The "Water Cube" swimming venue -- an iconic, futuristic structure for the 2008 Olympics that looks like a building covered in bubble wrap -- was unveiled on Monday in Beijing.
Beijing Olympic organizing committee president Liu Qi (
Known officially as the National Aquatics Center, the Water Cube has been dubbed the "cool" building of the Games because of its translucent, blue-toned outer skin that makes it look like a cube of bubbles.
PHOTO: AP
Forty-two gold medals will be up for grabs at the venue during the Olympics, which start on Aug. 8. The US' Michael Phelps will be out to break Mark Spitz's record of seven gold medals. He just missed the mark in 2004, winning six in Athens.
"There are many different buildings in the world, and I believe this could be one of the most significant sports venues," said Zheng Fang (鄭方), an architect and chief of the design team for China Construction Design International.
The Chinese company collaborated with Australian company PTW Architects.
PHOTO: AP
"The building is very innovative in how it appears," said John Pauline, a lead architect with PTW. "The aesthetics are cutting edge. In that respect it's incredibly unique."
The venue has 6,000 permanent and 11,000 temporary seats. Like the 91,000-seat National Stadium -- the "Bird's Nest," which will be completed in March -- both are seen as works of art and will anchor the Olympic Green area.
While some argue the gargantuan "Bird's Nest" could become a white elephant, the Water Cube has been built for conversion to a shopping area and leisure center with tennis courts, a water park, retail outlets, nightclubs and restaurants.
"This building was designed for use after the Games," Pauline said. "We were looking at 30 or 40 years from now."
The outside and inside skin is made of a Teflon-like material -- ETFE, or ethylene-tetrafluoroethylene. Composed of two layers, it's separated by an interior passage that allows the building to breathe like a greenhouse.
The maintenance could be complicated. At the unveiling it was clear the bubbles needed cleaning, soiled by Beijing's dirty air. Officials said this would take about a week and would be done periodically.
The exact cost of the building has been shrouded in secrecy, with estimates ranging from US$150 million to more than US$200 million. The original cost estimate was about US$100 million. Much of the building was financed by US$110 million in private contributions from people in Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macau.
The Water Cube and Bird's Nest are located several hundred meters across from each other, situated on either side of a "sacred" north-south axis and promises to shift development. The venues are 8km due north of Tiananmen Square -- the world's largest public plaza -- and the Forbidden City.
There will be 37 venues for the Olympics. Beijing is the site of 31 -- 12 new, 11 renovated and eight temporary structures. Most are located in four clusters in the north of the city. Five more venues for soccer and sailing are located outside Beijing, and equestrian events will be held in Hong Kong.
The Water Cube will host a test event this week. Though it hasn't drawn a top field, at least one swimmer can't wait to test the water.
"It's an important meet for me," said Swedish sprinter Stefan Nystrand, who competes at 50m and 100m. "I think it's great to be here since it's the same pool as the Olympics. I don't know why more top guys aren't showing up."
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but
Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier