Over 200 Judokas have indicated interest to participate at the Loveth Howell national Open Judo Championship will kick-off at the Ogbe Stadium, Benin, Edo State.
The championship which will feature Cadet, Junior and Senior categories (for male and female) begin from December 13th to 17th, 2017.
The Championship named after Loveth Howell, a former National Champion will serve as a National Ranking event for both Judokas and Referees.
The former Champion who represented Nigeria at several International meets before retiring is currently the Philanthropist on the Board of the Nigeria Judo Federation.
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All Africa Games Bronze medalists, Franca Audu and Fatima Bashir, Auwal Reza (Club Champion), Cyrain Miracle, Ahmad Dorayi, Buhari Musa, Ika Bassey, Abdullahi Abdullahi on Friday confirmed their participation to aclsports.com on Friday.
National Champion, Franca Audu (52kg) said the championship has made Judokas across the country train seriously.
She said, “Most Judokas are starved of competitions and you’ll not be surprised that the competition will record overwhelming appearances from former champions, national champions and underdogs”.
The Secretary General Davies Oludare said the latest International Judo Federation (IJF) rules will be test run when the championship starts.
He said, “To all coaches, referees and judokas, although we shall have new modified IJF rules in place from January 2018; to avoid confusion, the rules will be used for this National Open Judo Championships”.
Let there be regular competitions to expose grassroot and budding talents in the game as well as make the game popular in the country!