36 year old Lachlan lives in Leicestershire, and works as an IT Technical Services Manager in Coventry. Other than playing golf once a week he'd not really exercised over the past eight years. In January 2006, weighing in at 13 stone 2lb, he was a good stone overweight. So, like many others, he made a New Year's resolution to step up his activity! Lachlan's personal challenge was to get fit to compete in the British Indoor Rowing Championships, held at the National Indoor Arena Birmingham, in November, but it turned into much more than that.

Lachlan bought a cheap rowing machine, and together the family was determined to make fitness part of their 'lifestyle'. Then a few weeks later in February, Lachlan's mother-in-law was diagnosed with colon cancer whilst on holiday in Spain. Fortunately, after a harrowing four weeks the growth was successfully removed. The whole event inspired Lachlan to do his bit in aid of cancer research, so the Rower Roadshow was born.

Lachlan decided to base the fundraising around the British Indoor Rowing Championships, giving himself the target of going from his then best time of 8 minutes for 2,000 meters down to seven minutes by the event. Originally Lachlan set a fundraising target of £2,000, £1 for each metre rowed. Having broken the £2,000 only 6 weeks into the campaign Lachlan revised the target to £4,000. Lachlan's update:

"I am pleased to report that the appeal reached £4,000 on September 17th following the successful Oar-some Challenge Team Rowing Event in Coventry when donations totaled over £600."

Before Lachlan's campaign started he learned that Concept2 Indoor Rowers were at the British IRC:

"I approached staff at Concept 2 - it's truly one of the friendliest, most helpful companies I have come across. Not only did they invite me to their offices in Nottingham where former British rowing coach Terry O'Neill gave advice and a bespoke training programme; they also loaned me an Indoor Rower from March through to the BIRC in November!"

Lachlan built a dedicated website for his fundraising campaign development, and following his own physical progress. So how does the Rower Roadshow work?

Lachlan wrote to several organisations known for their generosity in helping good causes; amongst those were Round Table, Probus, and Ladies Circle. As well as these groups, Lachlan's Roadshow has taken him to The Haven holiday site in Norfolk and even a wedding!

The Roadshows started out with Lachlan rowing 2,000 metres as fast as possible with people throwing money in to the pot just to see him suffer! Lachlan soon got smart. Everyone else at the Events had to row and to pay for the privilege. For more details on what happened at the different Events, and pictures visit www.rowerroadshow.co.uk/events.htm

The EU-Matic Team "Rower Roadshow" at the Village Hotel, Coventry

This was the penultimate Rower Roadshow Event of the series that Lachlan has taken to other venues across the country. It was also different as this was the only one to have teams racing against each other. There were seven teams, each of six competitors who were Lachlan's workplace colleagues from EU-Matic Ltd. competing in five minute relays for two and a half hours.

Tom Kay, www.technique2.co.uk who has distinguished rowing career for over 25 years opened the Sponsored Fundraising Event. He was a World Champion three times, twice an Olympian and finished his international career after 15 years with a World Silver Medal in the single scull in 2003. He is a Rowing Coach for both on and off the water and a Concept 2 Master Instructor. Tom started proceedings with a technical demonstration; his main advice was: "not to rush off at the start..." No one listened to that bit!

Lachlan was very pleased with the Event: "Wow, what a fantastic day! To see so many people giving 100% physical effort in the aid of a good cause is so overwhelmingly pleasing. The fact that this was a team event made the day very good; and each and every person taking part was so passionate about doing their very best made it extra special."

Anyone unfortunate enough to get cancer is destined for a tough time and they need to dig deep to find the strength and character to carry on. Looking at the grit and determination of the people involved in this team rowing event, I witnessed the sort of character required to fight in such tough situations.

"The youngest rower taking part was my daughter Clarice, aged 11 who managed incredible an 500 metre split times of 2 minutes 15 seconds toward the end of her sessions; the oldest rower, Ken Bartlett*, is 59 years old and ironically was the fastest rower of all! Ken rowed 5 times for the IT team, and managed an average of 1,300 metres for each row of his 5 minute relay intervals."

"Process Engineering won the event in the end. Their 5 man team rowed 35,000 meters over the two and a half hours, winning by a comfortable distance in the end. Special thanks go to the Village Hotel for giving us the use of their impressive facilities; Tom Kay for opening the event and giving us a crash course in indoor rowing techniques; and to each and every person that took part in the event!"

• Inspiration for the Rower Roadshow Charity Challenge: Lying awake in bed one night Lachlan decided to base the fundraising around the amazing Concept 2 Indoor Rower. He spoke to Ken Bartlett, a colleague at work who is a dedicated Indoor Rower and was involved with an Event that raised £34,000 last year. As his goal, Lachlan decided to base the appeal around the BIRC.

There's still time to play, donate and win a weekend break for two!

In the run up to the BIRC there's still time to Donate. Please make your Donation through www.justgiving.com/rowerroadshow by clicking on the link, or pasting it in the address bar if the link does not work for you. The benefit of www.justgiving.com is that the donation is completely tax free and through the Gift Aid scheme an extra 28p gets added to every £1 donated.

This is a creative and imaginative Fundraising project. Lachlan is optimistic that more donations will be made in the next few months, supporting Cancer Research UK.

"Thanks to those who have helped me with the campaign via the website, to everyone at Concept 2 for their support and to Tom Kay for his free technical evaluation and encouragement."

www.cancerresearchuk.org
www.rowerroadshow.co.uk
www.justgiving.com/rowerroadshow
www.technique2.co.uk