The Army Headquarters Garrison troops on Wednesday emerged as the overall winner of the 2023 Inter-Formation Combat Obstacle Crossing Competition held at the 7 Guards Obstacle Course, Lungi Barracks Abuja for troops drawn from various Divisions, Formations and Units.
The winner of the competition scored crossing time of 25 minutes and 29 seconds and a total time 33 minutes and 29 seconds while 82 Division emerged second and 2 Division emerged 3rd in the military exercise.
The competition which is a real-time battlefield simulation exercise and activities, has 320 troops, 40 each from a total of seven Army Divisions and the Army Headquarters Garrison, participating.
The Chief of Army Staff (COAS), Lt.-Gen. Taoreed Lagbaja, represented by the Chief of Training (Army), Maj.-General Sani Mohammed, congratulated the participants for the preparations and good outing.
Lagbaja reiterated the commitment of the Nigerian army in continuous training of troops towards ensuring full combat readiness and preparation to surmount the myriad of security challenges confronting the nation.
He said the competition was organised and conducted in line with the Army Headquarters Training Directive for the year, adding that the essence and objectives of the competition was largely achieved.
The COAS commended the technical team for ensuring adherence to the prescribed standards, expressing hope that the lessons learned from the competition would pave way for positive improvements in future for enhanced performance, particularly in the conduct of operations.
“With the objectives of this competition largely achieved, you can all be adjudged as winners nonetheless.
“I must however, single out and specially congratulate AHQ Garrison that emerged overall winner.
“To all formations, I urge you to embrace the culture of individual fitness, training, teamwork and early preparations as you engage in other future tasks.
“Finally, I wish to reiterate my commitments towards ensuring of my unflinching support and drive for qualitative training in the army,” he said.
NAN reports that the Acting Director, Physical Training, Brig.-General Abdulraheem Bello, announced the result of the competition.
Giving the highlight of the competition, Lt.-Col. Suleiman Hussein, said the obstacles crossing competition was designed to test operational fitness of troops under competitive atmosphere that would reposition the army with professional competence within joint environment.
Hussein said a total of 304 personnel were generated from the competing formations with each information providing 33 personnel with five reserve each.
He said the competition proper commenced on Tuesday with a total of eight formations crossing 15 apparatus, adding that the participating formations covered a distance of 2.4 kilometre before heading to the first apparatus.