This may be old news to some and maybe it is more common than I think but I came across it today and I was a little surprised. Track will not be held in the 90,000 seat Maracana stadium where the opening and closing ceremonies will take place in Rio in 2016. Instead the Olympic soccer tournament will take place there and track will be in a smaller nearby stadium.
Check the link for more maps of the facilities.
Gong Gong
Gong
Joao Havelange stadium is a great T&F facility. It will seat 60,000, and is a pretty a venue as you'll find. We had the Pan American and ParaPan American Games there in 2007. The Brazilian competition officials did a great job with both meets.
I have to say it makes sense in a country and continent that cares more about football and not so much about athletcs or any other sport. Some people in London are probably wishing they did the same thing.
Of course a few decades down the track, when the Olympics becomes a glorified football championship with some other minor sports thrown in, people might wonder if it was such a good idea.
Most of the fans at the 2007 Pan Am and ParaPan Am Games were football fans, and didn't know a lot about athletics. They made lots of noise and continuous noise. Lots of noise at the start of races, and lots of false starts and unfair starts due to noise.
...the beginning of the end
I'm sure PanAms were fine but these are the Olympics, the scale and the importance are totally different. The other stadium looks fine but I think I would be disappointed if I made the Olympics then I couldn't compete in the Olympic stadium.
No plans are official but during the bid process Rio16 organizers said that the marathon would not start or finish in the Olympic stadium either. Instead they plan on starting and finishing in the Sambodromo.
It makes sense to do it this way, Rio certainly doesn't need two stadiums with tracks. They already had the alternative one from 2007 so they would have to construct a track at Maracana and then probably take it out after, which doesn't make sense. They obviously plan on selling more tickets to soccer matches than athletics.
I just get the feeling that this move is pushing athletics to the side in the one event every four years where it actually matters to normal people. If the games are more financially successful because they sell more tickets for soccer games then that will be the new model for the Olympics - the little World Cup.