Over the course of time sports have inevitably evolved. What started as literal baskets transformed to modern day basketball hoops; fields with no lines turned into specialized stadiums designed to switch fields almost instantly; and, of course, the global expansion of sports has changed the game altogether.
Windsor is no different by taking great pride in its sports and always improving. During the summer of 2023, Windsor had a new turf field built thanks to the bond passed in November 2022. This turf is different though, with a unique design keeping team legacies and player safety in mind.
Athletic Director Eric Johnson (staff) said, “The big thing for me was two-fold. There’s sustainability to this: it’s environmentally friendly. The shaved rubber pellets, depending on who you talk to, there are some studies out there that say long-term exposure is not good…. The bigger factor for me was the heat…. This infill system allows us to play at an ambient temperature that is anywhere from 20 to 40 degrees cooler.”
As far as team legacies go, the new turf features the football team’s mantra — Never Outworked (N.O.) — on the 32-yard line. With N.O. physically embedded into the turf, it reaches more than just the football team and is a symbol for all Windsor athletics: “It was one of the ways we wanted to not only embody his (Lucas Watts) memory, but also really that mindset for all of our sports teams… any one who is on that turf, you know we’re never going to be outworked as a school,” Johnson said.
Piercen Lewis (11) is one of the many players who feels and see the impact of N.O. “That’s how we play our game. That’s our main thing. That’s what we strive to be like, we strive to never be outworked on the field. Now it’s on the field, so it’s a good reminder,” Lewis said.
Though the turf may have been designed with primarily the school’s sports in mind, it also provides additional benefits to other departments of the school, such as physical education. Samuel Boshart (staff) is a P.E. teacher at Windsor and sees many of the benefits from the new turf: “It’s definitely cooler, that’s the big thing…. Now we can go out there later in the day and not have to worry about it being as hot, kids getting overheated as quickly.”
Getting a new field that the entire community will see is not as simple as calling a construction company and paying them to do the job. In Windsor’s case, there was a much more complex process that had to take place in order for the field’s construction to become possible. “There was a competitive bid process by which companies were allowed to bid their services. We kind of specced out our project through the use of an architect…. Not only did they bid on a price, but the type and quality material and the timeline from start to finish,” Johnson said.
Rocky Mountain Sports Turf was the company that won the bid process. The reason this particular company won was not only due to their estimated cost but also their estimated completion time. Windsor keeps its facilities in use as much as possible; with football and boys’ soccer in the fall and girls’ soccer, lacrosse and track and field in the spring, there is little downtime for the facilities. Because of this, Rocky Mountains Sports Turf promised a completed field before the beginning of the 2023 fall seasons for football and boys soccer. Despite weather delays through the course of the summer, the field was still completed when promised.
Through the bond that was passed in late 2022, Windsor was given the opportunity to have a new addition to its facilities, along with several other district improvements. Being a major part of the school, the new field gets a lot of publicity and is seen by a large population of the community: “It’s the crown jewel of all of our facilities,” Johnson said. Not only is it a feature that appeals to the eye, but it also appeals to the safety and health of the athletes who help make it the crown jewel.
