SportsTurf

July 2013

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.

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FieldScience | By Andy McNitt, PhDmela J. Sherratt Issues and technologies used on NFL playing surfaces I 'VE HEARD IT OVER AND OVER AGAIN from those in the turf business: "If I could mow at one inch, I'd be able to have pristine looking turfgrass like in all these NFL stadiums." I politely reply that if those kinds of skills and knowledge existed anywhere, there would already be lots of smart people using them to improve these surfaces. Let's review a few facts that aren't always in our frontal lobe while we watch an NFL game from the comfort of our homes on a late November Sunday. First, it's November. It's getting seriously 18 SportsTurf | July 2013 cold now and the light levels are extremely low. Think about the effects of "winter play" on a golf course. Yes, most of the NFL's northern fields have an ethylene glycol heating system running under the sand rootzone. The heating systems provide some benefit by extending the growing season further into the fall and limiting frost development on areas that require painting; however, light is still limiting. The sun is low in the sky and the stadium seating is being placed as close to the playing surface as possible. This means very steep seats and significant shade. Yes, south facing endzones are sometimes built lower or more open but there are many fields where the sun never hits the field from the endzone through the 20 yard line in November. In the fall direct sunlight is very limiting and if the heating system is used to push the turfgrass excessively, the turf becomes severely etiolated. Also, the heating system can push moisture to the soil surface. In theory, the ideal set up for an NFL football game on a sand rootzone is to have ample moisture in the rootzone but have it a little dry in the top half inch or so. When the heating system is running during cold weather, moisture in the rootzone is vapor- www.sportsturfonline.com

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