# Race courses, stadiums or not?



## danVan (May 16, 2007)

Dou you think race courses qualify as stadiums??


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## Scba (Nov 20, 2004)

I'll go with yes. Spectators, whether you think the race is a sport or not.


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## Bigmac1212 (Nov 2, 2004)

Yes, but the sport is not team based.


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## Wezza (Jan 22, 2004)

A stadium to me should have stands on all sides, or at least around most of the pitch/field area.


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## Bobby3 (Jun 26, 2007)

They're stadiums, yeah.


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## en1044 (May 4, 2008)

yes


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## www.sercan.de (Aug 10, 2003)

IMO no.
Just some nascar pist are real stadiums, but the majority is not surrounded by stands


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## Alemanniafan (Dec 15, 2008)

I think it's a fairly difficult call.
The example en1044 posted would qualify as a stadium in my view.
But many other race courses wouldn't.










The famous Nürburgring for example is simply not like a stadium at all. The tradtional Nordschleife is a huge racetrack in the forest with a few stands and grass hills spectators sit on.









It does also have large stands in the part of the much shorter GP course, but the rest of the 20.832 kilometers of the traditional racecourse mostly just look like a pretty lonely road in the forest.
In Le Mans it's very simmilar. 
And the racetrack in Monte Carlo simply just consists of the city streets used every day. So all those types of racecourses surely wouldn't qualify as stadia, I believe.

I tend to pretty much go along with Wezzas way of defining it.
Wikipedia has this to say:


> A modern stadium (plural stadiums or stadia[2]) is a place, or venue, for (mostly) outdoor sports, concerts or other events, consisting of a field or stage partly or completely surrounded by a structure designed to allow spectators to stand or sit and view the event.


Doesn't really say anything about racetracks... But it doesn't exactly seem all too helpfull in terms of definition either. 

The problem with Wezzas attempt is, that some stadia just have a single stand on one side of the pitch, some stadia only have two opposite stands. And that's also pretty far from reaching around most of the pitch, field or area.


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## CharlieP (Sep 12, 2002)

Bigmac1212 said:


> Yes, but the sport is not team based.


That's a bizarre argument. :nuts:


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## CharlieP (Sep 12, 2002)

en1044 said:


> yes


To me, that's a racing circuit or race track - *this* is a racecourse:


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## Huskies (Apr 15, 2009)

bristol motor spedway - yes every other racecource - NO so i voted no


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## KingmanIII (Aug 25, 2008)

Bigmac1212 said:


> Yes, but the sport is not team based.


Neither is singles tennis.


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## invincible (Sep 13, 2002)

What CharlieP said - racecourses are for horse racing. 

Flemington Racecourse has a capacity of 120,000 with a record of almost 130,000 in 2006 which only makes it the country's biggest venue.


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## weava (Sep 8, 2007)

some are no different than an athletic stadium with a track, people running in an oval vs a car going in an oval, same basic idea as they are stands facing the oval with concorses, bathrooms, consesion stands, press boxes, luxury boxes, ect. I'm not a nascar fan but how are these not stadiums?


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## Welshlad (Apr 22, 2003)

they are stands....


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## Basel_CH (Jan 7, 2006)

Definition from Wikipedia:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stadium



> A modern stadium (plural stadiums or stadia[2]) is a place, or venue, for (mostly) outdoor sports, concerts or other events, consisting of a field or stage *partly or completely surrounded by a structure designed* to allow spectators to stand or sit and view the event.


Therefore in my view, race places are outside of stadium meaning.


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## weava (Sep 8, 2007)

Basel_CH said:


> Definition from Wikipedia:
> 
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stadium
> 
> ...


If you going to quote wiki then how is it outside of that deffinition. Wiki lists racetracks on the stadiums by capatity page. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_stadiums_by_capacity#Motor_Racing_Venues

also worldstadiums.com lists racetracks


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## Bobby3 (Jun 26, 2007)

Charlotte's race track is 80% surrounded, it has a field, does it count?


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## speed_demon (Jun 2, 2007)

It's curious how the oval racing culture impregnated in the US. I enjoy oval racing, I like NASCAR, IndyCar, but it's curious why they always loved that kind of racing. I guess Horse racing must have been extremely popular in the past there. 

Anyway, I voted no, with the exception of Bristol Motorspeedway - a case that generates lots of discussion among architects, Bristol is a Stadium IMO.


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## Basel_CH (Jan 7, 2006)

weava said:


> If you going to quote wiki then how is it outside of that deffinition. Wiki lists racetracks on the stadiums by capatity page. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_stadiums_by_capacity#Motor_Racing_Venues
> 
> also worldstadiums.com lists racetracks


Its splitted on this page between current stadiums and Motor Racing Venues. Also the defintion speaks from *partly or completely surrounded by a structure designed
*
and usually motor racing venues are in my opinion not structure designed. And worldstadiums.com is for me not a reference page, they can list up everything their, if they want...


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## joezierer (Jan 16, 2011)

*Car Racing Tracks/Autodromes*

I know there is a thread for Formula 1 Tracks, but I wanted to have a thread to talk about all kinds of race tracks from anywhere around the world.

So basically F1 tracks>F1 Tracks tread; all other tracks>This thread.

So some pictures to start us off:








_Road America/Elkhart Lake, Wisconsin_









_Bristol Motor Speedway/Bristol, Tennessee_









_Pomona Raceway/Pomona, California_









_Phoenix International Raceway/Phoenix, Arizona_









_Bowman-Gray Stadium/Winston-Salem, North Carolina_ (a football stadium AND racetrack)









_North Wilkesboro Speedway/North Wilkesboro, North Carolina_


And my local track








_Tri-State Speedway/Haubstadt, IN_
So post your favorite race tracks and stuff!


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## hussu123 (Oct 7, 2012)

Buddh international circut,grater noida,india


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