Mystery donor hands astonishing £5.5m to Sport Relief - a QUARTER of the total raised

A mystery donor gave £5.5 million to the Sport Relief charity appeal in one of the biggest single donations in the history of TV fund-raising, the BBC said today.

The BBC said the gift from the anonymous donor - made last night as viewers watched the Sport Relief telethon - was the biggest donation in Comic Relief's 22-year history.

The spokeswoman said the "phenomenal" donation pushed the total raised to more than £19 million.

She said the donor had asked for anonymity and that the BBC could not say whether the money had come from a man or woman.

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The telethon saw celebrities battle it out in the boxing ring and the ballroom.

Richard Hammond, Gary Lineker and Davina McCall fronted last night's extravaganza, which saw many of the channel's most popular shows brought together.

There were special Sport Relief-themed editions of Strictly Come Dancing, The Apprentice and Top Gear - as well as A Question of Sport Relief.

At the end of the show, in the early hours of this morning, a total of £19,640,321 was unveiled by presenters Patrick Kielty and Claudia Winkleman, to whoops and cheers from the audience, as ticker tape cascaded from the ceiling.

The figure beat the amount of money raised at the last Sport Relief in 2006, when the biennial event raised a total of £18 million.

The cash will help vulnerable people in the UK and across the world.

The theme of this year's Sport Relief was "Rise To The Challenge".

Last night's celebrity-packed events kicked off with former England footballer Alan Shearer's marathon cycle ride - one of the star fundraising attractions.

His epic trip, with TV presenter Adrian Chiles, finished in London after they cycled 335 miles from Newcastle to London.

The pair set off on their two-day journey from Newcastle United's St James's Park stadium on Thursday morning and made it across the Pennines on the first day.

The journey took them yesterday through West Bromwich, where they stopped at The Hawthorns - home of Chiles's beloved West Bromwich Albion.

They were also joined for 19 miles by Wolverhampton Wanderers' manager Mick McCarthy.

Along the way they faced gale-force winds and rain, and a series of mishaps that saw both men take a tumble from their bikes at times.

They kept themselves going with a series of quiz questions and a diet of cheese and ham sandwiches and flapjack.

Finally after cycling for a total of 26 hours they pulled into Television Centre in Shepherds Bush, West London.

Former England cricketer Mark Ramprakash teamed up with EastEnders actress Kara Tointon to win a special edition of Celebrity Come Dancing.

And comic Jimmy Carr hosted a one-off episode of A Question of Sport which saw Gary Lineker, Sue Barker and boxer Ricky Hatton answer the questions.

The event saw a celebrity boxing bout between GMTV presenter Ben Shephard and soul singer Lemar. The judges' decision saw Shephard victorious.

And in a showdown of the chat show kings, Jonathan Ross interviewed Michael Parkinson.

Little Britain star David Walliams and Olympic rower James Cracknell recently took on a swimming challenge, covering 12 miles from Gibraltar to Morocco.

The 2008 fundraising campaign will culminate tomorrow with the announcement of the final total.

Before that, thousands of runners will do their bit by running in the Sport Relief mile run to raise funds.

Runs are taking place all over the country, in cities including Belfast, Birmingham, Edinburgh and Swansea.