A very good friend of mine (Kevin Harper) had an operation on 19th February 2012 at Kings College Hospital to remove a (benign) tumour from his brain stem.

Kevin was later moved to the Elmstead Rehabilitation unit at Queen Marys Hospital, Sidcup. Kevin then experienced a further setback and had to be returned to Kings for yet another operation. He soon returned to Elmstead and took major steps towards his recovery. On 1st June 2012, after a total of 4 operations, Kevin returned home.

Seeing Kevin and his family go through so much and feeling quite useless, we decided as a group of Kevin's closest friends to raise some money for Brain Tumour UK & King's College Hospital's charity - "together we can".

We have opted to have a series of events throughout the Summer and we're calling it HarperFest in honour of Kevin.

We held a Race Night on Saturday 7th July at Old Shootershillian RFC. It was a huge success and raised over £3,100!

I ran the Dartford Half Marathon to raise further money for HarperFest. At 9am on Sunday 22nd July, I set off with around 650 other runners.

Two hours and twenty minutes later I crossed the finish line at Central Park Athletics Arena, the home track for Dartford Harriers.

We estimate that this run has added over £1,150 to the HarperFest Pot! Please do continue to sponsor me

We now need players for our Poker Tournament on Tuesday 21st August 2012 at Fox Poker Club. The entry fee is £25 - please contact me on arrymental@sky.com for further details if you are interested in playing.

Based on information supplied by Simon Monk.