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The name for our planet's shape is an 'oblate spheroid', which is like a sphere squashed slightly in one direction (like if you press down on a soccer ball on the floor; Smarties are also oblate spheroids but squashed down a lot more than the earth.) If the earth didn't spin around once a day it would be a sphere since gravity has been working long enough on the planet, and it pulls all parts of the planet inwards equally so eventually it ends up mostly spherical (after some stages in the evolution of the solar system). But since it also spins, the centrifugal force is greatest around the equator, so it pulls the middle of the earth out slightly into a bulge. I may be wrong, but i think this is a characteristic common to all of the planets in the solar system, maybe barring Uranus, since its axis of rotation points towards the sun. Hope this helps ;)

From Dr Octavian.

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