Late in the third quarter of the AFC championship game on Jan. 21, with the score tied 21-21, New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady dropped back into the pocket and launched a wobbly pass to wide receiver Jabar Gaffney, who deftly leaped up at the back of the end zone and hauled it in for the score.
Patriots fans went wild, even as the opposing Indianapolis Colts were protesting, saying Mr. Gaffney was in the air when he made the catch and landed with his feet out of bounds.
Officials reviewed the play on video but ultimately ruled it a touchdown, saying Mr. Gaffney landed out only because he was pushed by the defence. But it was a tense few moments in the normally boisterous Indianapolis RCA Dome as the go-ahead score hung on the edge of a thin white line.
If Mark Nicholls, president and chief executive officer of Sportexe, has his way, such scenes might be a thing of the past.
Not only could his company's new product help determine the legality of any given play, it just might give the fans something to watch while they're waiting for a decision.
Sportexe, based in Fonthill, Ont., and with offices in Texas, is the second-largest manufacturer of artificial turf systems for athletic venues in North America. It is already a leader in providing conventional polyethylene turfs that look and feel like grass to indoor stadiums across the continent.
But what really has people talking is Sportexe's next generation of artificial greenery: fibre-optic fields.
"We're calling it Turf TV," Mr. Nicholls says.
Though it's still more than a year away from commercialization, Sportexe has patented a technology that will effectively turn entire sports fields into giant computer screens.
With the new turf, the labour-intensive process of converting a football field into a soccer field could be done in seconds using a computer.
Empty spaces, such as end zones and sidelines, could provide new revenue streams in the form of advertising dollars as unused playing surfaces became interactive billboards.
"It's taken us five years to get to the point where we could even start talking about it," Mr. Nicholls says, but at its core, it's a simple concept.
An image -- a first-down marker, foul-ball line, beer logo, whatever -- is electronically sent to field level, where it's distributed through a network of thousands of interconnected trays that convey light.
Think of it as a grid of fibres that work together to form a sort of rudimentary television screen. But rather than being upright, it's lying on its back, underground. From there, the image is reflected up through thousands of tiny optical fibres blended with polyethylene made to resemble grass.
Between the grass and the grid, there's a base of rubber and sand to give the playing field some substance.
Throw in a drainage system to handle the elements and voila -- you've got a futuristic video-field, one that looks and feels like grass but conveys images that can be seen from above.
Mr. Nicholls says people mistakenly assume there would be an electrical safety issue with players running on a fibre-optic field.
"People who don't understand how fibre-optic technology works say, 'Well, what if it rains?' but there's no electricity involved." No electric currents are conducted at field level, he says; there is just the transfer of light.
The field is safe, Mr. Nicholls says, and hardy enough to withstand the impact of a 280-pound linebacker slamming an opponent against it. Try doing that on your new plasma television.
It's not hard to see the novelty factor and marketing opportunities with video turf. But the interactive nature of the technology could also help maintain a sport's integrity.
Say a lacrosse player runs across a field and lunges into the air toward the goal. Was his foot in the crease before he jumped? Turf TV could tell you. With the click of a mouse, officials could illuminate the runner's footsteps all the way up the field.
The fibre-optic cables are not pressure-sensitive, Mr. Nicholls explains, but they can detect when light is being obscured -- when they are covered by a runner's foot, for example.
The system could then be directed to illuminate only the sensors that were obscured. The effect would be an illuminated walkway, showing every step of a runner's trajectory.
Of course, such cutting-edge technology doesn't come cheap. A full-sized football field made of Turf TV would cost about $1.7-million depending on the size, Mr. Nicholls says. That's eight times more than a field made of sod, and three times more than Sportexe's conventional turf fields.
Stadium owners might balk at the price tag, but Turf TV could theoretically pay for itself quickly through ad revenue, particularly for high-profile sports.
Not to mention the savings that municipalities could achieve if they didn't have to support multiple stadiums.
"Cities don't want to have to replicate the services for, say, a new soccer stadium when they've got a football stadium sitting empty more than 300 days a year. It just doesn't make any sense," Mr. Nicholls says.
Interactive fields also could enhance the experience for spectators by providing visual aids and secondary attractions on the field between plays.
"Right now professional sports is geared toward television audiences," Mr. Nicholls says.
"Teams struggle with how to keep people in the stands engaged so that when the camera comes back, they've got screaming fans ready to cheer. It's pretty hard when you say, 'Sit there for two minutes, we'll get back to you. Stare at each other.' " Gord Bullock is one stadium manager who sees potential in light-up turf. He's the game operations contractor for the Toronto Rock of the National Lacrosse League. The Rock plays in the Air Canada Centre in Toronto on a more traditional Sportexe field known as DieterTurf. Before the centre installed DieterTurf, however, lines and ads had to be painted on the old artificial playing surface. After repeated paintings, the surface became hard and dangerous for athletes. The Sportexe product uses an inlay system where lines are installed right into the turf and Velcro-like ads can easily be attached or replaced.
"It's performed very well for us," Mr. Bullock says.
But that's not to say he wouldn't be interested in upgrading to a fibre-optic system some day.
"The people on the research and development side in the industry are doing some amazing work, and I'm sure it will happen," Mr. Bullock says.
In his opinion, the ability to seamlessly convert fields, as well as add new sources of income, would be invaluable.
"Anyone involved in sports would tell you this is a fantastic thing to have."
Anyone involved in marketing would probably agree.
How it works
- The blades of "grass" are the ends of fibre-optic cables, which emit light coming from a grid, laid under the base, that possesses its own light-processing circuitry. Sort of like a computer screen underground.
That image is then projected up through the blades, in a display that can be viewed from above. The green blades of grass are simply the shafts of the fibre-optic cables, blended with the same polyethylene that's used in conventional turf systems.
-The infill is a mix of rubber and sand to provide a solid base for athletes to play on.
-The same drainage and stability layering system used with current artificial turf.
-Optical fibres connect to form a grid.
SOURCE: FORBES
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