Opportunity Village
welcomed 6,119 Santas at the fourth annual Las Vegas Great Santa Run on
Saturday, Dec. 6 at the Fremont Street Experience.
The morning’s festivities
included an appearance from long time friend and supporter of Opportunity
Village and host of VegasDeluxe.com, Robin Leach, performances by local singer
and songwriter George Dare, who wrote the Las Vegas Great Santa Run theme song
“Run Santa Run” and the sensational singing duo, Zowie Bowie.
Magicians of the Century,
Siegfried & Roy, served as Honorary Team Captains for the third year, drawing
support from participants and fans from around the world. Leading the one mile
walk, Siegfried & Roy walked in front of a sea of Santas, giving participants a
chance to be a part of something truly magical during the season of giving.
Opportunity Village’s
Chief Development Officer, Linda Smith, gained a well-respected group of
supporters including Mayor Oscar Goodman, Senator John Ensign and Santa Claus
himself.
“We had an amazing turnout
for this year’s Las Vegas Great Santa Run with more than 6,100 people from all
over the world donning Santa suits and flooding Fremont Street with red and
white,” said Smith. “This event has become an international competition; one
that we hope will spread worldwide in the coming years with New Zealand and
Milan joining Liverpool and Dublin in the annual event. Opportunity Village is
incredibly thankful to everyone who came out in support of the 900 intellectually disabled
clients we serve daily.”
The world record for the
largest Santa gathering was set in 2005 with 3,291 participants in the Liverpool
Santa Dash in the UK. In 2007, the Las Vegas Great Santa Run had 7,269
participants making Las Vegas the Guinness Book of World Records 2007 winner.
The Las Vegas Great Santa
Run serves as a fundraising effort to benefit Opportunity Village, an attempt to
break the current world record for the largest Santa gathering and to provide a
light-spirited warm-up run for participants in The Las Vegas Marathon the
following day. Opportunity Village is a Las Vegas-based, not-for-profit organization
that serves people with intellectual disabilities to improve the quality of
their lives and the lives of their families. Opportunity Village is the largest
private provider of
vocational training, employment, advocacy and recreation for people with
disabilities in Nevada and is currently serving hundreds of people with severe disabilities every
day. For more information, call 702.880.4000 or visit www.LasVegasSantaRun.org.
