SportsTurf provides current, practical and technical content on issues relevant to sports turf managers, including facilities managers. Most readers are athletic field managers from the professional level through parks and recreation, universities.
Issue link: http://read.dmtmag.com/i/739563
STMA IN ACTION News from the Sports Turf Managers Association 44 SportsTurf | November 2016 www.sportsturfonline.com TOOLS & EQUIPMENT N E W S F R O M E U R O P E Water efficiency accelerates in Europe daily use by the PSV team for the UEFA Champions League trainings, the pilot field was in much better shape than other years. Since the turf is stronger we are seeing less playing damage," SAYS Gert van Veller, project manager at Achterberg Bedrijven BV. Van Veller is responsible for the maintenance of many sports fields, including PSV Eindhoven, World Equestrian festival CHIO Aachen, Hippo Arena, Samorin, Slovakia, and Dutch Olympic Sports Union NOC*NSF at Sports Center Papendal. AFC AJAX AMSTERDAM The pursuit of top turf is a big challenge for professional soccer clubs. It is paramount to achieve strong and vigorous turf, especially for soccer stadiums and training facilities at Dutch premier league clubs. In addition, sustainable water and energy practices are a key factor for former UEFA Champions League Champion AFC AJAX as an innovative leader in the world of soccer. After hearing the story about better water quality from some of his colleagues, AJAX groundsman and grass specialist Martin Brummel decided to give it a try. "We have suffered from brackish surface irrigation water and high sodium content in the top layer of our training fields. Therefore, it's important to improve the quality of the water. AJAX applies the latest innovations to optimize the turf on its soccer fields and save (maintenance) costs. With Magnation, we definitely achieve more vital and stronger turf," says Brummel. SC HEERENVEEN Dutch premier league soccer club SC Heerenveen has positive experiences with Magnation water treatment. SC Heerenveen groundsman Henk Schreuder is not one to be easily convinced. Nevertheless, he also found these claims plausible enough to give this technology the benefit of the doubt to eliminate some of his toughest challenges on his stadium field. "I constantly get complaints from the players about the offensive stench on the stadium field. That's because we irrigate with ferrous well water. The hydrogen sulphide in the water creates a rotten-egg smell and turns white goal posts, nets and boarding into a dirty brown color, and also makes the field slippery due to a layer of algae on the grass," he says. After installing and measuring results, a surprisingly convinced Schreuder says, "Right after the first irrigation turn I stuck my nose literally between the grass plants. To my surprise, the smell completely disappeared! Also the field is not slippery anymore and looks more vigorous and green." Editor's note: This article was written by Piet Regnerus, European distributor for Magnation Water Technologies. Irrigation water quality has become a hot topic to the sports turfgrass industry in Europe. Elite European stadiums and arenas are always looking to one up each other in a tightly knit, competitive environment. Forward thinking and open-minded doesn't mean without a healthy dose of skepticism. The promises Magnation Water Technologies claims are huge: 20% savings on irrigation water and a greener, denser and healthier turf. Water efficiency by magnetizing irrigation water[DASH HERE]who believes that? As it turns out, more and more people are fans of this mysteriously elegant and easy-to-use technology that replaces chemicals by using physics to transform water quality. Soccer clubs PSV Eindhoven, AFC AJAX Amsterdam and SC Heerenveen have been actively implementing the magnetization technology for quite some time now. PSV EINDHOVEN It may seem obvious that water has such a big influence on plant growth, but yet water quality is easily glossed over. The management of Dutch soccer champion PSV Eindhoven decided that further research could be interesting. PSV launched a controlled trial in cooperation with Agterberg Bedrijven BV, who has been responsible for PSV field maintenance for the last 16 years. "A few weeks after installing the field with Magnation water treatment on the irrigation system, we saw significantly more vital grass plants and better root growth," says Kees Haaksman, director of Agterberg. "After 2 months of watering, there was clearly a big difference in color and density of the grass. After winter with intensive SC Heerenveen groundsman Henk Schreuder