Engineering company’s expertise to be showcased on television
The ground-breaking work of a Sheffield engineering company in designing and installing the world’s first dividing and retractable sports pitch at Tottenham Hotspur’s new stadium is to be profiled on national TV.
Former Top Gear presenter Richard Hammond will get up close and personal with some unique pitch engineering at the stadium in this week’s episode of his Discovery Channel series “Richard Hammond’s Big.”
He will explore the pitch that splits and rolls away, designed by SCX, based at Wincobank, Sheffield as well as taking a walk on the stadium roof.
And Hammond will meet the unsung heroes behind the development and delve into the science, research and expertise required.
From SCX he will meet project director Danny Pickard and the special projects team of Paul Bettison, Mark Hollis, Bryan Robinson and Sam Watts. Pickard said this has been one of his company’s biggest projects, and one of the quickest in terms of delivery timescales.
Danny Pickard
“It has been a phenomenal success, equal to what we have achieved with the retractable roofs for Centre Court and No.1 Court for the All England Lawn Tennis Club at Wimbledon, and within a very tight timescale,” he said.
“The Tottenham pitch went from being perceived as the highest risk part of the project – with all the moving parts, the turf joins and an engineering concept that had not been tried before – to something neither we nor the client had to worry about.”
The grass surface can be rolled back to reveal a bespoke NFL pitch below.
Its integration into the stadium will bring new commercial opportunities to Tottenham Hotspur for decades to come, and a world-class home for the club and its fans. The system means the venue can be used for music concerts and other events in addition to regular football matches and NFL games.
The retractable real grass surface splits into three pitch-long steel trays.
When the trays slide together, the join is invisible and imperceptible to the players. The trays, weighing more than 3,000 tonnes each, can be rolled under the new South Stand to reveal the NFL artificial surface in a process taking about 25 minutes.
The episode is due to air in the UK on Wednesday 19 February.
