The latest news and views from SAPCA
Five years ago, new European Standards were introduced that replaced all existing national standards for the performance of sports surfaces. Since then, the work to develop these standards has continued and new versions will soon be published. SAPCA provides an update and examines the implications for the marketplace in the UK
European Standards for Sports Surfaces
What are the European Standards? As part of the EU’s desire to facilitate the free trade of products throughout Europe, each country’s existing national standards for sports surfaces have been through a process of harmonisation, leading to the introduction of new European Standards. In the UK, these standards replaced the existing British Stan- dard BS 7044 for multi-use sports surfaces.
How are the standards developed? The Committee European de Normalisation (CEN) is the European equivalent of the Brit- ish Standards Institution (BSI). Within CEN there are numerous technical committees, each looking after the harmonisation of stan- dards for different products: CEN TC/217 is responsible for sports surfaces.
Under this technical committee there are various working groups, each responsible for standards for different types of surface or looking at different aspects, such as test meth- ods and environmental issues.
Each country has its own shadow techni- cal committee, which co-ordinates its input into the work. In the UK it is BSI Technical Committee PRI/57. This committee is made up of experts from various stakeholder or- ganisations from across the UK sports facility marketplace; many of the committee mem- bers are from the industry, but there are also sports councils, sports governing bodies and other sports-related bodies represented
What is an ISO?
ISO stands for International Standards Organi- sation; an ISO standard has worldwide status, whereas CEN just relates to Europe.
Issue 2 2012 © cybertrek 2012
The standard for synthetic turf is split into several sections, with different requirements for hockey
To limit the huge amount of work involved,
if there is already a relevant ISO standard then CEN will simply adopt it as a European Stan- dard, rather than duplicate it.
Why do we need standards and test methods for sports surfaces? A sports surface is a complicated piece of engineering that must have the right playing characteristics for the sport. It must be safe to
use and should withstand rough treatment and remain stable for a realistic period of time. It was not long after the introduction of the first synthetic sports surfaces in the late 1960s and early 1970s that sports bodies began to recognise the need to be able to measure and specify the playing characteristics they required from the new types of surfaces.
What properties are measured? The European Standards set down agreed limits for the performance of sports surfac- es – not the method of construction – using agreed test methods. The tests can generally be split into four groups: • Ball/surface interaction: properties such as ball bounce, ball roll and pace. • Person/surface interaction: dynamic properties such as shock absorbency, sur- face deformation, energy restitution and the frictional properties of the surface as expe- rienced by the athlete or player. • Constructional aspects: properties influenced by factors during construction, such as seam strength, tensile properties (of in-situ mixed and laid polymeric ma- terials), permeability, gradients, regularity, dimensions and line markings. • Durability: how resistant a surface is to ageing through weathering, wear and tear and predictions of how the sport perfor- mance of the surface may change over its life, as a result of these influences.
How do European Standards relate to standards set by NGBs? The European Standards are aimed at recre- ational standards of play, for sports facilities
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