LASG RESTATES COMMITMENT TO SPORTS DEVELOPMENT

… AS LAGOS WOMEN RUN HOLDS 3RD EDITION

Lagos State Government at the weekend reaffirmed its commitment to provide the necessary support and logistics to initiatives that would further complement the development of sports in the State.

The Chairman of Lagos State Sports Commission, Dr. Kweku Tandoh gave the assurance on Saturday during the Third edition of the annual Lagos Women Run, LWR, initiated by a group of career women led by the first Nigerian woman Black Belt holder in Taekwondo, Tayo Popoola and supported by the State Government.
Dr. Tandoh acknowledged the yearly improvement recorded by the annual 10-kilometre race since its inception in 2016, saying that the sporting event has grown in leaps and bounds.

He said that the State government was open to partnership with individuals or corporate organisations in the development of other sporting activities in line with its sports for excellence drive.

“What I have seen from this year’s edition of the Lagos Women Run is that the event has been well-coordinated and it is getting better every year. As a government, we provided support for this event in form of funds and logistics as well as personnel from relevant agencies like LASEMA, RRS, and LASTMA among others”, the Chairman stated.

According to him, the LWR has been very instrumental in achieving some strong pillars of sports development which are the creation of awareness for mass participation in sports and promoting wellbeing and healthy living.
The Chairman stressed that the event, the first of its kind and the only one in the country as well as across West Africa, is presently gathering trend beyond Nigeria.

He added that the organisers of the event were overwhelmed with the large turn out and participation of women in the 2018 edition which was bigger and better than those held in 2016 and 2017.

The representative of the First Lady at the event, Mrs. Biodun Ajanaku – wife of the Special Adviser to the Governor on Information and Strategy – commended the LWR initiative, noting that the 10-kilometre race will help women to keep fit and stay healthy.

She urged the organisers to sustain the LWR idea, saying that it will greatly help womenfolk and prepare them for better performance during the main marathon race.

“LWR gives women a chance to showcase their running skills and going by what we have seen, the race has been fantastic so far and the women that participated in the run enjoyed themselves”, she added.

According to her, the intention of the yearly race was not designed as a form of competition per se but rather a platform for women participation where they will run against cancer, infertility, discrimination and other social vices.

Two categories of women runners participated in the race, comprising the Open Category made up of runners from ages 18 years to 44 and the Veteran Category for runners from age 45years and above.

Rose Akusho, emerged the winner of the 2018 Lagos Women Open Category run with a cash prize of N500,000, while the winner of the Veteran Category took home N200,000.

Other cash prizes for winners of the LWR include 1st Runners-up N300,000, 2nd runners-up N200,000, 4th Place, N100,000, 5th Place N50,000. For the veteran category, 2nd place N150,000, 3rd place N100,000, 4th place N50,000, while silver medals and certificates were issued to all the runners