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TheSportsPitchDoctor
Peter L K Dury, MBE NDT, D Uni Essex.I have had over 50 years in the sport and landscape industry and was a pioneer in the development of performance quality standards for sport and landscape facilites, being involved with the Sports Council since 1974 in all aspects or research, design, construction, maintenance and management and with the England and Wales Cricket Board and its predecessor, the National Cricket Association, as their Non Turf Pitch Consultant.
A past President of the Association of Landscape Management; and a former Chairman of the Institute of Groundsmanships Education Committee for whom I also acted as an examiner. |
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On leaving school I joined the Nottinghamshire county cricket club at Trent Bridge with the intention of becoming a county cricketer. When I did not make the grade I joined the ground staff at the British Celanese Sports ground at Derby. Having become very interested in groundsmanship I joined Derby Parks Department for four years before take post of head groundsman at the Southport and Birkdale Cricket Club in 1960.
1965 saw a return to local government and after working in Nuneaton and Huntingdon I returned to my native Nottinghamshire as Deputy County Playing Fields Officer in 1968 progressing to County Playing Fields Officer 1n 1973. The time as head of the Playing fields department led to my developments in synthetic turf to compliment my expertise in natural turf pitches. As a groundsman first and foremost the desire was to produce synthetic facilities on which the performance would be similar to natural turf.
Starting with cricket and the development of the Nottinghamshire Pitch, the Envelope system and the NottsBase system the high cost of natural turf maintenance led to developments in other areas using the Envelope system for football, hockey, multi use and childrens playground safety systems. Even golf greens and bowling greens were developed utilising the principles of the "Envelope". When a number of football clubs followed Queens Park Rangers lead in the Mid 80's installing artificial pitches the Envelope system for football was there to provide natural playing characteristics. Unfortunately the desire to use the pitches for more than just football led to all clubs adopting bitumen bound bases resulting in the failure of these to catch on.
Re-organisation and the privatisation of local authority services led to a sideways move and the development of the Sports and Landscape Development unit providing consultancy and design services to Nottinghamshire, other local authorities and commercial enterprises. Natural turf was not neglected and re-inforcement using synthetic fibres such as fibre sand and the VHAF systems were all down to me during this period.
Retirement from the Council led to me setting up as an independent consultant enabling more involvement with governing bodies of sport. My services were also enlisted by Hewitt Sportsturf who required my expertise as they branched significantly into Professional Football and my designs were adopted at Arsenal, New Wembley Stadium, Nottingham Forest, Liverpool, West Ham amongst others.
1965 saw a return to local government and after working in Nuneaton and Huntingdon I returned to my native Nottinghamshire as Deputy County Playing Fields Officer in 1968 progressing to County Playing Fields Officer 1n 1973. The time as head of the Playing fields department led to my developments in synthetic turf to compliment my expertise in natural turf pitches. As a groundsman first and foremost the desire was to produce synthetic facilities on which the performance would be similar to natural turf.
Starting with cricket and the development of the Nottinghamshire Pitch, the Envelope system and the NottsBase system the high cost of natural turf maintenance led to developments in other areas using the Envelope system for football, hockey, multi use and childrens playground safety systems. Even golf greens and bowling greens were developed utilising the principles of the "Envelope". When a number of football clubs followed Queens Park Rangers lead in the Mid 80's installing artificial pitches the Envelope system for football was there to provide natural playing characteristics. Unfortunately the desire to use the pitches for more than just football led to all clubs adopting bitumen bound bases resulting in the failure of these to catch on.
Re-organisation and the privatisation of local authority services led to a sideways move and the development of the Sports and Landscape Development unit providing consultancy and design services to Nottinghamshire, other local authorities and commercial enterprises. Natural turf was not neglected and re-inforcement using synthetic fibres such as fibre sand and the VHAF systems were all down to me during this period.
Retirement from the Council led to me setting up as an independent consultant enabling more involvement with governing bodies of sport. My services were also enlisted by Hewitt Sportsturf who required my expertise as they branched significantly into Professional Football and my designs were adopted at Arsenal, New Wembley Stadium, Nottingham Forest, Liverpool, West Ham amongst others.
Recognition2002 - Hon Doctorate Degree from University of Essex
2003 - Life time acheivement award from the Institute of groundsmanship 2003 - National Playing Fields Association Presidents award 2010 - ECB award for services to cricket 2012 - MBE for services to groundsmanship |
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