Thanks for taking the time to visit my JustGiving page. I'm part of a group friends all of whom have an interest in raising awareness of mental health issues and finding a way to keep fit and mentally healthy this year.

We intend to run 6721 miles across 2021 – a mile for every suicide and every tragic story behind it.

Suicide, particularly male suicide, is a growing problem in the UK, and around the world. The statistics are stark. 6721 people died by suicide in the UK in 2019, a significant increase from 2018, and suicide remains the UK’s biggest single killer of men under the age of 45. Whilst data for 2020 is still provisional, the trends show no sign of reversing and there is real concern regarding the longer-term impact of recent lockdowns on mental health issues of all kinds.

These are awful facts to face and each of the 6721 deaths carries its own devastating story, its own reverberations through families, friends and wider society. This is why we want to take on a challenge that represents every one of those individuals and, in the process, draw attention to an issue that needs more exposure and understanding.

This challenge has also been driven by very personal stories of friends, colleagues and family impacted directly by suicide. One such was a close university friend, Jon McCartney. Jon was a wonderful guy to know – a passionate Nottingham Forest fan, successful patent attorney, BBQ enthusiast, occasional trumpet player and someone with endless energy to take on new projects and challenges. Most of all he was a kind, supportive and unfailingly generous friend.

In October 2017 Jon unexpectedly and tragically took his own life at the age of 35.

His family set up a charity in Jon’s memory, Jonathan's Voice , the purpose of which is to increase the understanding and awareness of suicide risk, particularly among young professional men. The donations you make through this page will therefore raise funds to support the fantastic work of Jonathan's Voice who do so much to facilitate much-needed dialogue about mental health and suicide.

Finally, we're also all doing this as a challenge for ourselves and as a group. 2020 was a tough year, and 2021 is set to continue to test us all. This challenge is a way for each of us, individually, to set goals that get us motivated, fit and mentally healthy across the whole year. It will also help keep a group of friends, dispersed across six countries, connected at a time when social contact and friendships are particularly hard to sustain and having mechanisms to talk to and support each other is so important.

Hopefully as well as donating, visiting this page and finding out more about our challenge might inspire you and your family and friends to take on something similar - we'd love to hear about it if you do!

Every mile matters. #6721

You can follow our progress at https://www.strava.com/clubs/everymilematters.

The group includes Ali Sargeant, Andy Edwards, Andrew Higgins, Ben Dixon, Dave Horsfall, Graham Micklem, Marcus McConnell, Mark Fyson, Oliver Musto, Paul Meller, Pete Hull, Phil Holliday. We have set up a team justgiving site so donating to any one of us will go to the same cause - the team site is: www.justgiving.com/team/6721