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Field conditions at Ohio Stadium

Dispatch

OHIO STADIUM
Out with old sod, in with the new
University considers switch to artificial surface after season
Tuesday, September 26, 2006
Tim May
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH
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By late afternoon yesterday, a couple of new strips of sod were in place down the middle of the Ohio Stadium floor, which by late afternoon today once again could be a lush playing field suitable for the top-ranked team in the country.
"Our desire is to give the Buckeyes the best field possible," said Don Patko, OSU assistant athletic director for facilities management.
That?s why athletic department officials opted to have the deteriorating, 3-year-old playing surface scraped off Sunday, the day after the Buckeyes? 28-6 win over Penn State. They had 13 days before the next home game, and in this age of near-instant lawns, athletic facilities enjoy the same type of speedy makeovers.
Patko picked out a 70,000-square-foot patch of bluegrass at the Cygnet Turf farm near Bowling Green, Ohio. The Motz Group turf-installation company of Cincinnati was hired to remove the old field, which was taken to a disposal site, and install the new. The process will cost between $75,000 and $100,000.
The new grass will be laid in strips about 4 feet wide by 30 feet long. With a 2-inch base of soil, the strips? weight will help hold them in place, making the field playable almost as soon as the last strip rolls out.
That will get the Buckeyes through the season. Afterward, athletic department officials will debate whether to stick with grass or move to one of the new-generation artificial surfaces in use by five other Big Ten schools, including Michigan. The OSU football team currently has two such surfaces on practice fields ? one inside, one outside.
"I think if you have an extraordinary grass surface and it?s as fast as it can be, it is probably the best situation," OSU coach Jim Tressel said. "How long you can keep it that way is what we?ve been fighting over the last six or seven years."
The new generation of infill artificial surfaces ? grasslike fibers supported by a layer of rubber granules and/or sand ? have an initial cost of $500,000 to $600,000 installed, Patko said. No mowing, fertilizing or watering is needed, only an occasional washing, raking or sweeping.
A recently published study by Penn State researchers found that "the infill systems are softer, less abrasive and generally exhibit better traction qualities than traditional AstroTurf. They maintained these qualities after 180-plus games of simulated traffic. The Gmax (pounding on the feet and legs of athletes) and traction values obtained from the synthetic surfaces are very comparable and in some cases more desirable than those measured on a similarly worn natural turf-grass area."
"Those fields have an eightyear warranty, usually," Patko said. "You never know what you?re going to have in year eight because it?s still a relatively new product, but it?s a consistent footing throughout the year, and that?s what is most important."
With Ohio State making a push to host the state high school football championship games in the future, an artificial surface also would help with the bid, Patko said.
"If it?s synthetic, you give them a good surface," he said. "We?ll put in whatever the athletic department wants. Obviously, everyone knows that grass is only as good as the weather."
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The Motz Group turf-installation company of Cincinnati was hired to remove the old field, which was taken to a disposal site, and install the new. The process will cost between $75,000 and $100,000.

What a waste. It pisses me off to think that we have to spend $75-100,000 for replacement grass when we could have had Reggie Bush for the exact same cost. Bullshit if you ask me.
 
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Folanator;618267; said:
What a waste. It pisses me off to think that we have to spend $75-100,000 for replacement grass when we could have had Reggie Bush for the exact same cost. Bullshit if you ask me.
Don't be silly, ask anyone in the country ... everybody knows that we're already over the cap with the players we've got as it is. :wink2:
 
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RCollett;618349; said:
I see they did Foxboro as well. I don't know if that is good or bad because there field looked horrible last weekend.
I thought I heard them say there was a concert there Thursday night and the stage wasn't fully removed until Saturday morning and there was another event there within the past week (soccer game maybe).
 
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Link



Workers replace 70,000 feet of sod at Ohio Stadium
Sep. 26, 2006
CBS SportsLine.com wire reports
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[/FONT] [FONT=Arial, Helvetica] COLUMBUS, Ohio -- A third of the way through the football season, Ohio Stadium got a new playing surface on Tuesday. [/FONT]

[FONT=Arial, Helvetica] Workers laid 70,000 square feet of sod on the field, replacing a 3-year-old slab of grass that had badly deteriorated. After Saturday's 28-6 win over Penn State, the third home game of the season, there were large areas of worn and torn turf, particularly at midfield and within a few feet of the home and visitor sidelines. [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica] "The field has gone through cycles. When they first put it in, it was good for about two years and then got a little slippery, then they put it in again, and it was good for about two years, and then it got a little slippery," coach Jim Tressel said Tuesday. [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica] "Our grounds people worked as hard as you can possibly work with all the expertise you could possibly ask, but just right now it is not satisfactory." [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica] The Ohio Stadium sod was torn off on Sunday and the surface was prepared for the new sod on Monday. On Tuesday, the new grass was unrolled in strips 4 feet wide and 30 feet long. Each strip has a 2-inch base of soil, which holds it in place. [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica] The new surface is bluegrass from Cygnet Turf farm between Findlay and Bowling Green. Scraping off the old grass and laying the new field will cost between $75,000 and $100,000. [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica] The Buckeyes play at No. 13 Iowa on Saturday night. Their next home game is Oct. 7 against Bowling Green. [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica] Workers with rakes had to scratch off large piles of loose sod, dirt and grass after the No. 1-ranked Buckeyes' second home game against Cincinnati on Sept. 16. [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica] Tressel said last week that the university might consider installing artificial turf. Ohio Stadium, built in 1922, had its grass field replaced by artificial turf in 1970. After several versions of artificial turf over the years, the field was returned to natural grass in 1990. [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica] Ohio State used to host the state high school football finals when it had an artificial surface. It would like to have the state championships back, but it couldn't do it with a grass field because playing that many games over a short period would damage the turf. [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica] The games have been played in the Massillon/Canton area since 1990. All six division championships are played over a two-day span on artificial surfaces. [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica] Tressel said he liked artificial surfaces because they could stand up to heavy usage. [/FONT]
[FONT=Arial, Helvetica] "But the upside to a gorgeous golf course looking grass field is there's nothing better than a perfect grass field," he said. [/FONT]
 
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