“Athletics return home”, thats the way Madrid Meeting 2019 attracts the attention of the fans in the official poster for the competition taking place on August 25th. It will also be the opening of the new Vallehermoso Stadium.
This Madrid Meeting, one of the PREMIUM Permit Meeting events of European Athletics, returnos to an historical place in Madrid that closed doors on 2007 and now 12 years later, tne City of Madrid will make reality the dream of enjoying athletics again in this great stadium. It will have a brand new green track as iconic national and international reference ready to host grater events in the future.
The competition will start at 6:00 pm (opening doors at 5:00 pm) and will include this events in the official timetable:
MEN: 100m, 400m, 800m, 3.000m, 110mh, 400mh, high jump, triple jump, javelin
WOMEN: 100m, 400m, 1.500m, long jump, pole vault
The Vallehermoso Stadium was opened for the Iberoamerican Athletic Games of 1962 and held along the years eleven editions of this Meeting until it closed his doors and was demolished in 2007. This Meeting has an amazing number of world top athletes as for example the remembered 1987 Meeting when Edwin Moses, world record holder of 400mh at the time, finished being unbeatable after 122 wins being defeated by the also american Danny Harris. Another remembered great moment is the 2005 competition where te russian Yelena Isinbayeva set a new world record in pole vault with 4,95. This are only two moments of a big number of them.
Therefore this 2019 Madrid Meeting will be very special for all fans. This new stadium is now modern and adapted to this new era. The project begun in 2015 and has been directed by the architect Alfonso Cano -old pole vaulter- and started work in april 2018 with an investment of 14.515.808€ -for structure and inside equipment-.
The new Vallehermoso Stadium, with a 10.000 seat capacity has a green 400m track and 8 lanes, with single radius curves of 36,5m and pavement with approved 1 IAAF synthetic material of bes quality. The seats are partially covered with capacity for 10.000 seated spectators. It also has a covered training zone of 75×12 meters being one of the main hallmarks of this brand new equipment. Access control, offices, a finish lane of 110 meters and 9 lanes, a 10th lane of artificial grass for worm ups and long distance athletes, double corridors for various events and many other equipment for all athletics events such as a natural grass field.
