CIPLA MEDPRO MILES FOR SMILES GALA DINNER

The "Cipla Medpro Miles for Smiles" Great Wall Runners raised over half a million rand for the Miles for Smiles Foundation. The final amount was announced at a glitzy Gala Dinner and auction held in the runners' honour, in Stellenbosch at the end of March.

David Grier and Braam Malherbe became the first people ever to run the entire length of the Great Wall of China in one attempt when they covered 42 km a day, 6 days a week for 4 months. The two runners crossed some of the world's harshest terrain and endured extreme temperatures varying from 42°C in the Gobi Desert to -22 °C in the mountain ranges north of Beijing, to achieve their "impossible" goal.

The smiling Great Wall Runners handed over a cheque to the tune of R550 000 to Natalie Miller and Gianluca Biavati, representatives of Operation Smile South Africa, the beneficiary of the 2006 Miles for Smiles campaign. Operation Smile is an international organisation that provides children with cleft palates and cleft lips the gift of 'smiling' for the first time through volunteer surgery by international and South African medical professionals.

Grier and Malherbe are also the first people to accurately measure the Great Wall using high tech GPS devices. They announced at the dinner that the accurate length of the 'Sleeping Dragon', as the wall is often called, believed to be 5000km, is actually only 3518.61km long. The runners themselves ran over 4200km as they often had to meet their support crew kilometres away from the wall, due to the terrain being impassable for vehicles.

The Miles for Smiles runners have been named the 'Out There Adventurers of the Year', beating other legendary adventurers such as Mike Horn and Martin Dreyer for the title.

Grier said: "It was a brilliant campaign, well worth everything we went through."
"Winning the 'Out There Adventurers of the Year' was a nice surprise and a lovely accolade. It's quite an honour to be recognised, especially with the calibre of the other nominees."

Malherbe said: "By doing this run I wanted to show people, particularly children, that nothing is impossible. The only limitations we impose on ourselves are those in our mind. It has been a very humbling experience for me and I am extremely grateful to everyone out there who supported us, and the children, though this arduous expedition."

The 200 guests, comprising some of the country's top business people gathered at the exquisite Nooitgedacht venue. A three course dinner by one of Cape Town's top chefs, Pete Goffe-Wood, was enjoyed before Tuxedo got the guests dancing into the small hours.

R300 000 was raised through various initiatives over the past 6 months, largely due to the generosity of the South African public. A further R250 000 was raised at the Gala Dinner after an extremely exciting and competitive auction. A bottle of 20 year old anniversary Johnnie Walker Blue Label, won by Jorrie Jordaan, and two Richie Ryall limited edition prints were among the items that went under the hammer. The highest bid was received for the Children's Charter. This document, written in Chinese and proclaiming the rights of children, was signed by officials and school principals in the villages the runners passed as they traversed the wall. The Charter was won by Jerome Smith, CEO of Cipla Medpro.

Our sincere thanks to the South African public who logged onto the website, www.milesforsmiles.co.za, and supported this incredible initiative.

Please contact Leanne Raymond, 021 914 0520 with any queries