18th IAAF World Half Marathon Championships - Birmingham 2009

Birmingham

City of Sport

05 Jul 2009

Birmingham is passionate about sport. The city has some of the finest sports facilities in Britain and has staged a total of 27 World and 17 European Championships since 1991.

The National Indoor Arena has staged international events in more than 20 different sports including badminton, gymnastics, tennis, judo, taekwondo archery and wheelchair basketball. In the last six years alone the city has hosted the 9th IAAF World Indoor Athletics Championships, the World Badminton Championships, the World Junior Wheelchair Basketball Championships, the 29th European Athletics Indoor Championships. In addition to the 18th IAAF World Half Marathon Championships in 2009, Birmingham will also be hosting the European Artistic Gymnastics Team Championships Men/Women in 2010.

The city is home to one of the world’s top cricket grounds in Edgbaston which will once again host an Ashes text match in the summer of 2009 and there are two major football clubs in the city – Aston Villa and Birmingham City.

Birmingham’s passion for sport though is not new as the city has a strong sporting heritage which stretches back for centuries. Birmingham was the birthplace of lawn tennis in 1858 and the world’s oldest football league was started in the city in 1888.