Sports Court

By Author: tarkettsportsindoor
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Ask a random person on the street the question, “When you think about a gym floor, what is the first thing that comes to your mind?” The most common answer is wood. If you posed this question outside of North America you would not get the same answer. There are many opinions as to why but the reality is North America is trained to think that the only viable playing surface in gymnasiums is a wood athletic floor system. But much of the credit goes to The Maple Flooring Manufacturers Association (MFMA) for their tireless effort to push maple flooring standards in school gymnasiums from the early 1900s to present day. Despite wood being the most popular choice for competitive basketball, is it truly the best surface for heavily used gymnasiums? To answer this question we need to, first, understand the physical properties of wood and, second, understand what makes a sports floor a great system.

Wood, by itself, has zero sport flooring properties. There are multiple performance aspects we test and certify for sport floors, but the most common when evaluating a product or system are surface ...
... friction and force reduction. The wood does have natural surface friction properties as it ships from the mill unfinished, but it cannot be used for recreational or competitive game play. Surface friction is what provides the floor with enough grip and slip to help reduce injuries such as rolled ankles or having your feet fly up over you and landing on your back. Applying an MFMA approved polyurethane finish, after sealer coats, is the necessary ingredient for proper surface friction. Keep in mind that the polyurethane finish is not permanent. This means you will need to account for the cost of applying new finish year over year and, sometimes, twice a year if your facility is heavily used. The maintenance cost impact by itself can make a wood floor financially unattractive over the life of the floor.

Sports Court Surfaces
Wood is naturally dense and a hard playing surface does not provide crucial force reduction needed to reduce injuries. Good force reduction (a.k.a. shock absorption) can help relieve stresses upon the body incurred through impact forces such as running, jumping, and diving on a floor during a game or practice. In order to get proper force reduction, we have to install the maple wood over an area elastic (like a trampoline) subfloor system. Typically this consists of a plywood and/or sleepers with shock pads or cushioned roll goods. Depending on the construction of the subfloor and padding used, force reduction values can range from 10% all the way up to 53% or more. The bottom line is that a good subfloor is what will provide the best playing experience; not the maple surface itself. Maple gym floors will always be around for highly competitive amateur and professional game play. But with increasing demand for multi-activity court space, perhaps wood athletic floors systems are not the most practical choice.

Okay, so, here we are and you’re asking, “Well, big shot sports flooring professional, if this is the case, what are my options if a wood athletic floor system is not a practical choice?” Let’s refer back to the start of all this with the question, “When you think about a gym floor, what is the first thing that comes to your mind?” In Europe the common answer would not be a wood floor but rather what is referred to as a combination elastic sports floor. Similar to wood athletic wood systems, they too have an engineered wood subfloor panels with individual shock pads or continuous cushioned roll shock pad.

But the difference lies in the playing surface on top of the subfloor system. Instead of wood, a synthetic sheet good such as vinyl, linoleum, or poured polyurethane over a thin rubber roll good is applied to the wood subfloor panel. This produces a resilient to the touch surface for comfort with a subfloor system that can absorb heavier forces applied to it. A dual stage of safety and performance.

After years of owners and architects trying to find the best sports flooring system to meet the demands of today’s athlete while maximizing the available space that large gymnasiums offer through non-sporting events such as ceremonies or fairs or concerts, and efforts to reduce annual operational costs; they have found the combination system of choice in Tarkett Sports Lumaflex product line.

Lumaflex has three different variations but only two of them, Lumaflex Classic and Lumaflex Elite, are designed for indoor court sports and the other is Lumaflex Fit specifically for the fitness market. Lumaflex Classic and Lumaflex Elite can provide remarkable force reduction that will meet and exceed the performance of almost every high end wood athletic system on the market today. And with a factory finished vinyl or linoleum finish good installed on top for the actual playing surface, your worries and financial commitment of applying polyurethane finish year over year go away. Saving you not only money but the down time it takes to complete a wood floor recoat. When you rely on court rentals to subsidize your operational costs, this matters greatly to your budget.

The most perfect athletic floor system that does everything for everyone does not exist. Track has track surfaces for reason. Tennis players, well, tennis players like a lot of different surfaces: grass, synthetic grass, clay, acrylic, etc…they judge it for the ball spin. You would think that indoor court sports such as basketball, volleyball, futsal, handball, pickleball, etc…would have different preferences for athletic surfaces. This would be true unless you have Lumaflex installed in your facility. Equal performance for all. Play to win and create a new tradition along the way.visit us-https://www.reddit.com/user/Complete114/comments/k6jg5x/lumaflex_a_step_above_the_status_quo/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3