Uppingham School

Uppingham, Rutland

Being located in the smallest historic County in England doesn’t prevent you from being big on ideas and innovation.

With a rich history of sporting excellence, the world famous Uppingham School is proof of this, having further enhanced its already high quality range of sports facilities with one of the largest state of the art non-turf cricket practice areas in the country.  

The Independent School, who count the BBC’s former Leicestershire & England cricketer Jonathan Agnew as a former pupil, has shown great “vision” throughout the design process of their new facility. In partnership with ECB Approved system supplier Dura-Sport of Leicestershire, every element within the eight lane practice facility has been specified to the finest detail, with numerous enhancements and site specific products added to the design. 

There's bespoke, then there's Uppingham

Subsequently, Uppingham School has become the first Independent School in the country with a non-turf cricket practice facility to incorporate materials which replicate a match play situation in terms of look, feel and performance.   

With over 25 years of industry experience, Dura-Sport were appointed by the school to design, project manage and construct the facility from initial concept to completion.

Over 1,000 tonnes of materials were shaped, moved and imported in to the area to form the foundation, separated into eight practice lanes by a heavy duty steelwork structure and new netting system, which also fully encloses and secures the facility. 

Over 1,200m2 of synthetic materials were then installed, with a layout and configuration to replicate the natural look and feel of a prepared grass pitch and run up within each lane.

The natural look has been achieved by installing an ECB Approved DSi-pro Vision non-turf cricket pitch system within each lane.

Now in its 2nd generation following product enhancements last year, the revolutionary Vision pitch design was the first ECB Approved system to feature a playing surface manufactured using shades of light, natural coloured yarns to replicate a well prepared natural turf cricket pitch, rather than the traditional green offering.

In addition to this, the enhanced DSi-weave carpet design has been recently confirmed in ECB laboratory tests as the strongest and most durable non-turf cricket surface available. The carpets spike resistant technology adds to the natural appearance, feel, professional quality and realism of the surface. 

The remaining areas of the facility are surfaced with DS grass. Designed and manufactured using shades of green yarn to, as the name suggests, provide the look and feel of natural grass, within both the run ups and alongside each pitch. 

We were hoping that a certain former teacher at the School would be available to cut the ribbon at the opening, but admit it may be a long shot now that he has left the profession and gone on to become one of the world’s most famous movie stars. Even so, we are certain that Hugh Jackman couldn’t help but be impressed, even more so knowing that there was no CGI involved in the making of this facility.