On 7 July 2013, I will join thousands of amateur cyclists from around the world on the Etape du Tour, a race taking place over exactly the same course as a mountain stage of this year's Tour de France (see the gallery for the stage profiles). My main aim is to finish ahead of the dreaded "broom wagon", which sweeps up stragglers and ejects them from the race.  But I must admit I am training hard, and harbour secret ambitions of breaking the 6 hour mark.

I am also hoping to use this opportunity to draw your attention to the work of Theatre for Change - an innovative charity working to educate and empower people in the sphere of sexual and reproductive health in Africa. TfAC has been making a real difference to people's lives in Ghana and Malawi, for more than a decade - have a look at the website to find out more: http://www.tfacafrica.com

I am particularly proud to be a trustee of this inspirational organisation, and so I hope you will help me to support it with a donation. In fact, in order to push myself harder and encourage you to donate to TfAC, I have set myself a target time of 5 hours and 30 minutes. For every minute by which I fail to meet this target, I will match each and every pound donated by you on this page with a 5% contribution of my own. 

For example, if I finish just 10 minutes outside my target time, I will make a matching contribution of 50% of total donations. So the more you can give, the more I will have to match, and the faster I will have to pedal! And as my training progresses over the last few weeks, I will review and revise my target time if it looks like it's going to be too easy.

Please do consider donating to this excellent cause, and thank you for visiting my JustGiving page and reading about TfAC and my Etape challenge.