prognosis was potentially quite final. However, I was very lucky and thanks to the great NHS, an incredible team at Guy’s hospital (some rather nasty but effective new chemo therapy drugs) and of course my amazing family (& friends) I am still here today to tell the tale. So, I felt a little celebration was in order.

To motivate me to get to the top when the pain becomes unbearable I
will be raising money for Bloodwise the UK's leading blood cancer research charity. Blood cancer is still the third biggest cause of UK cancer deaths and it would be great to help them speed their research up a bit.

https://bloodwise.org.uk/

I hope that the worthy cause and fact that I will not complete this task without suffering considerable pain will encourage you to sponsor me.

I’ve been training hard, but will it be enough…