stadiums galore

So last Friday I went to see a track and field event at the big fancy Olympic Stadium with my office, and took a bunch of pictures but forgot to put them up. The event was the China Athletics Open, basically a bullshit track and field invitational of almost entirely Chinese athletes so that Olympic organizers could test everything out with the stadium. The highlight was seeing Liu Xiang, the world record hurdler, compete in a semi-final heat. Right before the runners set he switched jerseys from the local Shanghai team to the China Olympic team jersey. He was broadcast on the big screen and when he took off his shirt you could literally hear every woman in the stadium twitter with excitement. It was also a really smoggy day, which you can see in some of the pictures even inside the stadium.







For comparison, check out the north gate of Worker's Stadium, built back in the late 50s I believe and the venue for the soccer games. It's actually fairly large, seats about 80,000, and was the host of many a mass rally during the Cultural Revolution during the 1960s. I live right across the street from here.