VYRE Ltd, the global provider of content management solutions, is one of the main sponsors of the inaugural Greaseball Challenge charity car rally.

Pit stops for re-filling with petrol won't be on the agenda for one of the world's first green car rallies - drivers in it will, instead, be stopping at wayside restaurants for a tank of yesterday's chip fat.

The rally will start in Washington on April 1st with a British girl, Nicola Matsukis - who lives and works in London and has been a key organiser of the event - as one of the drivers. With the aim of promoting bio-fuel and green motoring, five teams in cars including two vintage Mercedes bought on e-bay and an American school bus, set out to drive 4,5OO miles in a month-long run through the USA to Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaragua and Costa Rica.

Each car will be powered by vegetable oil, waste grease or any renewable fuel source. The cars will fill up from diners, fast-food outlets, markets, factories and farmers who are often delighted to have a use for their used fat-waste.

The Greaseball Challenge was set up as a charitable trust to promote bio-fuel projects and to assist small grassroots projects in Central America - projects run by small community and farming co-operatives and other non-government organisations. Funds from it will also go to help promote eco-friendly tourism such as locally run guest houses and camp sites and it is in these that teams will stay en-route.

Once the rally is over the vehicles used will be donated to local communities. Says Nicola, "Greaseball is the complete opposite of the fuel-guzzling macho rallies that we see". A 35 year old business development manager for Lowe Worldwide ad agency with a senior role in the company, she was born in Zimbabwe, came to England 12 years ago and now lives in Fulham. "I have to travel a lot of miles round the world for business " she says "and I see this as giving something back. I just want to make a difference; it's as simple as that". She became interested in eco- friendly projects through a friend in the World Bank and has been working on Greaseball for over a year, taking a month's holiday for the drive.

For any further information and to see how the teams are getting on, please have a look at the Greaseball Rally website: http://www.greaseballrally.com/

This story has also been featured in Metro newspaper