National Lottery Olympic Funding

The National Lottery Commission has hit the half-way mark in its target to raise £750million for the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games.Money raised from specially-designed lottery games has hit £375million, officials confirmed today.

The figure represents a £35million rise over almost two weeks, with National Lottery placing its Olympic funding figure at £339.1million on 14 November.

National Lottery will contribute a total of almost £2.2billion to the London Olympic and Paralympic Games. Janet Paraskeva, the Olympic Lottery Distributor (OLD) chairwoman, said: "National Lottery players are making a major contribution to London 2012 and it is great to see the completion of enhanced facilities at the Weymouth and Portland National Sailing Academy on the day we reach the half-way mark to the £750m we will raise through Lottery games designated to London 2012.

"Thanks to the National Lottery, world-class facilities have been created for our elite sailors that will also provide an important resource for the local community now and until 2012 and beyond."