Nothing but the Best for San Diego's team

Monday, Apr 18, 2005
By Tom Shanahan, Chargers.com

The Chargers’ first training camp at Chargers Park that opens July 26 is three months away, but Monday marked the addition of a new training camp feature. The Chargers have installed FieldTurf as their choice for an artificial turf field.

Chargers Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer Jim Steeg and FieldTurf CEO John Gilman made the announcement Monday as workers installed the field.

With the extra bodies on a football roster during training camp, it will be necessary for the Chargers to utilize an artificial turf field to prevent overuse of the two grass practice fields. FieldTurf is a new generation of artificial turf that feels more like grass to the athletes as opposed to the old generation of artificial turf fields that felt more like a carpet.

“With training camp coming to Chargers Park for the first time this year, we wanted to upgrade our facility and make sure the field could withstand the additional usage,” Steeg said. “FieldTurf has set the standard and become the norm for artificial turf fields in the NFL and around the country. Our players say it’s like playing on natural grass.”

The Chargers are now one of 21 NFL teams with FieldTurf in their stadium or their practice facility. A recent NFL Players Association survey revealed that NFL players prefer FieldTurf to the old generational artificial turf and some even prefer it to natural grass.

Chargers second-year running back Michael Turner played on FieldTurf at Northern Illinois.

“In my opinion, FieldTurf is the best surface I’ve ever played on,” Turner said. “I like it better than grass. The cuts are sharp. You don’t have to worry about the grass coming up when you make a hard plant. You get more explosive cuts on FieldTurf.”

In the NFLPA survey that ranked the 32 stadium fields, FieldTurf was ranked as high as No. 5 among the 32 fields. FieldTurf was also ranked ahead of 15 of the 19 grass fields.

The fields also rank high in safety, without the rash of knee injuries that come with the old generation of artificial turf.

“I haven’t ever heard anything bad about FieldTurf,” Turner said.

When Chargers Park opened in 1997, FieldTurf was still being developed and the old generation artificial turf was installed. Turner said when he came to the Chargers last year as a rookie, he was relieved head coach Marty Schottenheimer ran nearly all the drills on one of the two natural grass fields.

“As the (scout team) running back, I thought I might be getting cut up,” he said. “But the only time we used (the artificial field) was for conditioning, and even that can be hard on your legs.”

FieldTurf is a mix of silica sand and cryogenic rubber and a patented layering process. There are many FieldTurf fields in use around San Diego County high schools.