6th -14th September, Lands End to John O'Groats, 969miles over 9 days, 15,000m of climbing and all on a road bike............................... WHAT WAS I THINKING!

As somebody who didn't own a road bike until April this year, you may think agreeing to cycle 100+miles every day for 9 days is a true mid-life crisis (and you could be right!) however all the pain is for a good cause so please help me in my quest to complete the ride by sponsoring me.

The training has now started in earnest, both on and off the bike, and I now have a renewed respect for cyclists. After hour upon hour in the saddle its not just your knees and back that hurt.............anybody got a cushion!

All the Vodafone riders taking part are doing so in support of the Vodafone Foundations LEJOG challenge for Lesotho HIV/AIDS victims. Each rider is aiming to raise over £3000 so anything you can give to help me reach my target will definitely spur me on both in training and during the event itself.

You can also sponsor via JustGivingText at no extra cost,simply text GRAH97 with the amount to 70070 (e.g. text "GRAH97 £20" to 70070)

Thanks for all your support
Graham

Lesotho is a country facing an HIV / AIDS challenge and where there are currently 80,000 adults receiving antiretroviral drugs but only 4,000 children, despite ARVs being available through globally funded programmes.  We want all 41,000 children living with HIV to have access to treatment by 2017.  The Vodafone Foundation is working with in-country partners to increase the number of children accessing treatment and the first step is to get the children to clinics. Via M-pesa, sending money via the network has become a reality. Our technology will enable children to receive their bus fare to ensure they can attend treatment. It will cost the equivalent of just $65 per child to access treatment over the 3 years of the programme.  We need to raise $8 million to reach our 2017 target and the challenge for Vodafone employees is to raise $1 million of that.