Olympics 2024: Why is the athletics track purple?

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Andrew Feinberg

White House Correspondent

Paris hosts its third Olympics this summer and the athletics are underway at the Stade de France, the country’s national stadium, and the host venue for the Closing Ceremony.

The stadium, which has recently hosted the Rugby World Cup final, the final of Euro 2016 and the Champions League final in 2022, is the largest stadium for athletics events in Europe, capable of holding over 77,000 fans.

The athletics track is usually hidden under the field for football and rugby matches, and ahead of the games a new track has been laid.

This new track, manufactured by Italian surface and equipment specialist Mondo, is an eye-catching shade of purple.

Alain Blondel, sports manager in charge of athletics for Paris 2024, explained that the track’s colour is the simple result of a design approach.

He said that the Organising Committee wanted “to come up with a track that was different from what we had seen, to maintain the creative approach, [and] to go a little bit outside the box”.

“The look of the Games includes three colours for all the competition venues: blue, green and purple. We decided on this purple track with different tones: lighter for the track, darker for the service areas, and grey for the turns at the end of the bend, reminding of the ash-coloured tracks that were there 100 years ago for the Olympic Games [in] Paris [in] 1924.”

According to the Olympics website, purple has never been seen before on an athletics track, and Blondel emphasised that the Committee “had to work hard on the colours, so that they came out in the best possible tones to highlight the athletes”.

“It’s a track, it has to be pretty, but above all it’s a stage on which the athletes are going to perform. What’s really important is that the colours and the athletes stand out.”

Plenty more modifications are being made to the Stade de France, including the addition of two new screens – each the size of a tennis court – and the installation of 650 new lights.