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Qatar Opens Huge Sports Museum for World Cup Year

Show and tell: People visit the newly-inaugurated 3-2-1 Qatar Olympic and Sports Museum KARIM JAAFAR AFP
Show and tell: People visit the newly-inaugurated 3-2-1 Qatar Olympic and Sports Museum KARIM JAAFAR AFP
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Qatar Opens Huge Sports Museum for World Cup Year

Show and tell: People visit the newly-inaugurated 3-2-1 Qatar Olympic and Sports Museum KARIM JAAFAR AFP
Show and tell: People visit the newly-inaugurated 3-2-1 Qatar Olympic and Sports Museum KARIM JAAFAR AFP

Qatar on Wednesday opened one of the world's biggest sports museums with artefacts from some of the most famous Olympic heroes but also gives prominence to local athletes hoping to boost efforts to attract a new generation into sports.

The 19,000 square meter 3-2-1 Museum Qatar Olympic and Sports Museum, next to one of the stadiums to be used in this year's World Cup, has taken more than 15 years to get off the planning board and fill.

After scouring private collections and negotiating with the International Olympic Committee and other federations, its 17,000 objects include a glove worn by late boxing giant Muhammed Ali, when he won a gold medal at the 1960 Rome Olympics, a Ferrari driven by Formula One champion Michael Schumacher and a shirt worn by Brazilian football legend Pele.

There is also a cricket bat that belonged to Indian hero Sachin Tendukar and a torch from each of the modern Olympic Games, according to AFP.

The museum is part of a billion dollar-plus drive by the Qatar government to build the Gulf state into a cultural haven alongside its big spending on sports events.

But museum director Abdulla Al Mulla denied the museum only intended to put the spotlight on Qatar's energy wealth.

"We are not showing off," he told AFP. "We have the confidence, we earned the confidence of international federations."

Al Mulla also said Qatar's ruling family wanted the museum to show off the state's sporting legacy.

Al Thani, a member of the Qatar ruler's extended family who raced from 2003 until 2015, also said the museum was an "icon" through its recording of all Qatar's athletes and their rankings.

"If I knew that there was a wall with a local athlete on it, for sure I would want to be better than that athlete."

"So I will do 110 percent to be on that wall as well. Now I am a target, I am behind there, and so people can work hard and remove my picture and put someone else's on it."

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Giant Coral Colony Discovered in Red Sea

This natural wonder could become a key highlight for tourists at AMAALA. Photo: RSG
This natural wonder could become a key highlight for tourists at AMAALA. Photo: RSG
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Giant Coral Colony Discovered in Red Sea

This natural wonder could become a key highlight for tourists at AMAALA. Photo: RSG
This natural wonder could become a key highlight for tourists at AMAALA. Photo: RSG

Red Sea Global (RSG) has announced the significant discovery of a giant coral colony in the Red Sea (of the Pavona species) within the waters of AMAALA on the northwestern coast of Saudi Arabia.

Rivalling the size of the current world record holder—a 32-by-34-meter colony found in the Pacific—this remarkable new find is the largest coral colony of this type documented in the Red Sea to date.

According to a statement issued by the RSG on Sunday, this natural wonder could become a key highlight for tourists at AMAALA on diving excursions, offering a unique and unforgettable experience.

Access would be permitted in line with RSG’s responsible tourism ethos, minimizing any potential impact while allowing visitors to witness the breathtaking beauty of the Red Sea’s underwater world.

“The discovery of a coral of such extraordinary dimensions demonstrates the ecological significance as well as the pristine beauty of the Red Sea,” said RSG’s Head of Environmental Protection and Regeneration Ahmed Alansari.

“At RSG, we believe it is critically important to protect our coral reefs. In particular, these giants represent a time capsule of information, providing the ideal tools for tracing past oceanographic transformations that can help us model responses to future environmental changes,” he stated.

“Understanding how this coral has survived for so long will be crucial for protecting other reefs in the Red Sea and potentially all over the world, for generations to come,” he added.

According to the statement, determining the age of these giant corals with minimal impact is challenging due to the invasive nature of accurate dating techniques and the absence of published growth rates for this particular species of coral in the Red Sea. However, estimations have been made based on the coral’s size, growth rates of this species found in the Pacific, and results from photogrammetry efforts. Using these tools, the coral cluster is estimated to be between 400 and 800 years old.

Upcoming studies by researchers from RSG and King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) will help pinpoint the coral’s age more accurately and provide insights into the environmental conditions in which it has thrived.

Coral in the Red Sea is known for its particular resilience, adapting genetically to naturally warmer waters and higher salinity levels. This colony will be subject to ongoing monitoring and research to understand what makes these giants so resilient to multiple stressors over long time periods and to help inform conservation efforts for other reefs in the Red Sea and around the world.
The two RSG scientists who discovered the giant coral colony, Rhonda Suka and Sylvia Jagerroos, are now leading its mapping and documentation.
Suka said: “Finding such an invaluable specimen was a truly mind-boggling experience. This colony’s resilience gives us hope for the continued success of corals in the Red Sea, particularly in the face of increasing environmental and anthropogenic stress.”

“A coral this massive is incredibly rare. Mapping these giants is an important part of conserving them, something the ‘Map the Giants’ project is doing on a global scale by identifying and documenting these vital giant coral structures, which it classes as anything larger than five meters. This is the second colony RSG has submitted to the project in the last few months,” said Jagerroos.

The statement disclosed that AMAALA is set to welcome its first guests later this year with the ambitious goal of becoming the world’s most comprehensive health and wellness destination. Launching with more than 1,400 hotel rooms across eight luxury resorts, it will welcome some of the most renowned wellness operators globally, offering a wide array of programs tailored to diverse lifestyles and well-being needs.
This follows RSG’s other destination, The Red Sea, which began welcoming guests in 2023 and now has five hotels open.