LAHORE: An intense competition was witnessed among Pakistan Army players in the fifth Paces (Physical Agility and Combat Efficiency System) Champion-ship-2016 held at the Ayub Stadium from April 27 to May 6.

Chief of Army Staff Gen Raheel Sharif was the chief guest at the finals and awarded prizes to the winners. Lahore Corps Commander Lt Gen Sadiq Ali was also present.

About 275 contestants participated in the event.

Paces is an initiative to improve training regime in the army with modern scientific techniques to help each soldier achieve requisite fitness standards.

Gen Sharif appreciated the standards displayed by the participants and the efforts of both trainers and trainees in achieving those standards.

He said that regardless of the advance in warfare technology, the basic traits of soldiering were as important as ever, with physical fitness being of primary importance.

He gave away individual and team prizes to the winners.

In individual matches, Naik Muhammad Awais secured the first position in a two-mile race, which he ran in 10:01 minutes.

Sepoy Farooq won the first position by completing a combat efficiency test in 59.42 seconds. Gunner Ashfaq Hussain did 56 pull-ups and stood first.

Sepoy Naveedul Hassan secured the first position in a sit-up match by doing 1,948 sit-ups in 30 minutes.

Sepoy Ikram did 1,705 push-ups in 30 minutes to secure the first position and also won the overall best player award of the competition.

Sepoy Nasir Mahmood stood second.

The Rawalpindi Corps team won the fifth Paces Championship while the Karachi Corps team won the second position in the competition.

Published in Dawn, May 7th, 2016