Facility&Operations |
Mike Hebrard
Transitioning infield skin from turf to dirt and back
with a grass infield. This wouldn't typically be the norm for competitive fast pitch softball where one bad hop or errant throw could mean the outcome of the game.
F With Little League International getting
more involved with the Portland venue it was requested that the Main and East infields be skinned for the week-long tournament held in mid-August. Since most of the league play during the season for District 4 involves both boys baseball and girls softball the infields are left as grass, the mound circle is measured at 40-feet with an 8-foot radius, and the base- ball pitching rubber is at the back at 46 feet. Twice the infield of the Main Stadium Field was stripped, regraded and big roll sodded with play 7 days later.
32 SportsTurf | February 2012 There are typically 10-14 days before the
World Series starts after the last District Tournament for the host team to qualify. Then the preparation begins for the fields for
ROM THE TIME the Little League Softball World Series Major Division moved from Kalamazoo, MI to Portland, OR in 1992 the tournament has been played on conventional 60-foot bases
live television coverage by ESPN 2 for the semifinals and finals. Aeration, slice seeding, topdressing and fertilizing starts the day following the last tournament game, which can pose challenges to achieve great results before the tourna- ment starts. However the field gets bet- ter every day and, interestingly, looks its best about 2 weeks after everything is over. The decision to go with a skin in- field not only frees up some renovation time, but gets the field ready for tradi- tional softball play. On the first available day the sprin- kler heads are marked and the two in front of the shortstop and second base positions are measured and capped. Then the infield grass is sod-cut at about 1 inch and quickly removed by a
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The tartan pattern was originally done for the opening ceremonies and only after the acceptance from the tour- nament director, Bob Hudlow, and ESPN 2 was it decided to repeat the pattern for the championship game.
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