A relaxing Spring weekend in Paris? A quiet stroll down the Champs-Elysee in April? 

No. 

16 weeks of hard winter training to run a marathon around the French capital for Alzheimer's Society, a UK charity working to improve the quality of life for those living with dementia. 

I need your help to raise money for a charity which funds critical research into the disease and delivers much needed care to under-served dementia sufferers. 

Quick fact: Alzheimer's Society has committed £10m a year until 2017 to research. Dementia costs the UK £30,000 per sufferer each year, but only £90 per person is currently spent on research.

I gave up alcohol in December to make training that bit more efficient, and those winter months that much longer. An average person would have drunk 85 pints in my time of teetotalism. At the cost of an average London pint (£3.70), that's £315 you could donate to make up for my lack of boozing. Just a thought.* 

Quick fact: Alzheimer's Society delivers over 2,000 different services to local communities and those impacted by dementia. 1,340,000,000 hours were spent caring for people with dementia in 2013. 43% of carers do not receive enough support.

Help me get to the finish line on April 12th and more importantly, help a leading UK charity make new discoveries in dementia research and support those who really are in need.

Donate, and donate now.

That's all very well, but what is dementia?

Dementia is caused by diseases of the brain, the most common of which is Alzheimer's disease. The term dementia describes a set of symptoms that may include memory loss and difficulties with thinking, problem solving or language. It's caused when the brain is damaged by the disease or by a series of strokes. It's progressive and debilitating. There is no cure.

62% of sufferers have Alzheimer's disease, which is caused by changes in the structure of the brain and a shortage of important chemicals that help with the transmission of messages. 17% have vascular dementia, caused by problem in the supply of blood to the brain, commonly due to a stroke or series of small strokes. 10% have a mix of these two. The other common cases are made up of rarer diseases (including Parkinson's), Lewy bodies and frontotemporal dementia, which affects the front and sides of the brain. 

The serious stuff…

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. So it’s the most efficient way to donate – saving time and cutting costs for the charity.