sports surfaces
Weathering the storm
THE Great British weather is increasingly having a devastating impact on the nation’s favourite sports - with flooding disrupting international cricket tournaments, football pitches left too waterlogged to play, and golfing greens facing widespread disease. Contractors are under greater pressure to
future-proof sports pitches and ensure playability all year round, which has spurred a new generation of sports construction materials offering enhanced drainage characteristics.
wet,wet,wet Research from the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs shows that between 1998 and 2013, total annual rainfall for the UK surpassed 1,200mm six times. The same only happened once in the 18 years leading up to that period. This trend shows no sign of changing and
nor is it restricted to the winter months. In the summer of 2017 we had 32.8 per cent more rainfall than the average summer figure, making it the 11th wettest summer on record for the UK and the fifth wettest on record in Scotland, according to the Met Office. The Lake District, Western Scotland and
North Wales are amongst the areas that experience the highest rainfall in the UK, due to their location and topography, with warm moist westerly winds driving rainfall from Atlantic weather systems. One recent study suggests certain areas of the UK experience
rainfall at 300 per cent of the national average, yet pitch design and infill materials do not reflect these variations.
product innovation All of this wet weather is having a detrimental impact on the performance qualities of synthetic sports surfaces. In some cases, we have seen surfaces which were installed as little as five years ago rendered outdated and sometimes unplayable due to changing environmental trends, made worse by poor maintenance. For club operators, it has never been more
important to specify the right sports construction materials and undertake the correct maintenance procedures in order to protect their investment. Manufacturers have responded with
continued innovation of sports construction materials including future-proof drainage solutions to ensure longevity and maximum return on investment. One area of innovation has been silica infill
sands, which serve a number of purposes including weighing down the surface, preventing rippling, increasing fire resistance, protecting the backing and, of course, drainage, by acting as a filter to regulate the flow of water through to the subgrade. ProPitch Elite, for example, is a new
generation of infill sand from Aggregate Industries’ Garside Sands and Levenseat division which offers drainage performance, specifically designed for sports pitches at risk
pactfacilities.co.uk 35
Sean Colbert, sales manager at Garside Sands, examines how the latest innovations in infill sands can help synthetic sport pitches stay high and dry whatever the weather.
of flooding. The inclusion of larger rounded particles
provides superior void space for enhanced drainage. Traditionally, silica infills like the company’s 2EW sand from offer a nominal effective particle size of between 0.25mm and 0.39mm. Whilst this is suitable in most areas, ProPitch Elite signals a new approach for areas of extreme rainfall with nominal effective particle size of between 04mm to 0.8mm. It’s also proven to drain 25 per cent faster than 2EW and 116 per cent better than the most popular competitor sands. Innovative product development like this
helps operators to overcome the challenge of increasingly wet weather and withstand the new norm of average rainfall, protecting their investment and maintaining all-important revenue from sports pitches.
www.aggregate.com
www.lafargeholcim.com
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