程阳：世界上最大的赛马场迪拜落成
2010-02-22 10:53阅读：
程阳：世界上最大的赛马场迪拜落成
Meydan takes flight in Dubai
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates, Feb. 21 (UPI) -- The seat
bottoms resemble iMac compu
ters blinking a dazzling array of colors in twilight, fueled by
rooftop solar cells, a mile-long gathering of spectral fireflies on
a cool winter's evening.
There are empty floors upon floors of wallboard, reinforced
concrete and scaffolding, evidence of construction delays awaiting
the completion of a five-star hotel and restaurants being rushed to
meet a deadline five weeks away.
It is huge, the largest horseracing facility in the world.
The grandstand alone is nearly a mile long, the length of 22 Boeing
747s placed end-to-end.
'I was gobsmacked' -- astounded -- 'when I saw the
grandstand,' says Dubai's best-known jockey, Lanfranco Dettori, who
has been racing here since 1994.
Perched at the apex is a gleaming titanium curve representing
a falcon's wingspan, a fitting aerie in a nation for which that
hunting bird is its symbol. The wing is fitted with 4,840
meter-square solar cells, which will gather enough energy to
generate 20 percent of the electricity needed in the
grandstand.
The whole of it is unfinished but not. Looking down one sees
the completed functioning reason for the remaining disarray: two
circular oval tracks, the inner one an all-weather, synthetic
'dirt,' the outer one perfectly manicured six-inch tall Bermuda
grass.
Conceived in 2007 by horse-loving Sheik Mohammed bin Rashid
al-Maktoum at the peak of a dizzying finance and construction boom
that saw 20 percent of the world's construction cranes busily
gracing its 'Blade Runner'-like skyline, Dubai's new Meydan
Racecourse can be seen as an unfinished monument to ambitious
excess, an 'Ozymandias' moment.
Or perhaps it is the visionary gamble of a nation still
attempting to transform itself from a seaside village of fishermen
and pearl divers to a Casablanca-like vision of the world's future
in the midst of a current financial crisis.
Whether excess or gamble, it is expensive, a reported $2
billion, more than 2 percent of Dubai's now-famous national
debt.
Meydan, Arabic for 'meeting place,' opens officially March 27
when Dubai World Cup day serves up eight races with a record $10
million in purses. Meydan quietly opened for racing Jan. 28 with
the annual Dubai International Racing Carnival, hosting more than
450 Thoroughbreds trained in 20 nations for nine
meetings.
'Meydan is here now,' said Sheik Mohammed, Dubai's ruler, who
was in attendance opening night and seemed at an uncharacteristic
loss for words when he saw the sheer scale of his vision come to
life. 'We should just be happy.'
Meydan was conceived as a self-contained 'city' rising from
the desert south of Dubai with this racecourse as its hub. As many
as 300 multiple-use buildings are part of the original plan though
it is unclear how the current financial crisis will alter that
plan. A series of canals is planned to wind through the development
like a Middle East Venice and the Dubai Creek will be lengthened so
racegoers can arrive at Meydan by Abra water taxis.
Attendance during the Racing Carnival has been nowhere near
the shoulder-to-shoulder scrum in the apron near the parade ring
that was common at Nad al-Sheba. Of course, those attendees are
gone, former construction workers enjoying a free night on the town
now returned home to India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and elsewhere as
Dubai struggles to create a post-financial-crisis vision of
itself.
Even in the current troubled financial environment, Meydan
has continued the practice of free public admission to the
grandstand and the apron surrounding the tracks and parade
ring.
Writing in The Guardian, Greg Wood supposes: 'Meydan may yet
end up as an under-exploited white elephant. The glamor and
excitement of top-class racing is a much harder sell when there are
people abandoning their cars at the airport and getting
out.'
Others think Meydan is a shrewd gamble, destined to host
racing on turf and Tapeta when the European and American circuits
are inactive and other events when the world race calendar
pauses.
'The vision was always that Meydan would be used 365 days a
year, which is why there is so much adding that can be used outside
racing times,' says Frank Gabriel, Meydan's chief executive officer
who brings world-class horseman credentials, most recently from
Arlington Park outside Chicago.
Accordingly, Meydan's facilities include an equine-theme
hotel, a racing museum, a marina and an IMAX cinema, all to enable
the complex to remain busy on non-racing days.
Testing the multiple use waters, Meydan will host a
performance by recording artist Sting during its Super Thursday
program March 4.
The Meydan Masters, a gathering of winning jockeys from the
world's signature races -- the Kentucky Derby, Epsom, The Prix de
l'Arc de Triomphe, the Hong Kong Vase, The Japan Cup and others --
is set for March 5.
Looking into the future, Gabriel asserts a fuller and more
varied racing program beyond the current January to March season is
a real possibility.
For now, the racecourse itself is the focus.
The track is innovative for Dubai. While Nad al-Sheba had a
main outer circuit of true dirt and a less-used inner track of
turf, Meydan swaps that configuration, in part to emphasize the
preferred turf racing in Europe. Both are left-handed, like U.S.
racecourses.
The 'dirt' is different. In a land that inspired 'Aladdin'
and 'One Thousand and One Arabian Nights.' Horses will now have
what Meydan officials hope is their own magic flying carpet:
Tapeta, Latin for carpet, a familiar verbal relative to the
tapestries that famously grace Arabia in handmade rugs and wall
hangings.
Jockeys and trainers have been uniform in their praise of the
new surface.
'When it's right, Tapeta is the best surface around,' said
jockey Russell Baze, who holds the U.S. record for lifetime winners
and for winners on Tapeta.
'I think it's fair to say it gets a resounding 'thumbs-up'
from the jockeys,' Dettori concurred.
Inventor and horseman Michael Dickinson insists the surface,
which replaces dirt with 16 metric tons of a wax-coated blend of
mostly sand and a mix of polymers, will help end the nightmare of
the nationally televised 2007 Breeders' Cup when European champion
George Washington broke down and had to be euthanized on the spot
at Monmouth Park in New Jersey, which had been soaked for days by
rain, fatally softening a seven-inch dirt surface laid over solid
concrete.
It is hoped that, because of Tapeta, race fans and horse
lovers will never again witness the fatal breakdown of a Barbaro,
an Eight Belles or a Ruffian.
'It's an honor, but also a huge responsibility,' says
Wilkinson about installing and maintaining the surface. 'I'm never
entirely satisfied until every horse and jockey has come back safe
and sound.'
So far, trainers and jockeys are uniform in their praise for
the safety and fairness of the surface.
The choice of Tapeta also aides the probable goal of
expanding Meydan's racing calendar. Used on the training track at
Nad al-Sheba, the surface seemed to fare well in Dubai's
notoriously hot climate in months bracketing the current race
season.
'In terms of racing you always have to be very conscious of
the temperature here,' Gabriel cautioned. 'In the future we will
definitely look at ways to expand the racing program and add more
days if that would be possible. It is still very hot in September,
but the temperature starts to drop around October.'
When Nad al-Sheba was built, its subtler purpose was to lure
U.S. world-champion Cigar to Dubai. He came and he conquered,
winning the Inaugural Dubai World Cup and placing Dubai on the map
in more ways than horseracing.
Shrewd gamble or white elephant, Meydan seems designed to up
that initial wager, successfully reinventing horseracing -- and
perhaps Dubai -- yet again.
