Dream Olympic ticket for Rochdale’s Farah

Farah Rehman with sponsor Elaine Simons

Rochdale’s Farah Rehman is the latest name to join the London 2012 Games Makers team at this summer’s Olympics.

Games Makers is the name given to the army of up to 70,000 volunteers who will help ensure everything runs smoothly during the event.

Farah will join the world’s media at the Athlete’s Village where her role will be to assist media representatives with anything they need.

“It’s a dream come true for me. I’ve wanted to be involved in the Olympics since I was at school and as soon as London was chosen as the venue I knew I would volunteer to be a part of it,” the 25-year-old said.

“To be based at the Athlete’s Village working with the media is amazing – I’ve really struck lucky.”

A seasoned volunteer, Farah has spent time in orphanages in Uganda and working on community projects in Kenya. It’s this experience that she believes helped her to be chosen from around 250,000 applicants.

Farah has been able to realise her dream thanks to the support of local sponsors who are helping her meet her expenses as she attends training events in the run up to the summer Games.

“I really can’t thank my sponsors enough. As volunteers we’re obviously not paid so this financial help has made such a huge difference to me,” she said.

“It’s helped with my travel to training days and with my food costs whilst in London. Without this support I would have struggled to have taken advantage of this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.”

Elaine Simons, from EJS Marketing, is one of Farah’s sponsors. She said: “It’s a fantastic opportunity and Farah is so passionate about taking part that it is a pleasure to be able to help her. We’ll be following her story closely.”

Farah’s other sponsors include Link4Life, Rochdale Chamber of Commerce board members, Rochdale Town Centre Management and Hopwood Hall.

John Taylor, Head of Leisure & Community Services at Link4Life, said: “This is a fantastic development opportunity for Farah and we are delighted to support her in it. She will make a valuable addition to the London 2012 team.”