Thread: Southeast Asia Games - Korat 2007

The 24th Southeast Asian Games (also known as SEA Games) will be held in Korat from December 6 to December 16, 2007. When I first moved to Korat a couple of years ago I rode by the construction site and thought it was some sort of reservoir. Ms. B and I drove up today to have a look and it has changed significantly.


The main stadium.


The grand entrance.


The lake with stadium in the background.


Indoor stadiums on the other side of the lake.


Nice Kubota tuktuk used for delivering water to the new plants. I need one.


Swimming pool?

They have signs up, but they are clearly wrong. The arrow pointing to the velodrome was in exactly the wrong direction.

Pool? Shooting range?


Velodrome.


Indoor arenas.


Main stadium from the other side.


Athlete's village.


Office building overlooking the lake.

2007 Southeast Asian Games - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Looks pretty good.

I hope they get the signs sorted out or the 100m sprint times might be a bit slow due to running in 6ft of water.

Thanks for the pics - I had no idea Korat was the host.

Originally Posted by MeMock

I had no idea Korat was the host

I originally thought that Korat was the host for just a few events, but it turns out that it is the major host with a few (sailing?) taking place in more appropriate venues. (I didn't build my pond yet, so there's no place to sail now.)

I've been attending the Track and Field (Athletic) events over the past five days here in Korat. I'm impressed with the level of organization, the quality of the venues and many of the performances.


This is one of the indoor stadiums with TV trucks parked out front.


The entrance to the Main Stadium where the track and field events are held.


South end of the stadium where the games flame burns.


North end of the track with the big scoreboard.


East side of the track. The framework is the image of Phimai that was lit up during the opening ceremony.


Students from St. Mary's school formed a well-coordinated, clever and very loud cheering section.


Cheerleader. No wonder we live in Korat.

Women's 5000 meter race. Two barefoot runners.


Women's long jump. Coaching was very weak for these competitors. They got the approach and take off OK, but most had no idea how to land.


Marathon runners on Mittrapap Highway.


On the way to the main stadium.


Photo by Ms. B who was a volunteer Liaison Officer assigned to the women's boxing team from Burma.


Boxing venue at Pak Thong Chai. The Games mascot is the Sisawat, or Korat Cat.


Ms. B with two of her light featherweight boxers.


Notice the giant Korat Cat balloon.


HRH Princess Siriwanwaree Nareeratana awards gold medals to the Thai women's 4X100 meter relay team.

Excellent.

How much do tickets cost for these events?

^Tickets for the Track and Field are 50 baht per day. I think in some of the smaller venues (swimming) they charge 100 or 150. Well worth it.

that sounds like superb value.

Bet those Burmese boxing chix are hard as nails.

As usual, nice job buad hai, always a pleasure to read/view your photo posts.

Stadium Oddities

Entrances/Exits: After the first day of competition the authorities decided to close all but one of the entrances/exits in each quadrant of the stadium. This made getting up for a pee or to buy some refreshments a very long walk. It also resulted in massive people jams at the end of the day. This still baffles me.

Plastic Bottle Caps: On the last day of competition the authorities banned plastic bottle caps from the stadium. If you had a bottle of water or soda, you were required to open it and surrender the cap. I noticed this in advance, so I opened my water bottle and hid the cap in my pocket. I simply replaced the cap after passing by the alert security guards. Such brilliance in security also baffles me.

Later one, when I went to pee, I noticed what I must assume was a plastic-bottle-cap-sniffing dog with his military master. Luckily I'd left my contraband capped bottle at my seat, so my felonious activity went undetected.

Coca Cola Zero: The entire sports complex was festooned with posters and banners advertising Coke Zero. Unfortunately, almost none of the soda vendors actually had any of that beverage in stock. I did find one and purchased can and took it in to the stadium. I passed the first security check, but then the ticket checking ladies told me that I could not take the can in to the stadium. I responded that I was indeed going to take the can into the stadium as I planned to drink the elusive Coke Zero later on. The ticket checking lady replied, "OK". I guess she missed the lesson on being firm....

Performance of the Meet

The performance that most impressed me was that of the Indonesian woman who won the 10,000 meter race. She took an early lead and did the first few laps in about 1:15. This put her about a half a lap in front of the next runner. She then proceeded to finish the race running a never varying 1:25 per lap. She finished without anyone ever coming close. She must have a great coach to be able to keep up an even pace like that. Also remarkable was the fact that she took no water during the race or for the 20 minutes after the race during which she remained on the track.

Equally impressive was the Burmese runner who came in second and who ran the entire race with sandalwood powder on the cheeks and no shoes on her feet. Twenty five laps, barefoot.

closed all but one of the entrances/exits ... resulted in massive people jams at the end of the day. This still baffles me.

This summer I went to watch the Thai national soccer team play the Aussie national team at Ramajamagala stadium.

30,000 people, one small turnstiled exit. wtf?

Seeing as how I was with some dodgy Brit and Aussie mates, in true hooligan spirit, we scaled the 3m tall fence.

A couple of pics from the games from the Bangkok Post website.

Cheers for the pics, buadhai.

The games actually came through my town(pak chong) for a day, where the cycling took place. They gave the place a quick makeover the day b4, adding the odd concrete elephant and flower to make an otherwise dull town look fecking marvellous!!?!!

The ladies race took place in the morning, which only required 1 ambulance. Then came the men. The conclusion of the race was the climax of the decade for the people here, they were loving it. The winner eased in, followed by 2nd, 3rd and 4th about 2 minutes later, all shadowed by their team cars. Eventually the pack came in, gearing themselves up for the final sprint, accept, the car infront wasn't aware that these 'final sprints' existed, hence the final sprint was more like a final 'get out of my way you stupid cnut' type moment.

Ahhhh Thailand.......gotta love it.