FirstBank Taking Horse Racing Sponsorship to Another Level

When you talk of golf in Nigeria, a brand  that readily comes to mind is FirstBank and when its polo, certainly the brand sticks. Talk of football, basketball, athletics and even tennis, FirstBank is already established as one of the biggest players in term of sports sponsorship while discovering talents and harnessing skills.

Weeks back in faraway Kaduna, the financial institution added another feather to its growing and glowing reputation by sponsoring 2022 Nigerian Derby International Horse Racing Championship, further reaffirming their tag, ‘First with Sport’.

Truly, the banking giant has always been first with sports. Over 102 years of polo sponsorship isn’t a joke, Lagos Open golf Championship would be 61-years in 2022, OBJ Amateur Open would be six-years old in Abeokuta later in the year. They are present in Kano where they bankrolled Dala Hard Court, a yearly tennis tournament.

In football, FirstBank Fc popularly known as the ‘Elephant Boys’ compete in the lower tier of Lagos State Football Association (NNWL) league, the Elephant Girls; its Basketball Team has won laurels at the continental level. To them at the Elephant House, sports sponsorship is like a tradition.

A proof of that came weeks back in far away Kaduna where it bankrolled Nigerian Derby, an International Horse Racing Competition. Jockeys from Niger Republic, Cameroon, Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali and Jockeys from host country were on to race for fame and honours. Renowned star Jockeys, Chinada Mamman from Nigerien Republic, his counterparts Nuhu Mamane, Hadju Usein, Saleh Abubakar, Kanta Umar, Musa Ndoki were in Kaduna. Others from Cameroon, Chad, Mali and Burkina Faso were on display in the highly competitive Derby. 

On the other side of the divide were royal fathers led by the Emir of Zauzau, Ambassador Ahmad Nuhu Bamali, top government functionaries and businessmen. Complementing this class of people were horse racing fans who lined the railed track of the expansive sports centre to watch men race on horses.

Also, on the display were some of the best horses money can buy. There were the local breeds, the Arabian horse, the slim Sudan type and the Thoroughbred horses common in Argentina and Mexico. And to make the event go as planned was the biggest player in sports sponsorship in Nigeria, FirstBank of Nigeria Limited which provided the funds needed.

Expectedly, the event was all about running horse in the racecourse, the display of power and endurance, of gut and skill. This and many were on the display in the Derby.

Now, until now, the thought of Horse Racing in Nigeria sounds funny because Nigeria is one of the many countries in the world without an active horse racing scene, horse racing enthusiasts outside of Nigeria are unlikely to think of the country as a hub for the sport. But the truth is that the excitement around the grounds of a race track is amazing.

 The adrenaline rush is incredible, especially as the horses are racing down the stretch.

Horse racing has a loyal following across Nigeria, but it remains very niche when compared to other, mainstream pastimes.

This perhaps explained the excitement that with the coming of FirstBank f Nigeria, Horse Racing in Nigeria will catch the attention of the global horse racing community.