007 joins the fight against heart disease

He came up against many of the world's baddies in his time. But none of them was as formidable as his latest opponent - heart disease.

Now James Bond is taking on Britain's biggest killer as the family of 007 creator and author Ian Fleming, who sadly died of a heart attack in 1964, stages a series of fundraising events in aid of the British Heart Foundation.

The first of these events has just taken place in Kent, where more than £17,000 was raised at a charity golf day and auction at the Royal St. George’s Golf Club in Sandwich.

The Ian Fleming Centenary charity event celebrated the author’s life - he would have been 100 this year if he had survived. Ian Fleming played regularly at the Royal St George’s golf course and enjoyed his last game of golf at the club the day before he died, aged 56.

More than 38,000 people die prematurely of heart disease each year in the UK. The Fleming family put the event together to help us in our fight against this devastating disease.

After the day’s play, Ronnie Corbett (pictured above with the Fleming family) hosted a dinner which was attended by Bond Girl Tania Mallett, who played Tilly Masterson in Goldfinger.

The BHF spends over £100 of every minute of every day on vital heart research and they rely totally on donations of time and money to fund their work.

Sara Jane Woods, our Head of Community Fundraising, "We’d like to thank Lucy and Kate Fleming and all the people involved in the Ian Fleming Centenary golf day, who supported the BHF. They play an important role in the battle against heart disease."

What was your favourite James Bond 007 novel or film? Post a comment below and let us know!

Junkmonkeys.tv wins industry award

We're delighted that our children's Food4Thought campaign - Junkmonkeys.TV - has won the Grand Prix and Charity and Voluntary Sector awards at the NMA Effectiveness Awards 2008.

Our campaign aims to help children make healthy food choices and explains how junk food companies use marketing tricks to make their products more appealing.

The judges loved the virtual cityscape, packed with games and videos.

Check out the website and tell us what you think!

Reflections of Research winners announced

Judging of the third annual science image competition, Reflections of Research, took place last night in London.

BHF heart scientists from across the UK submitted fascinating and beautiful images to represent their field of research, and six finalists were short-listed.

The winner was Steve Thomas, with his image entitled 'A Platelet is Born', pictured above. Runners up were Maksym Harhun with 'Vital Cells for Circulation' and Anthony Davenport with 'Scanning New Horizons'.

Congratulations to all those on the short list and many thanks to all participants for their continued support.

See more images from the event on the BHF Flickr gallery.

BHF celebrates the art of science

The judging for our 3rd annual science image competition Reflections of Research takes place tonight.

Reflections of Research is a collection of artistic and unusual research images taken from studies into heart and blood vessels. The event forms part of the fundraising activities for our Help a Heart campaign.

The winner will be announced on the BHF website tomorrow. In the meantime, take a look at the entries on our recent Reflections of Research news release.

Let us know your favourite by posting a comment here.

Take five minutes out with our online games

Online gaming is big news these days. But you don't need to feel guilty about wasting time in front of the computer.

Online games can be a fun way for both adults and kids to put their knowledge to good use and learn new information at the same time.

Our BHF online games cover food, lifestyle, nutrition and exercise.

Snack Attack and the Food4Thought Challenge will get you thinking about which foods are best for your heart.

If your footy skills aren't up to much on the pitch then you can sit back and watch the goals roll in with our Freekick Football game.

There are plenty of heart operation games if you've always fancied yourself as having a bit of medical flair.

And if you're trying to give up smoking then the Smoking Tetris game could be just the little bit of extra motivation you need.

There's always time, of course, for a quick game of Escape the Office before you actually do!

Got a high score? Challenge someone to beat your score by posting a comment below!

Actress Imelda talks about heart disease and her family

Imelda Staunton is supporting our Help a Heart campaign after the sudden death of her mother three years ago.

In an interview with the Times the actress reveals that both her parents suffered from heart disease.

As a result Imelda says she has regular blood sugar and cholesterol checks and listens carefully to her body.

As part of her work promoting Help a Heart, Imelda recently met two-year-old Cordelia, (pictured) who was born with a heart defect but as a result of life saving surgery is now a happy, healthy toddler.

If you'd like to join Imedla in supporting our life saving research, please go to our campaign website for more information.

Read Imelda's interview in full

Read Cordelia's story

And just in case you missed this...

There were some great TV news pieces about our 2008 London to Brighton Bike Ride last weekend.

One of them was on BBC Breakfast News early on Sunday morning, but if you were taking part in - or making your way to - the Ride itself you will almost certainly have missed it.

Anyway, those very kind folk at the BBC and ITV have just given us permission to host the clips on our BHF YouTube video channel, so if you haven't seen them yet, here they are. First up, BBC Breakfast News...



And here's the ITV London Tonight news report...



Reminder - you can also see our gallery of 150 great photos taken at the Ride

And once again, if you took part in the London to Brighton Ride please let us know how you got on by posting a comment below.

Thanks very much to everyone who took part, and we look forward to hearing from you!