A couple of weeks ago I met an incredible lady called Charlotte Thompson. Charlotte lives in Hallaton and she runs - a lot!

She shared with me the story of how she came to fall in love with running and how she now uses her hobby (and her work - she is now a trainer!) to raise money for charity.

She has run the London Marathon, and has even run from Hallaton to London and then run the marathon! Then she told me all about her latest venture...

Charlotte, along with her friend and businesswoman Monique Coulton and Martin Johnson's wife, Kay, have organised a 200-mile group relay race from Devon to the England v France Six Nations game at Twickenham on February 26th.

Money raised by this latest venture will be split between LOROS and the Urban Zen Foundation, a charity founded by fashion designer Donna Karan to help good causes.

Charlotte and her friends have managed to get the help of a host of famous names to help - they will be greetd by when they arrive at Twickenham by representatives from Lions Rampant Clothing, Goodness Shakes and other businesses who have shown their support along the way. 

They will run on to the pitch at half-time, raising awareness of LOROS to tens of thousands of rugby fans and millions of people watching across the world. England manager Martin is a patron of LOROS as his mother, Hilary, spent time there before she died in 2002.

Also among the team are Times columnist Kate Percy; Hugh Brasher, chief executive of clothing specialists SweatShop; Tom Joule and Simon Dowling of Market Harborough firm Joules clothing; model Jo-Emma Larvin; TV magician Chris Korn; triple Afghanistan amputee Mark Ormrod; and blind marathon runner Dave Heeley.

Martin's fellow rugby legends Phil Vickery and Lee Mears will complete three-mile legs of the race along the way.

The race has been named The Rampant Rugby Ball Run, as Leicester clothing firm Lions Rampant Ltd is donating the kit.

Charlotte is an incredibly high-energy, positive person and I wish her and her fellow runners all the very best with this amazing venture!

To sponsor the team, visit:
http://uk.virginmoneygiving.com/200milerampantrugbyrun

Charlotte has also organised a fashion show in support of the fund-raising at the Leicester Tigers ground on Friday February 11th at 7pm. See our events section for more info.