An outdoor riverside sports complex is being built in Gravesend to get people limbered up for the 2012 Olympics.

Work has begun on the Games-inspired facility, which will be free to use when it opens on Gordon Promenade (pictured below) in March.

The adiZone, designed by sports company adidas, will have basketball, football and tennis areas, a climbing wall, gym equipment and open area to encourage dance, aerobics and gymnastics.

It will be open year-round for Gravesham residents, while talent scouts will be invited to visit the site to encourage promising young sportsmen and women to join local clubs. A similar facility in London's Tower Hamlets is pictured above.

Cllr David Turner, Gravesham council’s cabinet member for leisure, said: "This is the first tangible step on our way to taking advantage of the 2012 Games for the benefit of the people and business of the borough.

"The adiZone will provide what we are sure will be a lasting legacy helping to improve health, sports and leisure in Gravesham."

The £146,000 project, which has already been successful elsewhere in the country, is jointly funded by Gravesham council’s youth budget, a government grant and adidas.