The young swimmers from some selected schools in Lagos exhibited impressive swimming skills display at the just-concluded 4th Zenith Bank/Ikoyi Swimming Competition, giving a glimpse of hope for the sport in the country. The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the young students were from the selected 18 schools in Lagos, including 12 primary and six secondary schools.
The Swimming competition co-sponsored by Zenith Bank and Ikoyi Club took place at the Swimming Section of the Ikoyi Club 1938. The selected schools are
- Grange School, Ikeja,
- Corona School Ikoyi,
- British International School (BIS),
- Lekki, Greenspring Schools,
- Temple School,
- Italian International School,
- Victoria Island
- St Saviours School, Ebute Meta.
The competition touted as a grassroots development sports program, however, lived up to its billing as the young talents displayed prowess. Take for an instance, where some of the schools that
participated in the competition did not have a standard swimming pool to train in, but that has not stopped them from impressing in their events even as onlookers makes sports bet on them.
Other participating schools are
- Lagos Preparatory and Secondary School, Ikoyi,
- Kings School,
- X-Factor School Ikoyi,
- Edgewood College,
- Kristo Ball Schools,
- Children International School, Lekki.
The young swimmers in the age category of U-7, U-9, and U-13 participated in events such as Freestyle 50m, Backstroke, Breaststroke Freestyle and Medley Relay boys and girls.
The co-sponsor of the swimming championship competition represented by the Executive Director, Dennis Olisa, described the event as successful thereby calling for more competitions for swimmers. “This year’s event has been of great success, and it has been beautiful. I am so impressed with the performance of the swimmers whom, I see as the future of the sport.
“What we are thinking is to nurture these young swimmers for the future because if we take care of that our future is secured. “It is only swimming that can fetch Nigeria many medals in an Olympic or other events. Countries like Canada, Australia, the U.S., and others are well developed in the sport.
“Nigeria can as well take a cue from these countries to enjoy same privileges,’’ he said. NNN reports that Grange School, Ikeja emerged the overall winners of the swimming competition with nine gold, eight silver, and nine bronze medals. The winners were closely followed by Edgewood Schools, Ikoyi, with seven gold, one silver, and three bronze medals, while Children International School, Lekki, placed third with five gold, four silver, and three bronze medals.
Children International School won nine gold, six silver, and three gold medals, for the primary school category to become the first in the competition. The second is St Saviour’s, Ikoyi. They won eight gold, seventeen silver, and nine gold medals. Grange Schools, Ikeja is the third school and they won five gold, four silver, and seven bronze medals. Seni Adekoye, a student of Grange Schools, emerged the “Most Valuable Person (MVP) For the individual award, in the secondary category for his brilliance in getting four gold medals.
The MVP for the female category went to Adama Emmanuel from Edgewood School who showed class with five gold and one silver medal. The Promising swimmer, Abdul-Jabbar Adama showed class in his category and was rewarded with the MVP award for the primary school category. Also, the MVP for the female category went to Morinsola Idowu from Lagos Preparatory and Secondary School, Ikoyi.
The organizers note that swimming has a lot of health benefits such as keeping your heart rate up and takes some of the impact stress off one’s body. Swimming skills builds endurance, muscle strength and cardiovascular fitness. It helps maintain a healthy weight, healthy heart, and lungs. tones muscles and builds strength.
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