The wall of death, motordrome, velodrome or well of death is a carnival sideshow featuring a silo or barrel shaped wooden cylinder, typically ranging from 20 to 36 feet (6.1 to 11.0 m) in diameter and made of wooden planks, inside which motorcyclists, or the drivers of miniature automobiles travel along the vertical wall and perform stunts, held in place by friction and centrifugal force. Derived directly from United States motorcycle board track (motordrome) racing in the early 1900s, the very first carnival motordrome appeared at Coney Island amusement park (New York) in 1911. The following year portable tracks began to appear on travelling carnivals. By 1915 the first "velodromes" with vertical walls appeared and were soon dubbed the "Wall of Death".

The audience views from the top of the drum, looking down. The riders start at the bottom of the drum, in the centre, and ascend an initial ramped section until they gain enough speed to drive perpendicular to the floor, usually in a counter-clockwise direction. This act also became popular in the United Kingdom adn elswhere throught the Europe and Asia, and often is seen at fairs. In the 2000s, there remain only a few touring walls of death. A similar act called the "Globe of Death" has the riders looping inside a wire mesh sphere rather than a drum. This form of motorcycle entertainment had a separate and distinct evolution from carnival motordromes and derived from bicycle acts or "cycle whirls" in the early 1900s.