2000 Summer Olympics closing ceremony

The opening ceremony of the 2000 Summer Olympics took place on the evening of Friday, 15 September 2000 in Stadium Australia, Sydney, during which the Games were formally opened by then-Governor-General Sir William Deane. As mandated by the Olympic Charter, the proceedings combined the formal and ceremonial opening of this international sporting event, including welcoming speeches, hoisting of the flags and the parade of athletes, with an artistic spectacle to showcase the host nation's culture and history. Veteran ceremonies director Ric Birch was the Director of Ceremonies while David Atkins was the Artistic Director and Producer. Its artistic section highlighted several aspects of Australian culture and history, showing Australia's flora and fauna, technology, multiculturalism, and the hopeful moment of reconciliation towards Aboriginal Australians. The ceremony had a cast of 12,687 performers, seen by a stadium audience of around 110,000.The ceremony began at 19:00 AEDT and lasted over four-and-a-half hours. Around 3.7 billion viewers worldwide watched the ceremony on TV.The ceremony was described by the President of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) Juan Antonio Samaranch as the most beautiful ceremony the world had ever seen. Consistent with normal major production management, the music was pre-recorded under studio conditions to ensure its quality.The stadium's French-language announcer was Pascale Ledeur, while the English-language announcer was Australian actor John Stanton.

Since the inception of the A-League Men, Australian association football's highest level annual men's league tournament, 30 football stadiums have been used to host matches, with one more stadium set to host their first A-League matches in the 2018-19 season. The inaugural round of A-League matches took place on 26 and 28 August 2005, with four clubs hosting the opening fixtures. Of the stadiums currently serving as a team's regular home stadium, Sydney FC's Allianz Stadium is the largest stadium in the league (42,500), whilst Western United's Eureka Stadium is the smallest (11,000). The largest capacity stadium ever used in the A-League Men was Stadium Australia (83,500), which served as the temporary home ground of the Western Sydney Wanderers from 2016-2019 while the Western Sydney Stadium was being constructed. The smallest capacity stadium ever used in the A-League Men was the Morshead Park Stadium (8,500), which hosted an A-League Men's match between Western United and Wellington Phoenix on 9 April 2022. AAMI Park is the only stadium to currently serve as the home ground of multiple teams, with the stadium serving as the home ground of Melbourne City, Melbourne Victory and Western United.

Stadium Australia (currently known as Accor Stadium for sponsorship purposes), is a multi-purpose stadium located in the Sydney Olympic Park, in Sydney, Australia. The stadium, which in Australia is sometimes referred to as Sydney Olympic Stadium, Homebush Stadium or simply the Olympic Stadium, was completed in March 1999 at a cost of A$690 million to host the 2000 Summer Olympics. The Stadium was leased by a private company, the Stadium Australia Group, until the Stadium was sold back to the NSW Government on 1 June 2016 after NSW Premier Michael Baird announced the Stadium was to be redeveloped as a world-class rectangular stadium. The Stadium is owned by Venues NSW on behalf of the NSW Government. The stadium was originally built to hold circa 115,000 spectators, making it the largest Olympic Stadium ever built and the second largest stadium in Australia after the Melbourne Cricket Ground which held more than 120,000 before its re-design in the early 2000s. In 2003, reconfiguration work was completed to shorten the north and south wings, and install movable seating. These changes reduced the capacity to 80,000, with the capacity to add seating depending on the venue configuration. Awnings were also added over the north and south stands, allowing most of the seating to be under cover. The stadium was engineered along sustainable lines, e.g., utilising less steel in the roof structure than the Olympic stadiums of Athens and Beijing.

Sydney Olympic Park is a suburb of Greater Western Sydney, located 13 kilometres west of the Sydney central business district, in the local government area of the City of Parramatta Council. It is commonly known as Olympic Park but officially named Sydney Olympic Park. The area was part of the suburb of Lidcombe and known as "North Lidcombe", but between 1989 and 2009 was named "Homebush Bay" (part of which is now the separate suburb of Wentworth Point). The names "Homebush Bay" and, sometimes, "Homebush" are still used colloquially as a metonym for Stadium Australia as well as the Olympic Park precinct as a whole, but Homebush is an older, separate suburb to the southeast, in the Municipality of Strathfield.Sydney Olympic Park features a large sports and entertainment area, originally redeveloped for the Sydney 2000 Olympic and Paralympic Games. The stadiums, arenas and venues continue to be used for sporting, musical, and cultural events, including the Sydney Royal Easter Show, Sydney Festival and a number of world-class sporting fixtures. The suburb also contains commercial developments, residential buildings and extensive parklands.

The 2000 Summer Olympics cauldron is a heritage-listed former Olympic flame holder and now fountain at Cathy Freeman Park, near the corner of Olympic Boulevard and the Grand Parade, Sydney Olympic Park, in the City of Parramatta Council, New South Wales, Australia. It was originally designed by Michael Scott-Mitchell for the 2000 Summer Olympics with the design of the re-presentation in Cathy Freeman Park by Tzannes Associates. It was built from 2000 to 2010 by Engineers Tierney and Partners with the assistance of LUSAS Civil and Structural. It is also known as Olympic Cauldron at Sydney Olympic Park, The Cauldron, Sydney Olympic Games Cauldron, Millenium Games Cauldron and Sydney 2000 Games Cauldron. The property is owned by the Sydney Olympic Park Authority. It was added to the New South Wales State Heritage Register on 10 September 2010.

Sydney Olympic Park Athletic Centre is a multi-use stadium in Sydney Olympic Park, Australia. The capacity of the stadium is 5,000 spectators. It also hosted the 1996 World Junior Championships in Athletics and served as the warm-up track for the 2000 Olympic Games, being connected by a tunnel to Stadium Australia, where the Olympic competition was held. Since 1994 it's been a frequent venue of the Australian Athletics Championships.

Hillsong Conference is a mid-year week-long annual Christian conference hosted in Sydney, Australia, with a smaller three-day event held in London later each year. It is the largest annual conference in Australia of any kind. The event is hosted by Hillsong Church at the Qudos Bank Arena and surrounding Olympic Park precinct. Hillsong Conference grew from 150 people at the first conference in 1986 to upwards of 30,000 people each year in Sydney. It brings in over $28 million to the New South Wales tourism sector, annually.From 2020 to 2021, the Hillsong Conference was postponed for the first time in its history, due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Monster Skatepark is a fully outdoor skatepark located in Sydney Olympic Park, New South Wales, Australia. Skaters can use the facility between 10AM and 5PM Monday through Friday and 9AM to 5PM on the weekend.The schedule and site was designed to accommodate related recreational and sporting events, with separate sessions for skate-boarding, scooters and BMX riders, and a variety of ramps and surfaces entirely outdoors. The Monster Skatepark's central feature is promoted by the Government of New South Wales as the nation's "only international ramp facility" with mini and vertical ramps and amenities such as a shop, cafe and music for its users.This skatepark caught fire on 12 May 2017 with the blaze being categorised as a “sixth alarm", which is large and a loud bang was heard with thick smoke covering the roof of the venue. Only 10 percent of the skatepark has been burnt down. The outdoor Vert and Spine ramp and the cafe and retail store have been reopened to the public since the 22nd of December 2018.

The Homebush Street Circuit, also known as the Sydney Olympic Park Street Circuit, was a 3.420 km (2.125 mi) temporary street circuit around the former Olympic precinct at Sydney Olympic Park, Homebush Bay, Australia. The track hosted the Sydney 500 and was used for the first time at the final round of the 2009 V8 Supercar Championship Series. The circuit was used for the final time in December 2016 due to a relocation to a Newcastle after it was announced the ANZ stadium precinct would be upgraded and block the track location.

The Sydney SuperDome (currently known as the Qudos Bank Arena) is a large multipurpose arena located in Sydney, Australia. It is situated in Sydney Olympic Park, and was completed in 1999 as part of the facilities for the 2000 Summer Olympics. The A$190‑million facility was designed by COX Architecture & Devine deFlon Yaeger, and constructed by Abigroup and Obayashi Corporation Bob Carr, premier of New South Wales, officially opened the stadium in November 1999.The development of the stadium was part of three subsites which also included a 3,400-space carpark which cost A$25 million, and a plaza with external works, also costing $25 million. The roof's masts reach 42 metres (138 ft) above ground level, and the stadium occupies a site of 20,000 m2 (220,000 sq ft; 4.9 acres).The arena is ranked in the top 10 arenas worldwide. It is currently managed by AEG Ogden. For three consecutive years the venue was a finalist for the Billboard Touring Awards in the top venue category.The arena has a total capacity of 21,032 with a seating capacity of around 18,200 making the SuperDome the largest permanent indoor sports and entertainment venue in Australia.

The women's 50 metre freestyle competition at the 1999 Pan Pacific Swimming Championships took place on August 28–29 at the Sydney International Aquatic Centre. The last champion was Le Jingyi of China.This race consisted of one length of the pool in freestyle.

The Sydney Showground is a purpose-built venue used each year for the Sydney Royal Easter Show. Located at Sydney Olympic Park in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, it was opened in 1998, as a venue for the 2000 Summer Olympics and to replace the former Sydney Showground at Moore Park. Sydney Showground is operated by the Royal Agricultural Society of NSW (RAS), under lease from the NSW Government.