The Richmond Olympic Oval opened in December 2008 and was built for one purpose: to host speed skating at the Vancouver 2010 Olympic Winter Games. Twelve Olympic events were decided inside it over sixteen days.
When the Games ended, the ice came out and the building went back to work. It is now one of Canada’s busiest multi-sport venues, home to national championships in judo, wrestling, gymnastics and karate, and to the Richmond Olympic Experience — a museum of the Olympic movement that sits under the same roof.
The Maple Cup will be contested on that floor.
Look up. The Oval’s roof spans 100 metres without a column in the way — one of the largest wood roofs in the world. It is carried on fifteen timber-and-steel arches and clad in 452 prefabricated wood panels, milled from British Columbia pine killed by the mountain pine beetle: timber that would otherwise have been left standing dead in the forest.
The architects shaped it after the wing of a heron, the bird that fishes the Fraser River flats a few hundred metres from the door. The tips of the “feathers” reach out past the walls.
It is a building made of a place, in the way a well-made shinai is made of a place. Competitors tend to look up before they look down.
The Oval stands on the north bank of the Fraser River in Richmond, a city of about 200,000 immediately south of Vancouver.
Richmond is not an incidental host for this tournament. Its Steveston district was, before 1942, Canada’s second-largest Japanese community — some two thousand people, roughly two-thirds of the town — built around the salmon fishery. That community was forcibly removed during the Second World War and never returned at the same scale, but the history is marked, kept and taught in Steveston today, ten minutes from the Oval. Competitors and visitors are warmly encouraged to make the trip.
Address:
6111 River Road,
Richmond, BC,
V7C 0A2,
Canada
Vancouver International Airport (YVR) is in Richmond, roughly ten minutes from the Oval by road. It is served by direct flights from Tokyo, London, Zurich, Frankfurt and Paris.
The Canada Line light rail runs from downtown into Richmond in about 25 minutes; the Oval is a short taxi, bus or walk from Bridgeport Station.
On-site parking is available at the Oval.
Two days. Six nations. One floor.
Built:
Opened December 2008 for the Vancouver 2010 Winter Games
Games role:
Olympic speed skating venue — 12 events
Floor area:
About 33,600 m² (362,000 sq ft)
Roof:
100 m clear span, British Columbia pine, one of the largest wood roofs in the world
Also home to:
The Richmond Olympic Experience museum
Distance to airport:
About 10 minutes
