“Construction containing a large quantity of water and intended for bathing, swimming or other aquatic exercise and sports.” This is how the Real Academia Española defines the word “swimming pool” in its first meaning. And that is why this headline is in quotation marks: the largest swimming pool in Spain is in Madrid, according to the first part of the definition, but it is intended for a use other than purely recreational.
We refer to the Calm Water Channel of the Centro de Experiencias Hidrodinámicas de El Pardo (CEHIPAR), with dimensions of 320 m long, 12.5 m wide and 6.5 m deep. To get an idea: now that we have it in our minds because of the Paris Olympic Games the dimensions of an Olympic pool are 50 meters long by 25 meters wide and 1.35 meters deep.
so what is the intended use of this largest “swimming pool” in Spain? As CEHIPAR explains in its web is where tests and research are carried out to study “the hydrodynamic characteristics of ships and propulsors without waves” for civil, commercial and sporting purposes.
This is not the only striking feature of these facilities: if in Torrejón there is the only municipal swimming pool of olas in Spain, we could make the analogy that this campus in El Pardo is the closest thing to the sea that we can aspire to being inland: the Ship Dynamics Laboratory, equipped with “modern wave generation technology”.
One of the largest swimming pools in Spain (where you can swim)
Although the CEHIPAR facilities are not intended for swimming, that does not mean that in Madrid you cannot take a dip in one of the largest pools in Spain: the Riosequillo pool.
Inaugurated in 1993, it is located in Buitrago de Lozoya and has a capacity for more than 2,000 people. All the practical information about schedules and tickets can be found at this link.