Being sacked from the Brumbies was not the worst thing that happened to Andy and his family in the last 12 months. 

His wife Kerri Rawlings had received a serious brain injury while mountain biking and the family were struggling to cope with her rehabilitation when the axe fell on the coach of the ACT's Super 14 franchise, the Brumbies.

Andy and Kerri are now getting ready to embark on "The Friendly Ride", a bicycle tour from Cooktown to Canberra to raise awareness for brain injury.

Andy is tackling the Bicentennial National Trail, riding the majority of the length of the Great Dividing Range off the beaten track on country roads and old coach and stock routes, often little wider than the width of his handle bars.

Kerri will be driving in support and meeting him along the way.

The journey is an important part of Kerri's rehabilitation, Andy says.

"One of the main reasons (behind doing the ride) is for Kerri to be a back up support driver. In all our readings of people with acquired brain injury, the more you can get them to take responsibility for their own actions, the quicker their rehab is to improve," he told Ross.

Kerri's behaviour has changed since the accident. Her reactions to the everyday pressures of life have become less predictable for her family, but she is improving.

"There are a lot of people doing it a lot tougher than me," Kerri told Alex Sloan and Tim Gavel.
"It's just life changing. There are so many things you take forgranted that you can't do or have less control over than what you had before."

Bye-bye Brumbies

Andy Friend says he wasn't happy with the way things came to an end at the Brumbies.

"I was angry. I was disappointed with the way things had happened, but I couldn't change that.

"Given everything else that had happened to us in the previous nine months with Kerry's accident, that was it for me. We moved on to the next thing, which is looking after Kerry."