Ava Veith
Introduction
This study assesses how variation among natural and synthetic turf surfaces affect athlete safety and performance. Key metrics such as surface hardness, rotational resistance, soil moisture, thatch depth (synthetic fields) influence athlete-surface interactions and were used in this study to further characterize fields. additionally . ankle inertial measurement units (IMUs) and STATSports GPS units were wearable technology devices that were used to quantify how varying surfaces affect athletes during performance of specific rills. surveys captured athletes perceptions of the fields before and after performance to understand how they believe surface quality impacts their performance.
Athletic Fields | Tested
In August 2024, a study was conducted on four athletic fields at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Virginia. Two fields were natural turfgrass (Bermudagrass), categorized as 'low wear' or 'high wear' based on traffic frequency. The other two were synthetic, with one field installed early 2025 and heavily used (high wear), and the other installed in summer 2023 with minimal traffic (low wear) (Figure 1).
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