Latest:
A classic winner
00:00 11 Aug 1999
|
A sweeping avenue of mature chestnut trees leads the visitor to a
cluster of red-tiled buildings set amid acres of green fields
stretching as far as the eye can see. The seemingly tranquil scene
is disturbed only by the presence of site huts and the steel
skeleton of a new grandstand rising out of the landscape.
Newmarket, the headquarters of British flat racing, is undergoing a transformation, as are many sports venues in the UK, notably in football. The reasons for this are not hard to find. With the general rise in the quality of leisure activities, punters are just not prepared to put up with poor facilities, queues for toilets and bad food. So the old shed-style football stadia and racing grandstands are gradually being replaced by much higher quality facilities.
But all this comes at a cost and the difficulties facing the chairman of football clubs and those running horseracing reveal some interesting similarities as well as some notable differences.
The main contractor at Newmarket, John Mowlem, is ideally placed to observe the contrasts as the firm boasts a number of major football and rugby stadia projects to its credit, as well as three horseracing grandstands - Newmarket follows schemes at Kempton and Cheltenham.
Steve Smith, managing director of Mowlem Stadia Group, says the problems of maximising revenue out of either football or horseracing is common to both sports. Both are about getting 'bums on seats,' but the problem is how to find revenue when the new and expensive stadia are not in use. Football grounds are at least used a great deal more often than racecourses. Newmarket is used for only 14 days a year, so how to justify spending £16 million on a new grandstand?
Smith says: "Enlightened football chairman realise that the game is not sustainable over the long term with the current level of wages. There was a massive financial input into the game with the Sky deal, but TV won't factor up the money like that again. Football is aiming at a higher market, but the problem is most of them are not like Chelsea. You can put a hotel up in a fashionable part of London like Chelsea, but you couldn't do the same at White Hart Lane."
Smith also argues that health and fitness clubs attached to football grounds are unlikely to be able to compete with the likes of a Pinnacle or David Lloyd club. "Most football clubs can't do it," says Smith, "you need swimming pools, but the structural geometry doesn't fit."
In contrast one of the big advantages racecourses have over football stadia is space. "You can put on an exhibition at most racecourses and not have a problem with parking, which is something you can't do at most cramped football stadia where parking is usually limited," says Smith.
"On race days you've got to maximise revenue to a huge degree. The Cheltenham Gold Cup lasts three days, but that's when they get 80 per cent of their revenue - 50,000 people, TV rights and the like. On the other race days they'll get 5,000 to 10,000 people. It's very different to football where they have 20-25 matches and Sky money," points out Smith.
The other main difference between football and horseracing is, well, the fact that racing, to an extent, attracts a better class of punter. This will be immediately evident at the new Newmarket grandstand in the form of the high quality finishes - American red cherry panelling for example.
Another difference is that the Newmarket hospitality facilities are designed not only for race days, but to encourage people to rent them out at other times of the year. Bigger rooms are being built so they can be used for weddings, exhibitions or conferences - all of which helps generate revenue outside of race days.
Mowlem knew the Newmarket contract was coming up while it was working on its £9 million Kempton project. Project manager David Goward, who has the restoration of the Grand Hotel in Brighton, as well as Kempton and Cheltenham under his belt, faced an anxious wait after the initial enquiry.
"We waited for the documents for ages and thought we might have missed out, but once they came through at the end of September 1998 we got the award in mid-November," remembers Goward.
Mowlem had prepared the ground well. It had the advantage of the Kempton and Cheltenham projects, where the overall client is the same as for Newmarket. Newmarket Racecourse Trust is part of Racecourse Holdings Trust, which owns Kempton and Cheltenham. In addition, Smith ensured that the Mowlem team met up with the architect, Goddard Wybor Practice of Leeds, who designed the new development at York's racecourse. Mowlem had already worked with structural engineers Jan Bobrowski and quantity surveyors Davis Langdon and Everest on the Kempton job.
Mowlem has also taken care to keep the same team together on its racecourse projects, thereby offering the client a continuity of experience and personalities.
This continuity also extends to some of the major trade contractors. Because of the tight schedule needed to get the new grandstand open for the spring 2000 deadline, the client had already tendered some of the trade packages. The packages covered demolition, piling, lifts, steelwork and pre-cast concrete. All of these were novated to Mowlem, who tendered all the remaining packages.
Taking on novated packages can be a little awkward for main contractors, but Steve Smith says this is not the case at Newmarket. "Luckily we knew most of those trade contractors. It's a very specialist market. People get work by reputation and that applies to the specialists as well. It's not just what you know, but what is your attitude. So we all knew each other and that gave us a very good start to the job."
The critical package was the steel. Wescol Glosford ordered the steel two days after being awarded the package. "They confirmed they could deliver and as a result we were one month ahead in tender planning than the other contractors bidding," says Smith.
Work began with the demolition of the 1875 Rowley Mile grandstand and was followed by the piling. This takes the form of contiguous piled walls and individual piles with reinforced concrete ground beams and slabs. A slight problem was encountered here when it was found that the foundations of the old grandstand extended further than previously thought. "The poor old engineer spent Christmas designing a retaining wall, but it didn't hold us up as the contiguous piled wall was to have been the last element anyway," says Goward.
The new grandstand is 106m long, 39.4m wide and 34m high and connects to the existing Head On Stand. It has a capacity of 10,000. The five-storey structure has a steel frame with a metal clad and glazed cantilevered roof and Bison precast concrete upper floors and stepped terraces. External walls are composed of stone/block cavity walls, aluminium framed glazed walling, metal panel cladding and frameless glazed walling to the multi-tiered panoramic restaurant and scenic liftshaft.
Internal walls are generally of blockwork construction with considerable use of timber and other high-quality applied finishes. Plant is positioned at ground and fourth floor levels.
Unlike football grandstands, horseracing stands make use of both front and rear elevations. Football is about, at least in theory, keeping people in their seats, but horseracing is all about movement. People walk to the rear elevations to inspect horses in the parade paddock and move about to place bets and fetch refreshments throughout the day. In short, horseracing grandstands need to be designed for ease of movement.
The first floor features a lower standing terrace at the front and a large terrace at the back, where external columns support the balcony. The second floor features the Jockey Club dining area, which can double up as a function room. The viewing balcony is seated as, "you get a less mobile crowd here," says Goward.
The third floor accommodates a stepped restaurant with one frameless piece of glazing providing unrestricted viewing. The thick toughened glass is suspended from the structural steel with clear silicon strips in between the panes.
The fourth floor provides host to 12 hospitality boxes - each with its own kitchen area - and the photo-finish box. Above this a Kal-Zip canopy roof is suspended from a steel column, thereby avoiding any obstruction to the glass-fronted restaurant below.
"The whole project is designed for a quick build of the structure to ensure we have the maximum amount of time to get the finishes right. The steel, for example, was painted at Wescol's factory and just lifted into place - you get a better quality too that way," says Smith.
The finishes include fully tiled toilet areas with vanity-top granite wash stands and American red cherry throughout. All the red cherry has to be got from one source to ensure doors match particular wall panels. The ground floor will feature terrazzo tiling up to to the first floor, after which bespoke carpeting will take over to give a plusher look. The lifts are panelled to match the rest of the building.
Mowlem is currently on target to meet "the 2000 in 2000," ie the 2000 Guineas Classic race in April 2000.
BOXTEXT: INBRIEF
l The new grandstand is 106m long, 39.4m wide and 34m high and connects to the existing Head On Stand. It has a capacity of 10,000.
l Horseracing stands need to be designed for ease of movement. People move to the rear elevations to inspect horses in the parade paddock, to place bets and fetch refreshments throughout the day.
l Mowlem is currently on target to meet "the 2000 in 2000," ie the 2000 Guineas Classic race in April 2000.
BOXTEXT: Mowlem has also taken care to keep the same team together on its racecourse projects, thereby offering the client a continuity of experience and personalities.
Newmarket, the headquarters of British flat racing, is undergoing a transformation, as are many sports venues in the UK, notably in football. The reasons for this are not hard to find. With the general rise in the quality of leisure activities, punters are just not prepared to put up with poor facilities, queues for toilets and bad food. So the old shed-style football stadia and racing grandstands are gradually being replaced by much higher quality facilities.
ADVERTISEMENT
But all this comes at a cost and the difficulties facing the chairman of football clubs and those running horseracing reveal some interesting similarities as well as some notable differences.
The main contractor at Newmarket, John Mowlem, is ideally placed to observe the contrasts as the firm boasts a number of major football and rugby stadia projects to its credit, as well as three horseracing grandstands - Newmarket follows schemes at Kempton and Cheltenham.
Steve Smith, managing director of Mowlem Stadia Group, says the problems of maximising revenue out of either football or horseracing is common to both sports. Both are about getting 'bums on seats,' but the problem is how to find revenue when the new and expensive stadia are not in use. Football grounds are at least used a great deal more often than racecourses. Newmarket is used for only 14 days a year, so how to justify spending £16 million on a new grandstand?
Smith says: "Enlightened football chairman realise that the game is not sustainable over the long term with the current level of wages. There was a massive financial input into the game with the Sky deal, but TV won't factor up the money like that again. Football is aiming at a higher market, but the problem is most of them are not like Chelsea. You can put a hotel up in a fashionable part of London like Chelsea, but you couldn't do the same at White Hart Lane."
Smith also argues that health and fitness clubs attached to football grounds are unlikely to be able to compete with the likes of a Pinnacle or David Lloyd club. "Most football clubs can't do it," says Smith, "you need swimming pools, but the structural geometry doesn't fit."
In contrast one of the big advantages racecourses have over football stadia is space. "You can put on an exhibition at most racecourses and not have a problem with parking, which is something you can't do at most cramped football stadia where parking is usually limited," says Smith.
"On race days you've got to maximise revenue to a huge degree. The Cheltenham Gold Cup lasts three days, but that's when they get 80 per cent of their revenue - 50,000 people, TV rights and the like. On the other race days they'll get 5,000 to 10,000 people. It's very different to football where they have 20-25 matches and Sky money," points out Smith.
The other main difference between football and horseracing is, well, the fact that racing, to an extent, attracts a better class of punter. This will be immediately evident at the new Newmarket grandstand in the form of the high quality finishes - American red cherry panelling for example.
Another difference is that the Newmarket hospitality facilities are designed not only for race days, but to encourage people to rent them out at other times of the year. Bigger rooms are being built so they can be used for weddings, exhibitions or conferences - all of which helps generate revenue outside of race days.
Mowlem knew the Newmarket contract was coming up while it was working on its £9 million Kempton project. Project manager David Goward, who has the restoration of the Grand Hotel in Brighton, as well as Kempton and Cheltenham under his belt, faced an anxious wait after the initial enquiry.
"We waited for the documents for ages and thought we might have missed out, but once they came through at the end of September 1998 we got the award in mid-November," remembers Goward.
Mowlem had prepared the ground well. It had the advantage of the Kempton and Cheltenham projects, where the overall client is the same as for Newmarket. Newmarket Racecourse Trust is part of Racecourse Holdings Trust, which owns Kempton and Cheltenham. In addition, Smith ensured that the Mowlem team met up with the architect, Goddard Wybor Practice of Leeds, who designed the new development at York's racecourse. Mowlem had already worked with structural engineers Jan Bobrowski and quantity surveyors Davis Langdon and Everest on the Kempton job.
Mowlem has also taken care to keep the same team together on its racecourse projects, thereby offering the client a continuity of experience and personalities.
This continuity also extends to some of the major trade contractors. Because of the tight schedule needed to get the new grandstand open for the spring 2000 deadline, the client had already tendered some of the trade packages. The packages covered demolition, piling, lifts, steelwork and pre-cast concrete. All of these were novated to Mowlem, who tendered all the remaining packages.
Taking on novated packages can be a little awkward for main contractors, but Steve Smith says this is not the case at Newmarket. "Luckily we knew most of those trade contractors. It's a very specialist market. People get work by reputation and that applies to the specialists as well. It's not just what you know, but what is your attitude. So we all knew each other and that gave us a very good start to the job."
The critical package was the steel. Wescol Glosford ordered the steel two days after being awarded the package. "They confirmed they could deliver and as a result we were one month ahead in tender planning than the other contractors bidding," says Smith.
Work began with the demolition of the 1875 Rowley Mile grandstand and was followed by the piling. This takes the form of contiguous piled walls and individual piles with reinforced concrete ground beams and slabs. A slight problem was encountered here when it was found that the foundations of the old grandstand extended further than previously thought. "The poor old engineer spent Christmas designing a retaining wall, but it didn't hold us up as the contiguous piled wall was to have been the last element anyway," says Goward.
The new grandstand is 106m long, 39.4m wide and 34m high and connects to the existing Head On Stand. It has a capacity of 10,000. The five-storey structure has a steel frame with a metal clad and glazed cantilevered roof and Bison precast concrete upper floors and stepped terraces. External walls are composed of stone/block cavity walls, aluminium framed glazed walling, metal panel cladding and frameless glazed walling to the multi-tiered panoramic restaurant and scenic liftshaft.
Internal walls are generally of blockwork construction with considerable use of timber and other high-quality applied finishes. Plant is positioned at ground and fourth floor levels.
Unlike football grandstands, horseracing stands make use of both front and rear elevations. Football is about, at least in theory, keeping people in their seats, but horseracing is all about movement. People walk to the rear elevations to inspect horses in the parade paddock and move about to place bets and fetch refreshments throughout the day. In short, horseracing grandstands need to be designed for ease of movement.
The first floor features a lower standing terrace at the front and a large terrace at the back, where external columns support the balcony. The second floor features the Jockey Club dining area, which can double up as a function room. The viewing balcony is seated as, "you get a less mobile crowd here," says Goward.
The third floor accommodates a stepped restaurant with one frameless piece of glazing providing unrestricted viewing. The thick toughened glass is suspended from the structural steel with clear silicon strips in between the panes.
The fourth floor provides host to 12 hospitality boxes - each with its own kitchen area - and the photo-finish box. Above this a Kal-Zip canopy roof is suspended from a steel column, thereby avoiding any obstruction to the glass-fronted restaurant below.
"The whole project is designed for a quick build of the structure to ensure we have the maximum amount of time to get the finishes right. The steel, for example, was painted at Wescol's factory and just lifted into place - you get a better quality too that way," says Smith.
The finishes include fully tiled toilet areas with vanity-top granite wash stands and American red cherry throughout. All the red cherry has to be got from one source to ensure doors match particular wall panels. The ground floor will feature terrazzo tiling up to to the first floor, after which bespoke carpeting will take over to give a plusher look. The lifts are panelled to match the rest of the building.
Mowlem is currently on target to meet "the 2000 in 2000," ie the 2000 Guineas Classic race in April 2000.
BOXTEXT: INBRIEF
l The new grandstand is 106m long, 39.4m wide and 34m high and connects to the existing Head On Stand. It has a capacity of 10,000.
l Horseracing stands need to be designed for ease of movement. People move to the rear elevations to inspect horses in the parade paddock, to place bets and fetch refreshments throughout the day.
l Mowlem is currently on target to meet "the 2000 in 2000," ie the 2000 Guineas Classic race in April 2000.
BOXTEXT: Mowlem has also taken care to keep the same team together on its racecourse projects, thereby offering the client a continuity of experience and personalities.
ADVERTISEMENT
Most Viewed Articles
ADVERTISEMENT