500km. A 20-year-old bike I am training on. One very unfit rider. 350+ kids who deserve a life of choice, not chance.

In 2007, Peter Baines stood up at Panasonic Monday Morning Meeting and told us about a charity he’d started after the Boxing Day Tsunami. I was hooked. I’ve been donating to Hands Across the Water ever since.

Almost two decades later, I’ve been to the dinners, bid at the auctions and clapped in all the right places. This time I’m doing something much more terrifying: I’m getting on my bike.

From 22 to 27 February 2027, I’ll be riding 500km for Hands Across the Water.

Here’s the full list of my qualifications:

• Fitness: very low. I’d call it “aspirational”.
• Training Bike: about 20 years old and both of us have been resting for last 10 years.
• Training plan: in progress, which I’m told is not the same as “started”.
• Motivation: enormous. 

Why it matters:
Hands support 350+ children across 7 homes and projects in Thailand. Children come to live in a Hands home because they have no choice: no family to care for them, a family who can’t, or an unsafe home. Hands gives them food, safety and a bed, and then something just as important: education, career pathways and the confidence to see that a life of choice is possible.

Here’s what your donation does:

• $33: Dental care for 1 child
  2 Chickens for our sustainable farm
  Rice for 16 people for 1 week
• $108: Fortnightly Hands home maintenance Counselling and social support for 1 child for 1 month
• $246: University education – 1/3 term
  Career training, mentoring, tutoring programs
• $435: Cost of educating a child including supplies and uniforms for 1 year

My promise: I will finish, even if I finish last, sweaty, possibly red, hopefully not sunburnt and probably in a heated argument with a hill. Your donation is tax deductible, and it’s easily the most comfortable way to take part in this ride.

My goal is $5,000. That’s $10 per kilometre, which is a nice round way to look at it. Sponsor a few kilometres, or all of them, and make my suffering worth it.

Thank you for backing me, and for backing the children.

Alistair