page_title: Santa Maria, Bulacan
section_title: Sports and recreation
hierarchical_section_title: Santa Maria, Bulacan / Tourism / Sports and recreation
caption_attribution_description: Philippine Arena facade
context_page_description: Santa Maria, officially the Municipality of Santa Maria, is a 1st class municipality in the province of Bulacan, Philippines. According to the 2015 census, it has a population of 256,454 people. representing 7.8% of the population of the province.
  Located on the banks of the Santa Maria River, 32 kilometres north of Manila, Santa Maria has been a thriving settlement for almost four centuries. It was founded as a barrio of Bocaue in the early 17th century until it was established as an independent municipality on November 26, 1793 by the Spanish friar Francisco Dominguez Javier OFM. Known before as Santa Maria de Pandi, it is named under the patronage of the Immaculate Conception. Its administrative center, the Poblacion, forms as the historic core of the municipality. It is surrounded by four rivers and it still largely retains its 2.88 square-kilometer boundaries since the Spanish Colonial Era.
  Santa Maria, with a population of 256,454, remains by a significant margin the most populous municipality in Central Luzon, as well as the 5th most populous municipality in the Philippines. It is also the 2nd most populous local government unit in Bulacan next to San Jose del Monte City.
context_section_description: The Philippine Arena is a multi-purpose indoor arena at Ciudad de Victoria, a 75-hectare tourism enterprise zone located in the towns of Santa Maria and Bocaue, Bulacan. With a capacity of up to 55,000, it was the centerpiece of the Iglesia Ni Cristo's (INC) centennial, which was celebrated on July 27, 2014.
  Sports and recreation activities in the locality are usually basketball, softball, bowling, badminton, tennis and chess. The most common sports and recreational facilities in the town are basketball courts located in school compounds and in other part of 24 barangays. These courts also serve as multi-purpose pavements. A tennis court and a gymnasium named after the late Ricardo D. Nicolas, Jr. was constructed at the FFHNAS campus in Barangay Guyong. There are also two badminton courts in the town.
caption: The Philippine Arena is the world's largest indoor arena.