This athletics track in Alicante by Spanish studio Subarquitectura has an alternative track that loops up over the roof of the changing room.
Athletes can stick to the flat, standard track or deviate over the little hill behind a bank of spectators.
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The text that follows is from the architects:
3D ATHLETICS TRACK
Elda, Alicante / SPAIN
Designing an athletic track could get you as bored as when you are running on it: curve, straight, curve, straight, again and again…
Perfectly standardized, sport architecture has become more universal than international style. Track length of 400 m, 36.5 m radius. 1.22 m each lane... just data, without any fissure to let your imagination soar.
We have added to the conventional track an alternative one, amateur and funny, raised and three-dimensional. It goes off on a tangent, covers the changing rooms and returns to the conventional track.
As new ways are available for athletes, spectators get involved in the sport activity, seated in-between this two tracks.
This is our tribute to all the sport pioneers that created new ways of performing that later others followed. Tom Burke, Dick Fosbury, Graeme Obree….
Period of construction: 2009-2010
Architects: Subarquitectura ( Andrés Silanes, Fernando Valderrama & Carlos Bañón )
Promotor: Ayuntamiento de Elda
Constructor: CYES