HUNDREDS of young athletes will descend on Lancaster next week - for the city's 2005 International Youth Games.
For five days from next Monday, 500 young people from seven of Lancaster's twin towns will compete in a range of sports including athletics, badminton, football, golf, karate, swimming, table tennis and tennis.
The city will welcome teams and civic dignitaries from Aalborg in Denmark, Almere in Netherlands, Lublin in Poland, Perpignan in France, Rensburg in Germany, and Vaxjo in Sweden for the games being organised by the city council's leisure services division and local sports groups.
Chief leisure officer David Owen says: "The International Youth Games have grown steadily since they started in the early Seventies.
"They have a number of aspects that make them unique in this country and are something we can be justifiably proud of."
He says that one of the key elements is that children from the twin towns are accommodated with host families in and around the city."
The opening ceremony at Christie Park, Morecambe, on July 24, will be conducted by Welsh rugby international Iestyn Harris, pictured.
The games close at Lancaster City's Giant Axe on the Friday.
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