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The Vélodrome d'Hiver was an indoor cycle track (or velodrome) in the rue Nélaton, close to the Eiffel Tower in Paris. As well as track cycling, it was used for ice hockey, wrestling, boxing, roller-skating, circuses, spectaculars and demonstrations. more...

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The building was usually referred to by its contracted name of Vel' d'Hiv. Vélodrome d'hiver is the old name for an indoor track which riders could use in winter (l'hiver). The Vel' d'Hiv was the first permanent indoor track in France and the name persisted for other indoor tracks built subsequently.

Thousands of Jews were held in it during the second world war before being moved to a concentration camp in the Parisian suburbs at Drancy and then to the extermination camp at Auschwitz. The incident became known as the Rafle du Vel'd'Hiv or Vel' d'Hiv round-up.

Origins

The original track was housed in the Salles des Machines, the building used for the industrial display of the World's Fair which ended in 1900 and for which the Eiffel Tower was the most striking monument. The building stayed unoccupied after the exhibition.

In 1902 the Salle des Machines was inspected by Henri Desgrange, who the following year inaugurated the Tour de France on behalf of the newspaper that he edited, L'Auto. With him were Victor Goddet, the newspaper's treasurer, an engineer named Durand, and an architect, Gaston Lambert. It was Lambert who said he could turn the hall into a sports arena with a track 333 metres long and eight metres wide. He finished it in 20 days.

The first meeting there, on 20 December 1903, had an audience of 20,000. They paid seven francs for the best view and a single franc to see hardly anything at all. The seating was primitive and there was no heating. The first event was not a cycle race but a walking competition over 250 metres. The first cycling competition was a race ridden behind pacing motorcycles. Only one rider - Cissac - managed to complete the 16km, the others having crashed on the unaccustomed steepness of the track banking.

Change of name and track

In 1909 the Salle des Machines was listed for demolition, to improve the view of the Eiffel Tower. Desgrange moved to another building nearby, at the corner of the boulevard de Grenelle and the rue Nélaton. The venue was named the Vélodrome d'Hiver. The new track, also designed by Lambert, was 253.16m round at the base but exactly 250m on the line ridden by the motor-paced riders considered the stars of the day. Lambert built two tiers of seats, which towered above bankings so steep for their day that they were considered cliff-like. In the track centre Lambert built a roller-skating rink of 2,700 square metres. He lit the whole lot with 1,253 hanging lamps.

Read more at Wikipedia.org