Mike Tindall is cutting short his charity bike ride to go to a wedding

Speaking on his 'The Good, The Bad and The Rugby' podcast before beginning the trip, he told co-hosts James Haskell and Alex Payne: "I, fortunately, get the last day off as I have to be back for a wedding."

His co-hosts joked: "So you're going to have to go doubly fast then, in order to get it done in five days?"

But Mike said: "No, I'm just going to get a taxi from wherever I finish it," to which James and Alex both chimed: "That is cheating!"

The father-of-three knew the Raid Alpine challenge would be tough.

He noted: "We've got over 3,000 metres of climbing pretty much every day, which is nearly two miles vertically," Mike revealed.

Mike has been giving his social media followers regular updates on the trip so far.

After describing the first day as "pretty brutal", his day two update was captioned: "Col de Prez you can kiss my a** (sic)".

He then elaborated: "Horrible climb in the Col de Prez but the team stuck with it and got through it. Bring on day 3 (sic)"

The ex-sportsman shared another update on Friday (08.07.22) and which he admitted the rides were "getting worse" the longer the challenge has gone on.

Sharing details of Thursday's (07.07.22) route, he wrote: "So I'm figuring out they get worse every day".

He then added: "Long day again yesterday but in the can! Just keep pedalling! @cureparkinsons (sic)"

The cause is close to Mike's heart because his beloved father, Phillip Tindall, was diagnosed with Parkinson's in 2003.

He said: "My dad has had Parkinson's for 20 years. You know, it's been a tough road for him, especially in the last ten years and it's been great to put that funding into research."