Swindon Stadium

Swindon Stadium

Full name	Swindon Greyhound Stadium, The Abbey Greyhound Stadium or The Abbey Stadium
Location	Blunsdon, Swindon, England
Capacity	2,000 [1]
Construction
Built	1947
Opened	1949
Tenants
Greyhound racing Swindon Robins

Swindon Stadium, also known as The Abbey Greyhound Stadium, is a Greyhound Board of Great Britain regulated greyhound racing track & speedway track located in Blunsdon, Swindon, England.^[2]

The stadium is home to the Swindon Robins, who play in the Elite League. Matinée races take place on Monday and Friday with evening race meetings on Wednesday and Saturday nights. The Greyhound track has a large circumference of 463 metres; one of the largest in the United Kingdom, while the Speedway track having a circumference of 363 meters.^[3]

Competitions

The Arc
British Bred Produce Stakes

Opening

The stadium opened to the public on 23 July 1949 when it hosted the Swindon Robins speedway team and greyhound racing would follow three years later on 1 November 1952. ^[4] Swindon had already experienced two short lived greyhound track venues in the village of Wroughton and near the town centre in Edinburgh Street but both had disappeared by the mid-thirties. ^[5] In 1952 greyhounds returned with the site chosen being a rural setting south of Lady Lane and it was named after the Blunsdon Abbey Estate in Blunsdon St Andrew, a Victorian estate which had seen the main house destroyed by fire in 1904.

History

The track initially raced as an independent with two thousand people turning up on 1 November 1952 to watch a greyhound called Don’t Care win a 324 yard race in a time of 19.02 secs at odds of 6-1. ^[6] The stadium came into the hands of the Bristol Greyhound Racing Association, owners of Oxford and Bristol at the time. This inevitably led to the track becoming part of the National Greyhound Racing Club during April 1968. The Silver Plume competition arrived the same year as the tracks principal event. ^[7] Another independent track to the north west of Swindon opened during the sixties at Common Platt but had little effect on the business of its larger neighbour. ^[8]

In 1983 a company called ADT (British Car Auctions) purchased the Abbey Stadium using the large car park as a base for their sales. Other competitions competed for at the track were the Grand National of the West, Pride of the West and the Jubilee Stakes. ^[9] A pivotal year ensued in 1997 when the BS Group, owners of Bristol sold Bristol and bought Swindon from ADT. The entire Bristol operation including the racing office, bookmakers, trainers, the Western Two Year Old Produce Stakes and the BAGS contract was given to Swindon. ^[10]

The BS Group would become Stadia UK and then Gaming International and following the closure of Walthamstow in 2008 the track took possession of the Arc. In 2014 Stadia UK operations director Bill Glass announced that planning permission was granted for 66 new houses on part of the existing Swindon stadium site and the plan was to use some of the funds to build a new stadium and then the old site would be demolished for 450 homes.

Current Plans

As of 2016 the plans to demolish Swindon and rebuild a new stadium on the same site has met delays. ^{[11] [12]}

Track records

^[13]

References

External links

• Official site
• British Greyhound Racing Board

Coordinates: 51°36′28″N 1°47′32″W / 51.60776°N 1.79227°W / 51.60776; -1.79227