Just five short months ago, 9 committed staff members from Ridley & Hall agreed to put on their trainers and join the Running Down Dementia campaign. A team at Alzheimer’s Research UK came up with the challenge that each participant would run (or walk) 100km over summer 2016 and each raise £100 for dementia research. So, between July and the end of October, “Nigel’s Nutty Nine” covered over 900km (that’s over 21 marathons!) in all weathers, uphill and down dale, with the aim of raising vital funds for Alzheimer’s Research. With donations still rolling in, we have smashed our £900 target, raising a grand total of £1,025 altogether, with the money going directly towards dementia research which is desperately underfunded. For every person living with dementia, the annual cost to the UK economy is over £30,000 and yet only £90 is spent on dementia research each year.

Ridley & Hall already prides itself in providing a client-focused service to deliver better outcomes for people living with dementia and their carers. On an everyday level the firm works towards being more dementia-friendly through their communications, the office environment and compulsory staff training, but the Running Down Dementia campaign gave us a different sort of opportunity to get involved and help towards research to find treatments and preventions to defeat these complex brain diseases. There is currently no cure for Alzheimer’s disease or any other type of dementia. Delaying the onset of dementia by five years would halve the number of deaths from the condition, saving 30,000 lives a year.

Helen Webster, a solicitor in the Private Client department and one of the runners said of the challenge “I am so proud of the team, who all have our jobs here and other commitments outside of work, to have put aside so much time – whatever the weather and despite injuries – and made the effort to run for such a worthy cause as Alzheimer’s Research UK. As a Dementia Friends Champion, I am only too aware of the growing issue of dementia and its effect on the health service and economy. Research will hopefully lead to a cure in the future, and if our small contribution helps that happen any quicker, then each painful step will have been worth it”.

If you still want to donate to the team’s effort, it’s not too late as you can still visit the Supporter page and sponsor online at https://running-down-dementia.everydayhero.com/uk/nigel-s-nutty-nine