About Birmingham

Birmingham is the second largest city in England and forms the centre of the highly urbanised area known as the West Midlands. Widely known as one of the friendliest cities in the country, Brummies are fiercely proud of their town. And rightly so. For a long time, Birmingham was synonymous with massive 1960s planning schemes and some fairly shady architecture, in the aftermath of extensive damage caused in World War 2 and the general growth of the city as an industrial heartland. However, the city has undergone what can only be described as a “Road to Damascus” conversion in recent years into a superbly cutting edge, visionary place resplendent with 21st century development, epic new buildings sprouting up in glass and steel and a groundswell of excitement that exudes from its rich cultural heritage of industry, mass immigration, sporting traditions and love of mushy peas and chips.

The new Birmingham is ideal for the Rat Race; it’s exciting, modern, open to new ideas and full of quirky delights on and off the beaten track. Graced with the ever popular local boast of “more canals than Venice,” it is also purported to pack more trees than Paris and reputed to revel in more parks than any other city in Europe. It all goes into the mix to ensure that this industrial behemoth is an urban adventurer’s paradise.

The centre of the city is dominated by the brand new Bullring; it’s pretty much an entire new city centre constructed over many city blocks. Its centrepiece is the amazing looking Selfridges building, which adds an extremely innovative spectacle to the skyline by day and an eerie cool to proceedings at night as it glows green. Around it can be found the famous “largeness” district of Broad Street and Brindleyplace, all built on top of a huge canal network that winds its way through the city, both above ground and in tunnels underground.

You will get to know the NEC (National Exhibition Centre) out on the periphery of the city whatever happens, as it’s where the event will be based. In town, another major events venue may throw up its secrets too, with the National Indoor Arena adjoining the new civic space at Centennary Square. Throw in the sights and sounds of the Jewellery Quarter, the elegant shops and boutiques of the Mailbox, the inventory of high rise 20th century concrete and formica giving way to elegant and sleek 21st century glass and steel skyscrapers and throw in that smorgasbord of parks and trees throughout the city and you have the Rat Race Birmingham 2008. Stylish, smooth and exquisitely polished at the same time as rough, rugged and ready for action.

That’s Birmingham. And we love it. You will too.