The 4th year turfies on their last week before they graduate from tafe, visited local legend Brendon Large. Brendan is Optus Arena Manager and gave us a few hours of his spare time to discuss maintaining Turf at Optus Stadium. Before we walked onto the turf, Brendon talked about the hybrid turf (Hero Turf) that HG Turf Group use for their high profile Sporting Arenas. Brendan gave us a brief overview of growing in the Wintergreen couch into the Hero fibres, and that they do this at Greenacres Turf farm. From there we walked out onto the turf, Optus Stadium is so much more than AFL football and Cricket. Ed Sheeran, Matildas Olympic Qualifier, WWE (World Wrestling Entertainment) 24th February, Pink Concert in March and more I forgot to mention. The turf is in fantastic condition. Brendon was saying that he is effectively maintaining 4 fields with the different ages of turf on the field. There are still some areas of the original turf that were laid in 2017.
It's difficult to see the Hero fibres, but Blake from Kings Park managed to find one. We met Ben Musitano, and he briefly explained the operating procedure of the DryJect at Optus.
Brendon then took us over to the heat lamps, they increased the soil temperature between 3-5°C. Brendon then took us over to speak with Mathew Varley, and look at the new Vredo drop seeder. Brendan discussed how the Vredo drops the seed at a depth due to the slicing action prior to the seed drop. Unlike other models that drop the seed on the surface only to feed the pigeons.
We were then taken outside and shown the drop in wickets, and the massive machine that lifts and moves the wickets from outside to in the stadium, then out again after the cricket season is over.
I had a sneaky hello to Vinnie Poller, who graduated last year.
Thanks Brendon, you and your staff are doing a great job.
Brendan even handed out his contact details to the apprentices, should they ever need advice on any turf management issues.
He told them that he would always be available to answer any questions.
Definitely a legend in my eyes!!!!
