London (Fodor's 2012) - Fodor's [7]
Athletics events will all take place in the 80,000-capacity Olympics Stadium.
Gymnasts and basketball finalists will be limbering up in the O2 Arena, to be temporarily rechristened the North Greenwich Arena 1; badminton contestants and rhythmic gymnasts will aim for glory in the North Greenwich Arena 2.
The Beach Volleyball competition will be held in Horse Guard’s Parade in Whitehall, a beach ball’s toss from Downing Street and next to St. James’s Park.
Road Cycling takes to Regent’s Park. (For great views of the park and Central London head to nearby Primrose Hill.)
Football (soccer) matches will kick off in 90,000-seat Wembley Stadium, the home of the English National Football team.
Triathlon contestants and marathon swimmers will make a splash in the Serpentine in Hyde Park.
Swimming and diving will be held in the astonishing form of the signature Aquatics Centre.
Lovely Greenwich Park—London’s oldest Royal Park—is the venue for equestrian events and Modern Pentathlon.
In Woolwich, shooting will be staged at the Royal Artillery Barracks, while Lord’s Cricket Ground will host archery.
Tennis can really only be held at one venue—Wimbledon—with its famous grass courts, but rowers, canoeists, and kayakers will be heading off to Eton Dorney, near Windsor Castle.
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London will host the 2012 Olympic Games, but don’t expect to see many city inhabitants practicing their javelin throws in Hyde Park or going for a synchronized swim across the Thames. Sport in the capital comes into its own when it’s watched, rather than participated in. You’ll most easily witness London’s fervent sporting passions in front of a screen in a pub with a pint in hand. And those passions run deep.
If you’re lucky enough to score a ticket for a big football match, you’ll experience a seething, jeering mass of mockery and rude chants, especially if the opposition happens to be another London team. Amid all the aggression you might also catch a glimpse of why the excitement of English football makes it world sport’s hottest media property right now.
And sport does mainly mean football (refer to it as “soccer” at your mortal peril). David Beckham is not alone in being overpaid for kicking a ball around—a generation of footballers lives the high life in London, their status somewhere between sporting rock stars and royalty. Cricket, rugby, and tennis briefly impinge on Londoners’ sporting horizons at certain times of year, but you’re unlikely to see grown men crying at the outcome of matches at Wimbledon, or beating each other up about the Ashes.
FOOTBALL
The English may not be Brazil when it comes to football (returning home after an earlier-than-anticipated dismissal by arch-foe Germany at the 2010 World Cup in South Africa), but they invented the modern game and the sport is the national obsession. A self-deprecating expectation of failure accompanies the national team’s performances, although current squad manager Fabio Capello has injected a new sense of purpose. London’s top teams—Chelsea, Arsenal, Tottenham Hotspur, and West Ham—are world class (especially the first two), however, and regularly progress in the European Champions League, but rely heavily on foreign players.
It’s unlikely you’ll be able to get tickets for anything except the least popular Premier League games during the August–May season, despite absurdly high ticket prices (as much as £50 for a standard seat). Lower down football’s hierarchical ladder, you’ll have a much better chance of seeing a match. If you’re engaging locals in sporting banter, it is imperative to know your way around the big teams.
Arsenal (aka the Gunners) is historically London’s most successful club, and under the managerial reign of Arsene Wenger they have shed their boring image to become proponents of attractive, free-flowing football while hardly ever employing any English players, bar gifted winger Theo Walcott. | Emirates Stadium, Dayton Park, | London