Birmingham Announces Three Competition Venues for 2022 World Games

This morning, the Birmingham Organizing Committee announced the first four of potentially twenty-five venues for next year's World Games. With this announcement, we are beginning to see how the clusters will play out and which sports will be grouped together as we approach the long-awaited schedule release which is expected at some point this summer. 

The first venue to be announced last summer was the opening of the brand-new Protective Stadium, which is expected to complete construction this summer. The 47,000 seat stadium will be the site of the opening and closing ceremonies. After the games, the stadium will become the official home of the University of Alabama-Birmingham's football team and most likely replace Legion Field as the city’s main stadium attraction. 

Legion Field will also be used at the 2022 World Games as it will host the Flag Football tournament. Flag Football will make its first appearance at the games as an invitational sport. Choosing Legion Field as the site for Flag Football is an interesting decision. The version of flag to be used at the World Games is the 5 on 5 version, which only uses a 50-yard field. Unless the BLOC plans to add infield seating, or maybe run two games at the same time it seems like too big of a venue for the event. Regardless, the Flag Football competition will be very exciting with qualifiers taking place this fall at the IFAF Flag World Championships in Spain, where seven other nations (men’s and women’s) will stake their claim in Birmingham alongside the hosts.   

The Boutwell Auditorium will be the site of the "ring events" in Birmingham. The concert venue, which has a capacity of 5,000 seats will be transformed to host Kickboxing, Muay Thai, and Sumo Wrestling. These three sports all shared the same venue, Orbita Hall, at the 2017 World Games in Wroclaw. Sumo was the first sport, followed by Kickboxing and closed with Muay Thai. Expect a similar timeline in Birmingham.

Perhaps the biggest venue news comes with announcement of the Birmingham CrossPlex. The CrossPlex has three facilities available for use: a 5,000 seat indoor arena (Bill Harris Arena), an indoor swimming complex (Natatorium) which seats 1,400 spectators, and an indoor track. The Birmingham CrossPlex has a history of hosting marquee sporting events such as NCAA Division I and Division II Championships. 

The Bill Harris Arena will host Roller Hockey and Artistic Roller Skating events. Again, this is like the last version of the World Games when both sports were the only occupants of the Swidnica Icerink, just outside of Wroclaw. Artistic Roller skating started the competition and Roller Hockey closed it out. 

The Natatorium will be utilized to host the two swimming events of Fin-Swimming and Lifesaving. It will also host the Canoe Polo competition which will be held indoors unlike Wroclaw. Expect a loud exciting environment, with noise echoing off the Natatorium walls from fired up fans excited to see a live sports competition again. (fingers crossed)

Track Speed Skating heads indoors to the Indoor Track section of The CrossPlex where it will be teamed up with the invitational sport of Wheelchair Rugby. Road Speed Skating will stay outdoors but expect the starting and finish lines to be in the parking lot of The CrossPlex.

The 2022 World Games will take place from July 7 - 17, 2022 in Birmingham, Alabama. The Birmingham Organizing Committee looks well on their way to organizing not only a historic World Games, but most likely one of the first multi-sports games coming out of the pandemic.

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