Cardiff Arena, operated by Planet Ice, was a temporary structure that remained open whilst the new arena was built in the ISV.[2][3] This venue has now closed and been demolished. It has been replaced by the permanent ice arena.
Planet Ice were originally tasked to run the rink as well as design and build it, however following delays, Cardiff Council cancelled the tender and awarded it to Green bank Partnerships. Since opening the rink has been run by Ice Arena (Wales) Limited.[4]
The Arms Park officially opened on 7 April 1984, but by 1999 the Millennium Stadium, which was the fourth redevelopment of the Cardiff Arms Park site since 1881, had replaced it as the national stadium of Wales. The future of the remaining Cardiff Rugby Ground had been in doubt since the announcement in 2007 that the Cardiff Blues would be moving to the new Cardiff City stadium.[6] Cardiff Blues moved back to the Arms Park following the 2011-12 season.
Channel View Leisure Centre in Grangetown has been open since 2002. The centre includes three badminton courts, a squash court, a climbing wall, a fitness suite and an outdoor all weather 5-a-side pitch. Other activities available at the centre include badminton and netball.[15]
Eastern Leisure Centre (Welsh: Canolfan Hamdden y Dwyrain) in Llanrumney has been open since 1982. The centre comprises a 25 metres (82ft) swimming pool, six badminton and five squash courts, a multi-use sports hall, a fitness suite and an outdoor tarmac 5-a-side pitch. Other activities available at the centre include bowls, netball, table tennis, trampolining and gymnastics. Sports clubs using the Eastern Leisure Centre include City of Cardiff Swimming Club and Cardiff Volleyball Club.[16][17]
Fairwater Leisure Centre (Canolfan Hamdden Tyllgoed) opened in 1983. The centre comprises a 25 metres (82ft) swimming pool, four badminton and four squash courts, a sports hall, a fitness suite and an outdoor skate park. Other activities available at the centre include gymnastics, trampolining and soccer. Sports clubs either based at, or using Fairwater Leisure Centre include the BBC football club, Cardiff Triathletes and City of Cardiff Swimming Club.[18][19][20]
Llanishen Leisure Centre (Canolfan Hamdden Llanisien), the county's largest, opened in 1987. The centre comprises a leisure pool with wave machine, six badminton and three squash courts, a multi-use sports hall, a fitness suite and mini gym. Other activities available at the centre include gymnastics, trampolining and soccer.[21][22]
Pentwyn Leisure Centre (Canolfan Hamdden Pentwyn) opened in 1989. The centre comprises a leisure pool with wave machine, three badminton and three squash courts, a multi-use sports hall, a fitness suite and an outdoor skate park. Other activities available at the centre include basketball, bowls, gymnastics and trampolining.[19][23]
Star Centre (Canolfan Star) in Splott opened in 1981 and was taken over, and refurbished, by Cardiff council in 2001. The centre includes six badminton courts, basketball, netball and indoor 5-a-side courts, a gymnasium and a fitness suite. Other activities available at the centre include trampolining and table tennis. Sports clubs based at the Star Centre include the Capital Gymnastics Club.[24][25]
Western Leisure Centre (Canolfan Hamdden y Gorllewin) in Caerau opened in 1979 and was refurbished in 2008. The centre comprises a 25 metres (82ft) swimming pool, a gymnasium/fitness suite and an outdoor floodlit multi-use games area (MUGA). Activities available at the centre include basketball, football, gymnastics, tennis and trampolining. Sports clubs based at the Western Leisure Centre include Western Warriors Swimming Club.[26][27]
Cardiff City House of Sport
There is a further plan to develop HOS3 which will provide additional disability and niche sport facility provision to the City of Cardiff and will also serve to help grow the current sports education provision at the House of Sport. The Phase III Hall will extend and build on the principles and philosophies of the two current successful facilities and will adjoin phases I and II, expanding House of Sport coaching centre into new and niche sporting areas.[28] The new House of Sport Hall will be constructed for a capital cost of £1.5m.[29]
Cardiff Gol Football Centre
Gol Cardiff is Cardiff's and Wales' only indigenous 5-a-side and 7-a-side company and launched the country's first purpose-built football facility in Cardiff in January 2006. They were also the first company in Wales to make 3G rubber crumb pitches publicly available. In April 2016, Gol Cardiff introduced innovative video technology which has allowed them to capture up to 10 league games per night, with all clips captured uploaded to YouTube.[30]
Cardiff Council has approved a proposal put forward by Cardiff and Vale College and the Cardiff City House of Sport to lease Cardiff International Sports Campus.[36]
When complete, in addition to the Cardiff International Pool, the International Sports Village (ISV) complex will provide Olympic standard facilities for sports including boxing and fencing, gymnastics, judo, white water events (including canoeing and kayaking) and wrestling as well as a snow dome with real snow for skiing and snowboarding, an arena for public ice skating and ice hockey, and a hotel.[37][38] Some of the facilities at the ISV were used as training venues for the London 2012 Olympics.[39]
Cardiff International White Water is a £13.3m Olympic standard canoeing and kayaking centre that opens on 27 March 2010 as part of the Sports Village. It is expected to attract 50,000 visitors a year and play a part in the London 2012 Olympics.
The Corporation Baths at Guildford Crescent were opened in April 1862, including a first class and a second class swimming pool. It was given over exclusively to children after the Empire Pool opened in 1958. The baths eventually closed in March 1984 and were demolished.[45]
The Maindy Centre (Canolfan Maendy) comprises a full size football pitch within a floodlit 460 metres (1,510ft) outdoor cycling velodrome, BMXpump track, fitness suite, dance studio, outdoor tarmac 5−a−side pitch and a six lane 25 metres (82ft) swimming pool. The cycle track (previously known as Maindy Stadium) was relaid in 2006. It was one of the venues used in the 1958 British Empire and Commonwealth Games, when the site included a 400 metres (1,300ft) six lane running track (since removed). The swimming pool opened in 1993. The Maindy Centre is home to several sports clubs, including the Maindy Flyers Youth Cycling Club, Squid Flyers Swimming Club, Maindy Corries Football Club, Maindy Higashi Karate Club, Maindy Triathlon Club, and Maindy Rookie Lifesaving Club.[46][47][48]
The city features an international sporting venue, the 74,500 capacity national Millennium Stadium (Stadiwm y Mileniwm), where Wales' national rugby and football teams play.[49] The Millennium Stadium was built on the site of the former National Stadium, Cardiff Arms Park and was opened in 1999, in time to host the 1999 Rugby World Cup, including the final.
The Millennium Stadium also doubles up as a venue for other concerts and events such as motorsport's World Rally Championship as part of Wales Rally GB, with the first ever indoor special stages of the World Rally Championship being held at the Millennium Stadium in September 2005. It has continued to host this annual event.
One of the annual Speedway Grands Prix is staged on a purpose built full size track in the Millennium Stadium. The Grand Prix is a round of the World Speedway Championship event. Speedway was first staged at Cardiff White City greyhound stadium during the pre-war era with the first meeting being staged around Christmas 1928. In the early 1950s, a dedicated speedway stadium was constructed in Penarth Road and the Cardiff Dragons raced in the National League Division Three for a short spell.
The Sport Wales National Centre (Athrofa Chwaraeon Cymru) was established in 1972 to provide facilities to help develop excellence in Welsh sport. The institute has indoor sports halls, next to Glamorgan CCC's SWALEC Stadium in Sophia Gardens. Sports activities in the Main Hall include gymnastics, table tennis, trampoline, badminton, netball, basketball, archery, martial arts, fencing, dance and boxing. The site also contains squash courts and weight training rooms. Outdoors, the Institute has an international standard permeable artificial pitch, which is one of the home international venues for Welsh hockey. The pitch is also used for lacrosse and football. Their outdoor tennis courts are also used for netball and five-a-side football. Welsh national teams that train at the Sport Wales National Centre include the Welsh National Rugby team (on the institute's full-size, floodlit rugby pitch), Welsh National Badminton team, the Women's Welsh National Netball Team and the Welsh National Gymnastic Team.[56][57][58]
The Empire Pool was an international standard swimming pool building, constructed in the city centre for the 1958 British Empire and Commonwealth Games (hosted by Cardiff). It was demolished in 1998 to make way for construction work on the new Millennium Stadium.[59]
Cardiff is the capital and largest city of Wales. Cardiff had a population of 372,089 in 2022 and forms a principal area officially known as the City and County of Cardiff. The city is the eleventh largest in the United Kingdom. Located in the southeast of Wales and in the Cardiff Capital Region, Cardiff is the county town of the historic county of Glamorgan and in 1974–1996 of South Glamorgan. It belongs to the Eurocities network of the largest European cities. A small town until the early 19th century, its prominence as a port for coal when mining began in the region helped its expansion. In 1905, it was ranked as a city and in 1955 proclaimed capital of Wales. Cardiff Built-up Area covers a larger area outside the county boundary, including the towns of Dinas Powys and Penarth.
Cardiff Arms Park, also known as The Arms Park, is situated in the centre of Cardiff, Wales. It is primarily a rugby union stadium, but it also has a bowling green. The Arms Park was host to the British Empire and Commonwealth Games in 1958, and hosted four games in the 1991 Rugby World Cup, including the third-place play-off. The Arms Park also hosted the inaugural Heineken Cup Final of 1995–96 and the following year in 1996–97.
The Millennium Stadium, known since 2016 as the Principality Stadium for sponsorship reasons, is the national stadium of Wales. Located in Cardiff, it is the home of the Wales national rugby union team and has also held Wales national football team games. Initially built to host the 1999 Rugby World Cup and replacing the National Stadium, it has gone on to host many other large-scale events, such as the Tsunami Relief Cardiff concert, the Super Special Stage of Wales Rally Great Britain, the Speedway Grand Prix of Great Britain and various concerts. It also hosted FA Cup, League Cup and Football League play-off finals while Wembley Stadium was being redeveloped between 2001 and 2006, as well as football matches during the 2012 Summer Olympics.
The 1958 British Empire and Commonwealth Games were held in Cardiff, Wales, from 18 to 26 July 1958. It was the sixth edition of what would come to be known as the Commonwealth Games, the second Games held in the United Kingdom, and the second held under the name British Empire and Commonwealth Games.
Fitzalan High School is an 11–18 mixed, English-medium community secondary school and sixth form in Canton, Cardiff, Wales.
The Cardiff Wales Stadium, which is part of Sophia Gardens Cardiff, is a cricket stadium in Cardiff, Wales. It is located in Sophia Gardens on the River Taff. It is home to Glamorgan County Cricket Club and is listed as an international Test cricket venue.
Llandysul, also spelt Llandyssul, is a town and community in the county of Ceredigion, Wales. As a community it consists of the townships of Capel Dewi, Horeb, Pontsian, Pren-gwyn, Tregroes, Rhydowen and the town of Llandysul itself. Llandysul lies in south Ceredigion in the valley of the River Teifi and is visited for its fishing and canoeing. The community had a population of 2732, as of 2011. The village itself has a population of 1484.
The Welsh Varsity is an annual sporting event contested by Cardiff University and Swansea University, usually in early April. The sports contested include rugby union, hockey, cricket, squash, badminton, lacrosse, rowing, golf, basketball, football, American football, ultimate frisbee, netball, volleyball, fencing and an array of other sports. Profits go to charity. The event is held over the course of a week, with some sports competing over a weekend due to the nature of the sport. The majority of the games are held on the Wednesday afternoon, with the centrepiece rugby union match between the two sides held in the evening and often attended by in excess of 18,000 supporters.
The music of Cardiff has been dominated mainly by rock music since the early 1990s with later trends developing towards more extreme styles of the genre such as heavy metal and metalcore music. It, along with the nearby music scene in Newport, has brought a number of musicians to perform or begin their careers in South Wales.
The Sport Wales National Centre is a sports facility in Cardiff, Wales, set up to assist the development of elite athletes in Wales. The Centre, owned and operated by Sport Wales, was established by the then Sports Council for Wales in 1971 as the National Sports Centre for Wales. Renamed the Welsh Institute of Sport in 1994, it has been known as the Sport Wales National Centre since April 2010.
Maindy Centre is a velodrome and indoor swimming pool facility in the Maindy area of Cardiff, Wales. The velodrome was used in the 1958 British Empire and Commonwealth Games and the swimming pool was opened in 1993.
Newport International Sports Village is a multi-sport complex located at Lliswerry in the southeast of the city of Newport, South Wales. It is known locally as Spytty Park, the name coming from the original Spytty Fields on which it is built.
Cardiff International Sports Village is located in Cardiff Bay in the city of Cardiff, Wales. It is one of the largest regeneration projects currently in the UK and is a public-private funded project.
The timeline of Cardiff history shows the significant events in the history of Cardiff which transformed it from a small Roman fort into the modern capital city of Wales.
Sport Wales is the national organisation responsible for developing and promoting sport and physical activity in Wales. Working alongside partners such as governing bodies of sport and local authorities, they aim to encourage sporting ambitions in the young and promote championship standards nationally.
Cardiff International Pool is an Olympic-sized swimming pool built as a public-private funded project; with a partnership between Cardiff Council, OLLC which is a partnership between Orion Land & Leisure and Explore Investments (developers) and Parkwood Leisure (operator). Parkwood won the contract to manage the facility for 10 years, with a projected turnover of £2.5m each year.
Sport in Cardiff is dictated by, amongst other things, its position as the capital city of Wales, meaning that national home sporting fixtures are nearly always played in the city. All of Wales' multi-sports agencies and many of the country's sports governing bodies have their headquarters in Cardiff and the city's many top-quality venues have attracted world-famous sport events, sometimes unrelated to Cardiff or to Wales.
Most leisure centres in Cardiff, capital of Wales, are owned by Cardiff Council. Since 2016, the running of eight formerly Council-run leisure centres has been outsourced to Greenwich Leisure Limited, operating under their 'Better' branding. Channel View Leisure Centre continues to be managed by Cardiff Council, whilst the Cardiff International Pool in Cardiff Bay is run separately by another private company.
↑ "National Indoor Athletics Centre". Uwic website. University of Wales Institute, Cardiff – Athrofa Prifysgol Cymru, Caerdydd. 2009. Archived from the original on 20 April 2009. Retrieved 2 July 2009.
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