A blanket of bright red fills Ohio Stadium when the Ohio State Buckeyes are playing. Intimate and atmospheric, this huge stadium is one of the most recognisable landmarks in American sport, with over 100,000 spectators cramming in for the Buckeyes football fixtures, the majority of them wearing the team’s red jerseys. Built in 1922, the distinctive horseshoe-shaped Ohio Stadium can also be visited on stadium tours. It’s also regularly used for music concerts and has hosted legends like the Rolling Stones and Pink Floyd. Ohio Stadium is located in the south of Ohio State University’s main campus, around 10 kilometres north of downtown Columbus.
Saturday afternoons are a fiesta all around Ohio Stadium during the football season. Car parks and grass parks are transformed into spaces for barbecues, picnics and entertainment. Ohio Stadium has recently been refurbished and has become the fourth largest sports stadium in the United States. The seemingly endless sea of red is a remarkable sight on game days, and the Ohio State Buckeyes have an enviable home record.
Public buses connect Ohio Stadium with downtown Columbus and the city’s northeastern suburbs. There is extensive car parking space, and many fans arrive early on match days, taking camping chairs and lighting up barbecues in the car parks, their red jerseys shimmering proudly in the sun.
When the stadium opened, it had a capacity of over 66,000. Renovations in 2014 removed the running track and added more seats to push the capacity past 100,000.