The

Rainier III Rainier III (Rainier Louis Henri Maxence Bertrand Grimaldi; 31 May 1923 – 6 April 2005) was Prince of Monaco from 1949 to his death in 2005. Rainier ruled the Principality of Monaco for almost 56 years, making him one of the longest-ruling ...

Nautical Stadium (French: ) is a municipal sports complex on the Route de la Piscine in the

La Condamine La Condamine ( lij, A Cundamina ) is the central ward in the Principality of Monaco. Its landmarks include Port Hercules, the Rainier III Nautical Stadium, and the Princess Antoinette Park. Its farmer's market at the ''Place d'Armes'' dates fro ...

district of

Monaco Monaco (; ), officially the Principality of Monaco (french: Principauté de Monaco; Ligurian: ; oc, Principat de Mónegue), is a sovereign city-state and microstate on the French Riviera a few kilometres west of the Italian region of Lig ...

, in

Port Hercules Port Hercules (french: Port Hercule) is the only deep-water port in Monaco. The port has been in use since ancient times. The modern port was completed in 1926, and underwent substantial improvements in the 1970s. It covers almost , enough to pro ...

. The swimming pool itself originally existed as sectioned off part of the harbour, dating back to at least 1949. However, construction was expanded in 1961, with the addition of a link road and expansion of facilities. The stadium consists of a heated saltwater

Olympic-size swimming pool An Olympic-size swimming pool conforms to regulated dimensions that are large enough for international competition. This type of swimming pool is used in the Olympic Games, where the race course is in length, typically referred to as "long cour ...

, with 1, 3, 5, and 10m

diving platform A diving platform or diving tower is a type of structure used for competitive diving. It consists of a vertical rigid "tower" with one or more horizontal platforms extending out over a deep pool of water. In platform diving, the diver jumps from ...

s, and a 45m slide. The pool is converted into a 1,000m²

ice rink An ice rink (or ice skating rink) is a frozen body of water and/or an artificial sheet of ice created using hardened chemicals where people can ice skate or play winter sports. Ice rinks are also used for exhibitions, contests and ice shows. The ...

from December to March. The pool gives its name to the "Swimming Pool chicane" (or "Piscine") at the annual Monaco Grand Prix. Contrary to popular belief, the construction of the Nautical Stadium caused no changes to the layout of the Circuit de Monaco, as at the time, the original layout continued up a ramp, past the Tabac, on a road directly overlooking the swimming pool that is now grandstands and the pit lane. In fact, the "swimming pool" section of the Monaco circuit was there not created specifically for racing as such, but merely used this link road (built in 1961) around the outside of the swimming pool. This happened in 1973 as it had been decided that a sectioned off pit lane was required for safety reasons and, having had to use temporary pits in 1972, the only place they had room to build permanent pits was by using what was then the current section of the circuit between Tabac and the Gazomètre hairpin. This forced the circuit onto the previously constructed link road around the outside of the swimming pool.

References

External links

* 1972 establishments in Monaco Sports venues completed in 1972 Sports venues in Monaco Swimming venues in Monaco {{Monaco-sports-venue-stub