Field Turf
From NCAA Wiki
Field Turf is the most popular artifical surface installed in college stadiums today.
[edit] About
Field Turf started in the sport surfacing industry in 1988 with the manufacture of NovaCourt, a synthetic grass for tennis courts and NovaTee, a synthetic surface used to minimize wear and tear around golf practice tees under the name SynTenni Co. Based on a need to replicate real grass with these installations, the company began developing synthetic turf surfaces for other sports installations including soccer, lacrosse, football and baseball. NovaTee was re-engineered as a playing surface for contact sports. Marketed under the name FieldTurf, the system replicates a natural grass surface. FieldTurf is a safe alternative, resulting in a documented reduction of sports injuries. The sand and rubber infill system is the biggest technical development that the sport surfacing industry has seen in the last twenty-five years. This patented technology sets FieldTurf apart from all other sports surfaces.
FieldTurf is dramatically different from traditional synthetic turf. The most striking difference is immediately obvious. Instead of a dense, abrasive rug, FieldTurf’s fiber surface is soft, silky - like new blades of grass in a spring meadow. Players can slide, tackle and tumble on FieldTurf’s unique blend of specially treated Polyethylene fibers without fear of abrasions. Rug burns are a thing of the past. The old hatred of “turf” - voiced so loudly by players, trainers, coaches, the media, even parents and doctors - simply vanishes, a distant memory from the rough “carpet age.”
But FieldTurf is much more than just the absence of abrasions. Unlike traditional turf, FieldTurf does not rely on an underlying shock pad for safety, resilience and player comfort. Rather, like its natural grass cousin, FieldTurf’s grass fibers are surrounded and stabilized by a special blend of “synthetic earth” - FieldTurf’s patented mixture of smooth, rounded silica sand, rubber granules, and NIKE GRIND made of re-ground athletic shoe material.
The rubber granules are a key component. Tire rubber is cryogenically frozen, shattered into smooth, clean, rounded particles, sized and shaped to stay “in suspension” with the sand, which is of a similar size, shape and weight. The sand and rubber are precision layered to guarantee uniformity, with an installation process that is also patented.
The result: A stable, resilient, uniform, shock-absorbing surface. FieldTurf is the original and only system emulating natural grass, ideal not only for athletes at the elite level but for everyday athletes.
[edit] Field Turf and the NCAA
Among the NCAA Division 1 Colleges using FieldTurf today are: Syracuse, Northwestern, Oregon, Oregon State, Kansas State, Washington, Washington State, Cincinnati, Tulsa, Utah, Michigan, Western Michigan. Nebraska, Northern Illinois, Eastern Michigan, Wake Forest, Louisiana_Tech, and Wisconsin...to name a few!
Field Turf has a strong presence in all of the major NCAA Division-1 Conferences.
Nebraska was the First school to use Field Turf. After comparing Field Turf with real grass and a couple of other synthetic turf systems, Nebraska's athletic department installed it at a practice facility in May 1999. The reaction from Husker players was so enthusiastic that the school decided to improve its stadium field a year early, and thus the Huskers took to the field for the 1999 season (an injury-free, 12-1 return to form)on Field Turf.
