Doddie Aid is a mass participation event, encouraging you to get active for 6 weeks from 1 January and raise funds to help find a cure to Motor Neuron Disease. It was founded by former Scotland captain and British and Irish Lion, Rob Wainwright, and over the last two years has seen over 30,000 participants cover 4 million miles and raise over £2 million for the Foundation.

The event splits participants into six districts, with the winning district being the one which covers the furthest distance over the duration of the event.

What is MND?
MND is a disease which affects the motor neurons of the nervous system. It is life shortening and mostly progresses rapidly.

What does MND do?
MND damages and attacks the nerves, meaning that messages being sent from the brain to the muscles no longer work.

More Information
MND isn't as rare as you may think. Did you know that 1 in 300 people are at risk of developing MND in their lifetime?
There is currently no cure for MND.

For more information, the following sites are useful:
https://www.mndassociation.org/about-mnd/
https://www.alsuntangled.com/

We have all heard about MND and the heroism of sufferers like the late great Doddie Weir, Rob Burrow and the Herculean efforts of the legend Kevin Sinfield. Some of you will also know that Orrell RUFC lost a great player and friend to MND last year, Stephen “Raffs” Raffell. We therefore wanted to do our bit and together with friends of Raffs from St Cuthbert’s ARLFC, we will be joining a group of people from the rugby world to help raise monies into research of this devastating disease and to keep the profile of MND in the public eye.

Read on to find out more about our involvement and how, our great rugby family, can help.