sportsT'Rf ~ Playability Versus Liability By Stephen H. Guise I t's third down; the ball is snapped. As the quarterback scrambles, he spots a breakdown in his offensive line. Just as the quarterback releases the ball, a defensive lineman drills him into the turf: His head bounces offthe turflike a superball on your driveway. The crowd is hushed as he lies motionless, surrounded by the training staff. The dreaded cart appears. Before the game ends, the local hospital reports that the quarterback "just" suffered a concussion. He'll be back in the game next week. We saw this too many times this year: from simple abrasions to season- ending injuries; from Jeff George of the Atlanta Falcons to Gil Haskell, assistant coach of the Green Bay Packers, who suffered a fractured skull when two players slammed into him during a playoff game, driving his head into the hard artificial turf. It's no wonder that organizations such as the NFL Players Association (NFLP A) are taking a stand against field surfaces that they believe are shortening the professional careers of their members. The NFLPA has launched a crusade to do away with artificial turf in the NFL. Though Troy Squires, vice president of Southwest Recreation Industries, Inc., manufacturer of AstroTurf, was quoted 16 sporfsTURF Surrounded by attendees of the California Sports Turf Institute at Santa Anita Park, Dr. James Beard explains the effectiveness of Clegg Hammer measurements. Photos courtesy: Stephen Guise. in a recent article as stating that his company was getting a bum rap, many players think otherwise. When you listen to John Kerr and Clark Gaines of NFLP A, you begin to understand their players' concerns. Dar- rell Green, a cornerback for the Wash- ington Redskins, had this to say about playing on artificial turf, "The burns literally take your skin off.... Half of your arm or the sides of your calves are skinless." The Redskins' Brian Mitchell speaks of the after-effects of playing on artificial turf - the sprained ankles and aching knees and hips. The Bengals' Ki-J ana Carter missed his rookie year after tearing the anterior cruciate liga- ment in his left knee while playing on an artificial surface. There is no time in the history of sports that the construction and main- tenance of playing surfaces has been so closely scrutinized. Ralph Nader, the consumer advocate, is even involved! Add to this today's extremely active legal system and all the lawsuits flying around. Field playability and the liability factor are linked in a delicate - and costly - balancing act. Are artificial surfaces the entire reason for increased player injuries at all levels of play? In all fairness, we must realize that artificial turf is not the whole problem. Poor maintenance and construction of nat- ural turf fields also are to blame. Three NFL teams - the Chicago Bears, New England Patriots, and the Kansas City Chiefs - have pulled their rugs and installed natural turf with their own set of problems. Gauging Field Playability The playability of a field is a measure of how safe that field is and at what level of play (field consistency) that field will perform. Terms often associated with field playability are hardness and traction. A field is either too hard or too soft. Traction is either lacking or too great. The field's hardness has a direct relationship to the speed of an athlete running on its surface. Hardness is also related to the degree of potential injury the athlete will sustain ifhe or she falls or is delivered to that turf, or if the turf stops a player's forward motion without communicating it first to his or her body. Strong, fast turf does not necessarily have to be a hard surface. During my tenure at Santa Anita Park in Cali- fornia, thoroughbred horses broke track records on a turf course that was firm, without being hard. There is a difference. Firm turf is a product of sound agronomic
Transcript
sportsT'Rf ~
PlayabilityVersus
Liability
By Stephen H. Guise
It's third down; the ball is snapped. Asthe quarterback scrambles, he spotsa breakdown in his offensive line.
Just as the quarterback releases theball, a defensive lineman drills him intothe turf: His head bounces offthe turflikea superball on your driveway. The crowdis hushed as he lies motionless,surrounded by the training staff. Thedreaded cart appears. Before the gameends, the local hospital reports thatthe quarterback "just" suffered aconcussion. He'll be back in the gamenext week.
We saw this too many times thisyear: from simple abrasions to season-ending injuries; from Jeff George of theAtlanta Falcons to Gil Haskell, assistantcoach of the Green Bay Packers, whosuffered a fractured skull when twoplayers slammed into him during aplayoff game, driving his head into thehard artificial turf.
It's no wonder that organizationssuch as the NFL Players Association(NFLP A) are taking a stand againstfield surfaces that they believe areshortening the professional careers oftheir members.
The NFLPA has launched a crusadeto do away with artificial turf in theNFL. Though Troy Squires, vice presidentof Southwest Recreation Industries, Inc.,manufacturer of AstroTurf, was quoted
16 sporfsTURF
Surrounded by attendees of the California Sports Turf Institute at Santa AnitaPark, Dr. James Beard explains the effectiveness of Clegg Hammermeasurements. Photos courtesy: Stephen Guise.
in a recent article as stating that hiscompany was getting a bum rap, manyplayers think otherwise.
When you listen to John Kerr andClark Gaines of NFLP A, you begin tounderstand their players' concerns. Dar-rell Green, a cornerback for the Wash-ington Redskins, had this to say aboutplaying on artificial turf, "The burnsliterally take your skin off. ...Half ofyour arm or the sides of your calves areskinless." The Redskins' Brian Mitchellspeaks of the after-effects of playing onartificial turf - the sprained ankles andaching knees and hips. The Bengals'Ki-J ana Carter missed his rookie yearafter tearing the anterior cruciate liga-ment in his left knee while playing on anartificial surface.
There is no time in the history ofsports that the construction and main-tenance of playing surfaces has beenso closely scrutinized. Ralph Nader, theconsumer advocate, is even involved!Add to this today's extremely activelegal system and all the lawsuits flyingaround. Field playability and the liabilityfactor are linked in a delicate - andcostly - balancing act.
Are artificial surfaces the entirereason for increased player injuries at alllevels of play?
In all fairness, we must realize that
artificial turf is not the whole problem.Poor maintenance and construction ofnat-ural turf fields also are to blame. ThreeNFL teams - the Chicago Bears, NewEngland Patriots, and the Kansas CityChiefs - have pulled their rugs andinstalled natural turf with their ownset of problems.
Gauging Field PlayabilityThe playability of a field is a measure
of how safe that field is and at what levelof play (field consistency) that field willperform. Terms often associated with fieldplayability are hardness and traction.A field is either too hard or too soft.Traction is either lacking or too great.
The field's hardness has a directrelationship to the speed of an athleterunning on its surface. Hardness is alsorelated to the degree of potential injurythe athlete will sustain ifhe or she fallsor is delivered to that turf, or if theturf stops a player's forward motionwithout communicating it first to his orher body.
Strong, fast turf does not necessarilyhave to be a hard surface. During mytenure at Santa Anita Park in Cali-fornia, thoroughbred horses broke trackrecords on a turf course that was firm,without being hard. There is a difference.Firm turf is a product of sound agronomic
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principles, developing deep and denseroot systems supporting a thick,natural carpet of turfgrass biomass atthe surface.
Soils scientists have faced a dilemmain stabilizing sand fields without creatinghard, impermeable rootzones. As variousorganic or synthetic fiber materials wereadded to a sand for stability, the valu-able pore space necessary for oxygenand water infiltration was filled, resultingin compaction through increased bulk den-sities. This hard soil supported onlylimited, shallow-rooted turf, and playa-bility declined. Dr. James Beard andSam Sifers of Texas A & M Universityspent numerous years researching thissituation and seeking ways to develop nat-urally tough turf. Their work with athree dimensional system of sand/meshallowed them to achieve stability and agro-nomic benefits, with a surface theyfound could be firm without being hard.(Those interested in further informa-tion on the research ofDr. Beard and SamSifers, including a copy of "Enhancing Par-ticipant Safety in Natural Turfgrass
Don Waddington of Penn State standswith the Penn Foot for field tractiontesting.
Surfaces Including Use of InterlockingMesh Element Matrices," presented atthe November 1994 American Society ofTesting and Materials [ASTM] Sympo-sium on Safety in Football, may contactStephen Guise.)
The Clegg Impact Soil Tester (alsocalled the Clegg Impact Hammer) hadbeen used for years to measure thehardness or compaction of road bases. Thisinstrument is now accepted within thescientific community as a measure of field
hardness and is used to relate this fieldhardness to the safety of the athlete. Hard-ness standards for both natural andartificial turf fields have been researchedby the ASTM, and the Clegg Hammer hasbeen the instrument of choice due toits lightweight structure and measure-ment accuracy.
How hard is too hard? Many havestudied this issue, including not only Dr.Beard and his associates but also theSports Turf Research Institute (STRI) inBingley, England. STRI's researchfocused on soccer fields in Europe whileDr. Beard's findings were based on threeyears of research at Santa Anita Park.Despite the obvious differences in the "ath-letes," the hardness criteria are sim-ilar in the two sports.
Hardness is only half of the problemassociated with poor playability of sportsfields; traction is the other half.
Soil scientists have acceleratedtheir studies into the manipulation ofsand-particle-size distributions to increase
continued on page 18
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Playabilitycontinued from page 17
the playability of the sand rootzoneplaying fields. I caution you to leavethis technical work up to approved soillabs and soil scientists. I have seenfirsthand the failure of sports fields andturf courses when the mix of sand andsoils has been done incorrectly. Theresults can be disastrous - and costly.
Penn State's elite soils program haspublished guidelines that clearly statethe basic soil physics for properly addingloamy soil to sand fields to increase thefields' stability and agronomic effec-tiveness. The key when adding loamy soilsis to blend them with medium-to-coarsesize sands. It's when medium-to-finesize sands are blended with finer silts andclays that the results are more repre-sentative of concrete than the basis fora sports field. (Those interested in fur-ther information on this subject maywish to contact Don Waddington orAndy McNitt at Penn State for a copy ofthe research.)
The Penn State turf research team also
Santa Anita's track is firm withoutbeing hard. Firm turf results fromdeveloping deep, dense root systemscapable of supporting a thick, naturalcarpet of turfgrass biomass at thesurface.
developed for sports fields a tractiontesting apparatus commonly known asthe Penn Foot Traction Machine (orsimply as the Penn Foot).
Tests with the Clegg Hammer and thePenn Foot provide a comparative meansof gauging a field's playability in termsof hardness and traction.
Demand Proof!Many new products and companies
have entered the arena of field design andconstruction, and some old systems havebeen reworked. One must look clearly athard scientific research and data toevaluate their effectiveness. Too manyfields are being constructed and failingdue to a company not doing its homeworkand attempting its research on playingfields at the expense of the end user, theathlete. Research followed by field trialsshould be standard protocol before anyproduct is used on sports fields.
Another problem is inappropriate orshoddy construction performed by inex-perienced landscape contractors.
Demand experience of those whoare doing the critical stage of buildingyour fields.
Limiting LiabilityThose ofyou who attended the Sports
Turf Managers Association's 7th AnnualConference and Exhibition in Anaheim,CA,this past January had the opportunity
continued on page 23
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Playabilitycontinued from page 18
to hear Floyd Perry of Grounds Mainte-nance Services speak on the issue ofplayability versus liability.
Perry not only recognizes the fieldsafety issues but reminds us all thatthere are a number of procedures orsteps we must take "to avoid loss to yourorganization and formulate protectionagainst liability." It only takes one acci-dent or injury to remind us of how impor-tant it is not only to maintain a safeplaying field but to document all proce-dures and be proactive with safety audits.Within many parks and recreation depart-ments, trained personnel are assignedsolelyto the inspection, documentation andrepair of hazards in the parks.
The influx of soccer at all levelsof play in the United States has put evenmore pressure on sports turf managers andadministration executives. Increasedplay creates increased wear and damageto the fields.
It's important not to underestimatethe ability of a valid turfgrass coveron a field to increase the cushioningeffect and increase the traction availableto the athlete.
Field designs and maintenance stan-dards need to be developed to optimizethe growth and health of the grass plant.Excellent divot recovery and lateral soilstabilization are critical to heavily usedfields. As organizations and professionalassociations develop field safetystandards for field hardness, drainageand tractions, many existing fields andfield system designs will fail to meetthe new requirements. Liability suits willincrease, and facilities will find themselvespaying out large settlements if theirfields "fall below" acceptable levels ofplayabili ty.
Before you decide on who willreconstruct your fields and how it willbe done, ask yourself these questions:
• Am I creating a future liability?• Am I creating a hard surface?• Am I creating an unstable surface if
and when turf cover is lost for any reason?• Am I creating an environment
that could be detrimental to rootdevelopment and turfgrass health?
• Am I creating a "Band-Aid" solutionthat could develop into a long-termproblem. (For example, sod producedon heavy soils [silt and clay] when laidon a sand field will, over time, contaminatethe sand profile and can cause fieldfailure.)
• Am I creating a maintenancenightmare that my staff is not equippedto handle?
If the answer to any of these questionsis yes, reconsider your options. Seek outthe most up-to-date research. Request aneeds assessment by a team ofprofessionalconsultants.
The million dollar price tag associatedwith field construction today is only adrop in the bucket of the potential costsassociated with future liability.
We can provide safe playing surfacesfor our athletes and control liabilitythrough proper preparation and aproactive, diligent approach to field designand maintenance. 0
Stephen H. Guise operates a nationalsports turf management company from hisoffice in Fullerton, CA He is president-electof STMA, is an elected member of theSTMA's technical review committee, andseparately contributes to the ASTM Com-mittee on Natural Turf and ArtificialPlaying Surfaces.
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