ASBA recognizes new Certified Field Builders T HE AMERICAN...

SportsTurf 19www.stma.org

T HE AMERICAN SPORTSBUILDERS ASSOCIATIONASBA has announced thenames of the individuals most re-

cently recognized as Certified Field Builders(CFB). ASBA’s voluntary certification pro-gram allows builders of specific athletic facil-ities (currently tennis courts, running tracksand sports fields) to demonstrate proof oftheir experience, as well as their knowledgeof sports facility-specific construction.

ASBA developed the program in orderto help raise professional standards and im-prove the practice of sports facility con-struction. The CFB designationencompasses both natural grass and syn-thetic turf fields; however, an individualmay choose to specialize and become eithera CFB-N (the designation for those special-izing in natural grass fields) or CFB-S (forthose specializing in synthetic turf ).

To become a certified builder, an indi-vidual must meet specific criteria set forthby ASBA; he or she must complete an ap-plication that shows proof of a set amountof experience in the chosen type of sportsfacility, and then pass a comprehensive

exam on construction and maintenance. Inorder to maintain the designation, an indi-vidual must recertify every 3 years by docu-menting a sufficient level of continuingeducation activities in the relevant field orby passing the examination again. ■

Facility&Operations

ASBA recognizes new Certified Field Builders

The following individuals recently completed all requirements tobecome Certified Field Builders:

Derek Delmonico, CFB (R.A.D. Sports, Rockland, MA)Mark Heinlein, CFB (The Motz Group, Cincinnati, OH)Jason Hester, CFB (Sports Turf Company, Inc., Whitesburg, GA)Jonathan Holland, CFB (Precision Turf, LLC, Buford, GA)John McSweeney, CFB-S (AstroTurf, Trenton, MI)Aaron McWhorter, CFB (Sports Turf Company, Inc., Whitesburg, GA)John Plaia, CFB (Hellas Construction, Inc., Austin, TX)Christopher Polk, CFB, CTB (Hellas Construction, Inc., Austin, TX)Matt Schnitzler, CFB, CTB (Hellas Construction, Austin, TX)Craig Shonk, CFB- S (AstroTurf, Grain Valley, MO)Joseph Williamson, CFB (Sports Turf Company, Inc., Whitesburg, GA)

20 SportsTurf | June 2011 www.sportsturfonline.com

Facility&Operations | By Tom Serensits

WHEN WALKINGACROSS A SYNTHETIC TURFFIELD on a sunny sum-mer day, it does not take

long to notice the heat emanating from thesurface. While synthetic turf has undergonedesign changes that have improved overallfield conditions, the issue of high surfacetemperature remains. Should I irrigate myfield to cool it off? Do alternatives to blackcrumb rubber infill really lower surface tem-perature as they claim? At Penn State’s Cen-ter for Sports Surface Research, our studiesare beginning to answer these questions.

Before we get into the results of our test-ing, it is useful to have an understanding ofwhen and why these surfaces get hot. Sur-face temperatures reach their peak duringbright, clear sunny days with little humidityand haze. The temperature of a field on an82° F clear, sunny day will be higher than ona hazy, humid day with an air temperaturein the 90’s.

How hot can synthetic turf really get? Thehighest recorded temperature was 200° F dur-ing a summer day on the campus of BrighamYoung University in Provo, UT. While thismay be an extreme case, it is not uncommonfor temperatures to surpass 150° F. In fact,during Penn State’s Turfgrass Field Days thispast summer, we recorded temperatures ashigh as 175° F on our research plots. For acomparison, natural turf rarely reaches 100°F, even on the hottest, clearest days.

Irrigation is the most common methodused to try to reduce the surface temperatureof synthetic fields. Pumping water onto syn-thetic turf may garner some odd looks, butthe application of water can rapidly cool thesurface of the field. The problem is thatcooling effect is short-lived. Our researchshows temperatures quickly rebound 20minutes after irrigation stops and the irri-gated surface is only slightly cooler than anon-irrigated surface three hours after water-ing (less than 10 degree difference). Anotherissue with irrigation is the potential for in-creased humidity directly above the turf ’ssurface. Rising temperatures coupled withhigh humidity may expose athletes to evenmore heat stress.

The reason we have not been successfulin significantly reducing the temperature ofthese surfaces through irrigation is that thesesystems have been designed to rapidly drainwater. They simply do not hold onto muchwater and thus the evaporative cooling isshort-lived. We have attempted to increasewater holding capacity of the systems andthus increase the duration of the cooling ef-fect by adding water-holding particles to thecrumb rubber infill.

In our testing, we mixed a substantialamount of calcined clay with crumb rubber(1 to 1 on a volume basis). While successfulin prolonging the duration of cooling ini-tially, the calcined clay particles were re-duced to dust when subjected to simulatedfield use. Not surprisingly, the cooling effect

was lost as the particles broke down. Addi-tionally, such a high amount of calcinedclay may affect the playability of the fieldand the dust could impact drainage, al-though this was not measured in ourstudy.

Although it is common to blame thesunlight’s interaction with the blackcrumb rubber for the hot surface, thefibers also significantly contribute to afield’s temperature. Anyone who has spenttime working with traditional (non-in-filled) Astroturf-type surfaces can tell youthat those fields also got extremely hotand they do not contain any crumb rub-ber. In fact, results from our research plotsshow that the surface temperature of tra-ditional Astroturf is higher than infilledsynthetic turf when no irrigation is ap-plied.

Surface temperature reduction has beenattempted through modifications to boththe infill material and changes in the fiber.Marketers of crumb rubber infill alterna-tives claim their products reduce surfacetemperature. Some have proposed chang-

Is there any way tocool synthetic turf?

>> Figure 1. INFILLS TESTED included (left toright) Ecofill, TPE, green crumb rubber, tancrumb rubber, and black crumb rubber.

>> Figure 2. EXPERIMENTAL SETUP to evalu-ate surface temperature of synthetic turf.


ing the color of traditional crumb rubberparticles as a cooling technique. Certain turffibers are even claimed to contain technol-ogy that significantly reduces surface tem-perature. Unfortunately, independentresearch supporting the claims of theseproducts has been lacking and unavailableto consumers.

At the Center for Sports Surface Re-search, we conducted a series of experi-ments to evaluate the effects of varyingthese components on surface temperature.Surface temperatures of infill materials andfibers were tested independently and as asystem (infill installed into carpet). A vari-ety of infill materials including various col-ors of crumb rubber, Ecofill (polyolefingranules), and TPE were evaluated (Fig 1).For the fibers, we recorded the temperatureof white, gold, silver, black, and green(FieldTurf Duraspine, FieldTurf Revolu-tion, and AstroTurf AstroFlect) fibers. Thecombined turf system test included a totalof 11 fiber-infill combinations. We con-

ducted our tests indoors using a 250-wattinfrared heat lamp (Fig 2) that has beencorrelated to sunny outdoor conditions atPenn State.

Our study indicates that none of thefiber-infill combinations tested measured

substantially lower in surface temperatethan the standard green fibers and blackcrumb rubber infill systems (Table 1). Wedid find certain combinations of infill typeand fiber can lower the surface temperatureslightly. In the fiber test, it’s not surprising

Fiber Color Infill Surface Temperature (F)Gold Black Rubber 171.1 a†White Black Rubber 170.4 abSilver Black Rubber 169.2 abBlack Black Rubber 169.2 abGreen Ecofill 167.3 abcGreen (FieldTurf Revolution) Black Rubber 165.6 abcdGreen Black Rubber 165.5 abcdGreen Green Rubber 163.8 bcdeGreen Tan Rubber 161.1 cdeGreen TPE 160.5 deGreen (AstroFlect) Black Rubber 158.9 e

All fibers were FieldTurf Duraspine Pro unless otherwise noted†Temperatures that do not share the same letter are significantly (statistically) different

Table 1.Surface temperatures of various fiber-infill combinations after 3 hours under heat lamp.

that the darkest colors produced the hottest surfaces (Table 2).White fibers were the coolest, resulting in a surface temperature ap-proximately 10 degrees cooler than green fibers. When comparingthe three green fibers, both FieldTurf fibers (Duraspine Pro andRevolution) and AstroTurf ’s AstroFlect did not statistically differfrom one another.

In the infill material comparison, the color of crumb rubberproved to have little or no effect on surface temperature (Table 3).Green rubber was marginally cooler (less than 10 degrees) thanboth black and tan rubber, but was still nearly 150° F. Both Ecofill

(141.6° F) and TPE (136.4°) were cooler than all crumb rubber col-ors (black: 156.0° F, tan: 153.4° F, green: 147.9° F).

While it is valuable to examine the influence of synthetic turfcomponents on surface temperature individually, what really mat-ters is the effects of these components after they are combined inturf systems. In our study, any effect of fiber color was essentiallynegated with the addition of black crumb rubber infill (Table 1).It did not matter whether the fibers were white or black—surfacetemperature was essentially the same for any fiber color tested. As-troTurf ’s AstroFlect was not statistically different from FieldTurfDuraspine Pro fibers (green) that contained either TPE, greenrubber, or tan rubber, even though it trended about four degreescooler.

NO MAGIC BULLETWhat do these results tell us? As of right now, it is obvious that

there is no “magic bullet” available to dramatically lower the surfacetemperature of synthetic turf. Reductions of five or even ten de-grees offer little comfort when temperatures can still exceed 150° F.Until temperatures can be reduced by at least 20-30 degrees for anextended period of time, surface temperature will remain a majorissue on synthetic turf fields.

We will continue to investigate methods to cool these systems.You can follow our work on our website (http://ssrc.psu.edu),“Liking” us on Facebook (Penn State’s Center for Sports SurfaceResearch), following us on twitter (@PSUsportsturf ) and onwww.stma.org. We have also introduced a free video series on ourwebsite called the “Sportsturf Scoop.” Topics related to both natu-ral grass and synthetic turf (including a video on surface tempera-ture of synthetic turf ) are available and new topics are addedregularly. ■

Tom Serensits is manager of Penn State’s Sports Surface ResearchCenter.


Facility&Operations

Infill Surface Temperature (F)Black Rubber 156.0 a†Tan Rubber 153.4 aGreen Rubber 147.9 bEcofill 141.6 cTPE 136.4 d †Temperatures that do not share the same letter are signifi-cantly (statistically) different

Fiber Color Surface Temperature (F)Silver 149.4 a†Black 144.3 bGreen (FieldTurf Duraspine Pro) 140.5 bcGold 139.8 bcGreen (FieldTurf Revolution) 138.6 cGreen (Astroflect) 137.9 cWhite 128.7 d

All fibers were FieldTurf Duraspine Pro unless otherwise noted†Temperatures that do not share the same letter are significantly(statistically) different

Table 2. Surface temperatures of various fibers after 1 hour under heat lamp

Table 3.Surface temperatures of various infill after 1 hour under heat lamp

Reductions of five or even tendegrees offer little comfort whentemperatures can still exceed 150° F.

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URT STRETCH, parks man-ager for the Mattoon (IL)Parks District, reports he ismowing less and saving moneyon water and fertilizer since

sodding some of his baseball and softballfields with zoysiagrass.

“There is less maintenance involvedwith the zoysia; less water and fertilizer,and less mowing,” Stretch says. “And itholds up in the heat of this region; in fact,it thrives on heat and sunshine. In mid-June and July when bluegrass and fescueare taking a beating, the zoysia takes off.

“This year, with all the rain and coolweather we’ve had it’s a bit behind butEastern Illinois University and the Univer-sity of Illinois played on it in mid-Aprilwhen it was still dormant and they loved itsshortness and softness, despite it being onlyhalfway green,” Stretch says. “It wasn’t to-tally green until May 1. Those two teamshave played here the past few years and sayit makes for a true and fast infield.”

Stretch and his father both have the grassat their homes and he says his friend, RonMaxwell, owns a golf course in the area thatuses zoysiagrass so he knew what he was get-ting when he decided to use Zenith sod onsome of the district’s baseball and softballfields. “I have one field where half the out-field is bluegrass and half is zoysiagrass,” he

says, “and we mow the bluegrass every 3days while I’ve mowed the zoysia only twicesince April [we spoke May 14]. And I knewit would hold up to the heat.”

The district has 15 ball diamonds andStretch reports his water bill has been cutsubstantially since he began using zoysia-grass. “Our water bill went from $6,000 to$800, which is considerable and I’m able tospend that money elsewhere. Water doeshelp the zoysia but it doesn’t need it withits 15-inch roots.

“And in August we only have to mow itevery 10-12 days.”

Stretch also reports he can keep thezoysia at ¾-inch height of cut and alsoneeds only to spray a low dose of Roundupon the still-dormant zoysiagrass in thespring to kill any emerging weeds. “I also

apply some ROOTS turf food twice a yearand add in a little bit of nitrogen,” he says.

He says he did use zoysiagrass seed onone Little League outfield and it took untilthe 3rd year before it really took off ingrowth. It is hard to grow it from seed be-cause you have to patient while it estab-lishes. “In the infields I’ve used it though itis the opposite of other grasses; I put seeddown in June and July and those little seedsthrive in the heat.”

Stretch says he has not had any thatchor disease problems with the grass but thathe does use a power edger about once aweek. “We go a bit deeper because it willgrow out but using the power edger willkeep it straight and there’s no encroach-ment.” ■

Facility&Operations | By Eric Schroder

Illinois parks manager saving money& water with zoysiagrass

C>> CURT STRETCH, parks manager in Mattoon,IL says his zoysiagrass loves the heat and sun-shine.

SportsTurf 23


in place on your property? We are allstewards of the land. Signage is one ofthe most important tools we can useto educate and teach the general pub-lic about our environmental steward-ship.

Today, we have to listen to what thepublic is saying. For St. Mary’s Collegeof Maryland, it’s the students that mat-ter and how we conduct our day-to-daybusiness, including our Sports TurfgrassMaintenance program. We use aBermuda hybrid cultivar (Riviera) thatcan withstand the transition zone pun-ishment and heavy-use field play. We callour sports fields “green spaces” and pointout all the beneficial factors they possess.

A list below highlights signage oppor-tunities for the environmentally friendlypractices you might already have in place,from storm water management to recy-cling. Teaching the public is not only good

for your image, but it also serves as a 7-dayper week outdoor classroom for the environ-ment.

PARKING LOT AREASLarge common lawn areas around park-

ing areas that are not being used or serve asany function for your facility can be con-verted to meadows or naturalized areas. In-stalling blue bird boxes and selectiveperennial plants can turn this into a wildlifesanctuary. Signage can have wording forwildlife, storm water management and re-ducing carbon footprints.

Non-pervious parking lot surfacesequipped with rain gardens are an excellentoutreach and education tool for stormwater runoff prevention. Signage can havewording for different types of native peren-nial plants that absorb storm water runoff.Based on the square footage of your parkingarea, you can average how many gallons ofstorm water runoff you’re filtering from oneinch of rainfall. You could document allwildlife that makes the area its home.

IHAD A CONVERSATION withDr. Dave Minner and my wife, Sally,over dinner at the STMA AwardsBanquet in Austin last winter about

how the general public perceives sportsturf managers and how at times they seemto misconstrue the work we do. They seemto think we have a blatant disregard forprotecting our natural resources, when thetruth is, we preserve it every day.

I wonder why the general public is somisinformed about the work we do day inand day out. The truth of the matter issimple; when we are spraying pesticides orapplying fertilizers we may appear as out-laws to our environment, but what do wedo to showcase our environmentally

friendly stewardship practices? The answerto the question is a loaded one by far;however, the truth of the matter boilsdown to this: it might be our own fault.

We all have signage to lead the generalpublic to parking areas, restrooms, conces-sions stands, gift shops, etc., but howmuch thought is given to educating thegeneral public about environmental stew-ardship practices you might already have

Using signage to educatethe public about yourenvironmental stewardship

Facility&Operations

By Kevin Mercer

You do not need multiple signs; onesign can sum your entire environmentalprogram in a bullet-point format.

If you have asphalt or concrete parkinglots, plant several large canopy trees withinthe parking lot island for shade. Signagecan have wording about providing shadingfor a cooling effect for hot impervious sur-faces from the sun’s radiation.

You do not need multiple signs; one signcan sum your entire environmental pro-gram in a bullet-point format.

PRACTICE FIELD AREAS:• Unused lawn areas that serve no pur-

pose around your practice facilities can beturned into a forestation.

• Install buffer strips off all four sides ofthe field for slowing down sheet watermovement.

• Catalog all the native plants from yourmeadows and show them through signagethroughout your practice facility.

• Document any nesting or residentialwildlife and showcase through signage.

• Highlight and bring attention to anylarge trees that might be the largest on staterecord.

• Show through signage your organicfertilizer program.

• Show how many pounds or gallons ofpesticides you have eliminated.

• Show through signage if you’re usingVOC-free marking paints.

• Show through signage if you’re usingdisease- and pest-resistant turfgrass.

You do not need multiple signs; one signcan sum your entire environmental pro-gram in bullet point format.

STADIUM FIELD/PRACTICE ANDINTRAMURAL FIELDS

Dr. Keith Karnok, Dr. Gil Landry, andTimothy R. Murphy from the University ofGeorgia, and Dr. Bert McCarty fromClemson University, wrote a piece on theenvironmental benefits of turfgrass for theSports Turfgrass Management Course Cer-tificate Program that I would to like elabo-rate on a little. I would highly recommendthis course!

Air Purification. Healthy turfgrass andmoderated field conditions can have be-tween 40 million and 10 billion turfgrassshoots for a standard football, soccer orlacrosse field. The turfgrass shoots are verygood at trapping dust, dirt and other pollu-

tants that can be potentially harmful forhuman health. Hundreds of pounds of sul-fur dioxide can be absorbed throughout theyear, helping to reduce levels of ozone, hy-drogen fluoride and peroxylacetyl nitrate(PAN) to promote cleaner air. In fact, some

species of turfgrass are known to absorb car-bon monoxide. Turfgrass can aid in filteringhuge amounts of air pollutants found inurban areas from homes, cars and factories.

Global Warming’s Arch Enemy. Turfgrassrequires and absorbs carbon dioxide and



Facility&Operations

acts as an oxygen converter. This combatsand fights greenhouse gasses and hopefullysuppresses global warming. Turfgrass andtrees along interstate highways produceenough oxygen for millions of people.

Erosion Control. Turfgrass acts as a supe-rior control mechanism for erosion. Turf-grass has a superior root structure systemthat is ideal for eliminating soil erosion.Preventing soil erosion helps to eliminatesilt and phosphorus matter from leachinginto our local watershed and stabilizedshorelines. Turfgrass also reduces stormwater runoff much better than other vegeta-tion.

OTHER BENEFITS TO PROMOTE Turfgrass helps to filter rain and storm

water runoff for underground aquifers. Theheavy root masses and soil microbes act as afilter to capture and break down differenttypes of pollutants. Case studies from Cor-nell University have shown that properlyfertilized healthy turfgrass is one of the bestprotections against the possibility of nitro-gen leaching into your local watershed.There is another study that proves turfgrassacts as a superior filter for as storm waterrunoff. Remember, however, that certainturfgrass cultivars that are mowed once ayear control and absorb much more storm

water runoff then short-mowed turfgrasswithin ditch lines or culverts.

Turfgrass is one of nature best groundcovers for reducing solar radiation from thesun. Each individual blade of turfgrass actsas an evaporative cooler. The cooling effectin turfgrass comes from evaporation andtranspiration: one acre of turfgrass can loseabout 2,400 gallon of water. This evapora-tive cooling dissipates approximately 50%of the accumulated heat.

Other benefits include: fire prevention,allergy control, glare reduction, pest controland noise abatement.

You do not need multiple signs; one signcan sum your entire environmental pro-gram in bullet point format.

WILDLIFE HABITATS Meadows/naturalized areas can provide

habitat for many different types of wildlife.Show through signage how you are protect-ing the local ecological system.

Getting started

FOR MORE INFORMATION to become better environmentalstewards contact Jim Sluiter, staff ecologist at Audubon Inter-national, [email protected]. Remember, en-vironmental stewardship is not a fad but rather our socialresponsibility. So many sports turfgrass managers have al-ready shown support and shared ideas for new ways of re-thinking grounds maintenance programs withoutre-inventing the wheel. We have to be a team to make a dif-ference to clean our local watershed and reduce our carbon

dioxide for greenhouse gasses. Everything we do to preventstorm water runoff and to reduce our carbon footprint adds-up. We are the leaders who care about tomorrow’s sport turfmanagers. I remember how many golf course superintend-ents mentored me along the way on my turf managementpath. I still use some of the old-school concepts that I learnedfrom those guys. In my humble opinion, I think this is a greatway to give back and help the new generation of sports turfmanagers.-Kevin Mercer


You might have rain gardens, butterfly gardens and healinggardens, which are a new concept for college grounds. These areexcellent areas for signage of wildlife inventory.

Trees hold nests of many types of bird species. Have a surveydone from a professional nesting bird consultant. Show throughsignage how you are protecting sustainable grounds solutions.Some property might have bird and bat housing throughout theirproperty. Inform the public through signage how certain types ofbirds and bats can eat several types of pest insects, providing ameans of natural pest reduction.

You do not need multiple signs; one sign can sum your en-tire environmental program in bullet point format.

RECYCLING• Trash is the most common term that the general public as-

sociates with recycling. Set company goals per year for a certainamount of recyclables tonnage for your complex and show yournumbers to the public through signage and press releases.

• Yard Waste: Inform the public if you compost and showthrough wording how many yards you generate and apply foryour lawns at your complex per year to improve soil organics.

• Storm Water: Inform the public if you have rain barrels in-stalled on your downspouts for your complex. Show throughsignage how your company eliminates the use of portable waterfor irrigation for herbaceous plant watering.

• Food Waste: Vermin composting is becoming verypopular to eliminate food waste and turn into organic soilamendment. Show through signage how many tons of foodwaste per year you recycle back into soil organics for your bedsand lawns.

Signage can be very expensive; however, it’s worth everypenny for outreach and educational purposes, to tell the publicabout your company’s environmental stewardship. Keep all en-vironmental signage uniform in shape and color so people canassociate it from a distance and identify it as a symbol for posi-tive environmental influence for your property. If a picture canbe worth a thousand words, why not advertise it to speak to amillion?

When preparing your green space/sports turfgrass field, takea look around your parking lots, fields and shop areas to seehow you can improve your storm water management and re-duce your carbon footprint. It’s a packaged deal; we just can’tdo one or two things well. We should try to do as much as wecan to the best of our abilities if time and cost allows.

My good friend Jim Sluiter has been there for me since thestart of my environmental journey, always offering great adviceand encouragement. His dedication to protect wildlife sanctuar-ies and balance the aesthetics of turfgrass is a difficult combina-tion; however, once done, it can promote excellent recognitionfor your institution through a program that can work foryou. ■

Kevin Mercer is superintendent of grounds at Saint Mary’s Col-lege of Maryland.


Facility&Operations

By Clayton Hubbs

FOR THE FIRST TIME IN 60YEARS, college baseball’s“Road to Omaha” will endsomewhere other than historicRosenblatt Stadium. Just down

the road, the state-of-the-art TD AmeritradePark will be the new home to the NCAACollege World Series (CWS). Much hasbeen said about the great atmosphere andtradition that will be lost with the closing ofRosenblatt, but Omaha officials and the

NCAA insist that the CWS is gaining muchmore with the construction of the new sta-dium.

The CWS was first played in Omaha in1950 and is one of college baseball’s longestrunning traditions. Named after belovedOmaha Mayor Johnny Rosenblatt, buildingRosenblatt stadium and keeping the CWSin Omaha became a labor of love throughthe first 10 unprofitable years. Through thestruggle, Rosenblatt Stadium grew to be-

come a central piece of not only CWS his-tory, but the Omaha community andeconomy as well.

Almost 60 years after Omaha struggledto keep the CWS, the city was placed in afamiliar position with pressure from theNCAA to build a new stadium or poten-tially lose the CWS. In another labor oflove, then-mayor Mike Fahey proposedbuilding a new stadium in downtownOmaha. With such a tough act to follow,The Metropolitan Entertainment & Con-vention Authority (MECA), enlisted thehelp of designers HDR Architects, Popu-lous and DLR, and together with generalcontractor Kiewit Construction, set out toproduce a world-class, LEED (Leadershipin Energy and Environmental Design)Certified stadium. Even with the $131million investment, the new TD Ameri-trade Park has very large shoes to fill. Thenew stadium is expected to not only createnew Rosenblatt-esque memories for fansand players, but must also kickoff whatBaseball America calls the “new era of col-lege baseball” for the NCAA.

CATCH AND RELEASEPerhaps the least talked about feature

of the new stadium may be its most im-pressive. With such high expectationslooming, the new playing surface goesabove and beyond the traditional ballfield, providing a high-tech solution forthe stadium’s regulatory concerns and con-tributing large cost savings to the project.

Clayton Hubbs is a former groundskeeper for the Arizona Diamondbacks and Director ofOperations for Stabilizer Solutions, Inc

>> TD AMERITRADE PARK will be the newhome to the NCAA College World Series

...the field and drainagesystem balance the needto perform at a highlyscrutinized collegiatelevel with the site’sunique restrictions.

New home for CollegeWorld Series handleswater problems

www.stma.org

Designed by Dan Almond of Millennium Sports Technologies,Inc., the field and drainage system balance the need to perform ata highly scrutinized collegiate level with the sites unique restric-tions. Being situated along the Missouri River, flooding is a majorconcern. Because of this, restrictions are placed on the amount ofwater that can be released off the site, water that potentially couldaid in raising the river level during a rain event. While in a plan-ning meeting, Almond discovered that to meet the site’s historicrelease rate requirement, the architects and engineers planned touse large storage tanks under the parking lot to hold hundreds ofthousands of gallons of water. After learning of their plans, Al-mond suggested that he could design a drainage system thatwould allow them to store the required 7.5 inches of rain under-neath the field, cutting tremendous tank and labor expenses, andbringing the field into the spotlight for the rest of the designteam.

According to Almond, the drainage system construction beganwith the mainline piping, which runs like a spine from underhomeplate and discharges the water into a large vault/water sepa-rator under center field. Additional perforated drain lines runfrom the mainline in a perpendicular pattern. Almond had thelines placed in stone-filled trenches, as he is sure the water willfind its way to the trench as a backup, should something happento the drain line.

Next a layer of precisely selected ¼ to ⅜-inch gravel was placedfollowing the slope of the drain lines. The gravel selection is criti-cal to achieve the desired porosity that many of Almond’s calcula-tions hinge upon. This layer can be between 4 to 30 inches deep,increasing in depth closer to the main collector drain line dis-charge point.

Then a 10-inch sand rootzone was placed over the gravel layer.The sand is slightly coarser than a USGA specification and wasblended with 8% peat. When asked if the gravel and sand inter-face was tested, Almond laughed and said, “You could say that. Idon’t leave anything to chance; we use independent testing labora-tories and we test everything, and retest and retest.” The tests(and retests) were conducted to achieve the right sand particle sizeneeded to bridge correctly with the gravel, important in prevent-ing migration of the sand into the gravel layer below.

Finally, the surface was sodded with a Kentucky bluegrassblend from Graff ’s Turf Farms of Fort Morgan, CO. Almond sayswith this design, beyond the underground water storage capabili-ties, the surface is able to move water through at an extremelyhigh rate of 5-6 inches per hour.

TRUSTED TECHNOLOGYAs is his practice, Almond uses technology that he has prior ex-

perience with to deliver greater value to his clients. With almost10,000 linear feet of piping in the ground, Almond wanted tocapitalize on the large investment and use the drainage pipes forother purposes. A SubAir system was installed to help evacuatewater more quickly through the rootzone and to promote betterturf growth. The system’s main function will be to provide oxygento the root structure, but it is also fitted with natural gas injectors

SportsTurf 29


Facility&Operations

that can be used to warm and extend thelife of the field in the Fall, or speed up dor-mancy in the Spring.

Almond recounts another side benefit ofthe SubAir system. “I remember watchingBill Deacon, head groundskeeper for theNew York Mets, use the SubAir system atCiti Field to literally lift thetarp off of the ground andmove the water after a heavyrain. Those tarps can get re-ally heavy when covered withwater and this is a great wayto help.”

Almond noted, “This is atough downtown locationwith poor (air) circulation,bad weather and lots of rain.”

Because of the unique site requirements,careful attention was paid to the infield,warning track and mound clay material se-lection. For the infield mix, Almond collab-orated with Stabilizer Solutions, Inc., a soiltechnology company, to help design andsource a regional stabilized infield mix for

TD Ameritrade Park. The re-sulting “Pro Red” mix is a se-lected blend of 40% silt andclay content, with a silt-to-clay ratio (SCR) near 1, andthe remainder composed ofsand particles derived from acrushed and screened aggre-gate.

The mix contains the Sta-bilizer organic amendment to

maintain moisture levels longer, while keep-ing the playing surface stable during rainevents. The company relied on a localdealer, Golf and Sport Solutions of La Salle,CO, to meet its strict specifications andblending procedures to produce this mixcloser to Omaha.

The infield mix was designed with a0.75% slope to aid in surface drainage. Al-mond chose to use a crushed volcanic rockfor the warning track because of its appear-ance and crunchy feel, and to use the Stabi-lizer because it really knocks the dust downand holds moisture. The warning track wasdesigned with a 1.25-1.5 percent slope incertain areas. The mound was designed tobe portable, because of additional field usesuch as concerts, football and soccer games.

The site wasa former railroad

yard withexisting soil

that was verycompacted andcontaminatedwith debris...


Almond admits that construction wasnot easy. The site was a former railroad yardwith existing soil that was very compactedand contaminated with debris, making itdifficult to trench and install the 10,000linear feet of piping. Further complicatingconstruction was the fact that this was anOmaha Superfund site, meaning that theexisting soil was not permitted to leave thesite. This forced playing field contractorNemaha Landscape to get creative and storeexcavated soil under the parking lot andother areas.

Because of the tight 13-week field instal-lation time table, Nemaha Landscape wasrequired to work around the stadium con-struction team. The contractor worked inthree phases to allow other trades to finishon certain areas of the field. Amazingly,field construction was finished 1 weekahead of the deadline, but as a result of theschedule, the sod was not installed untilNovember 2010. This created a new chal-lenge for Turf Manager Dan Blank to estab-lish the sod in a short time frame. “This is

still a new field, Dan was able to get thenew turf well rooted by the use of growthblankets,” said Almond. Despite the smallsetbacks, Almond believes this field willstand up to what is thrown at it. “This fieldshould get quite a bit of use, CreightonUniversity plays their home games there,and it will host football/soccer games andconcerts. I think we were able to balancethe need for field use and drainage con-cerns.”

TD Ameritrade Park opened on April19, 2011 to host Creighton University vs.the University of Nebraska, attracting22,187 fans, the largest regular season at-tendance this year in NCAA baseball.While Rosenblatt will forever be a part ofthe CWS identity, so far reviews have beenfavorable of the new stadium design. The24,000-seat stadium features 360 degreeviews of the game from the concourse. Fansand media have commented on the ease ofmovement and room on the concourse, es-pecially near the concession stands, as wellas, the extra room in the aisles compared to

Rosenblatt’s cramped quarters.The light-brown exterior brick, a high

definition video board in right field, uniquecrisscross light standards, and an eye catch-ing blue-green press box and club levelcombine to give the stadium a contempo-rary aesthetic appeal. In regards to the over-all experience, Almond said, “There was alot of interface between design disciplinesinside and outside of the stadium that im-proved the process. The client was very in-volved in the project and we were lucky tohave them trust us to use the right materialsfor them.”

With the new stadium filling so manyother needs, for Almond and the rest of thedesign team, the pressure to be like Rosen-blatt was traded for desire to make a newimprint in the Omaha community.“Mainly, the client and design team wantedthis field to have its own signature look andfeel and I think we’ve accomplished that.”The CWS will be played in Omaha for the61st time and at TD Ameritrade Park forthe very first time June 18, 2011. ■

ASBA recognizes new Certified Field Builders T HE AMERICAN...

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