TERRE HAUTE —
Youth soccer brings thousands of people to Terre Haute each year, and the Vigo County Youth Soccer Association is investing heavily to ensure its facilities continue to draw big crowds.
The youth soccer organization, which involves about 1,000 local kids for its spring and fall seasons, has recently invested about $150,000 in upgrading its southside facilities, including installing an irrigation system designed to make the playing fields green even when all else is turning brown.
The project, being handled by Finzel Irrigation of Terre Haute, started last year before the current drought took hold. It essentially will create a giant underground sprinkler system for more than half of the approximately 44-acre soccer complex on Springhill Drive between South Third Street and Indiana 63.
“Soccer is all about the playing surface,” said Steve Danielson, risk manager for the youth soccer association and a member of its board of directors. “We knew that we needed to invest in our playing surfaces to create a truly first-class facility.”
Youth soccer in Vigo County involves kids, ages 5 through high school, from the entire Wabash Valley, including counties in Indiana and Illinois surrounding Vigo, Danielson said. Each year the organization hosts a large tournament that draws youth soccer enthusiasts from four or five states, he said.
“The people that come to Terre Haute and play on our fields, even before we had irrigation, thought that we had one of the nicest facilities in the state,” Danielson said.
The irrigation system being installed gets its water from a large aquifer that begins around the former Pfizer property in southern Vigo County and extends north. The aquifer formerly supplied Pfizer with about 1 million gallons of water each day, said Rob Finzel of Finzel Irrigation, who was working on the project Tuesday. The aquifer can easily supply the approximately 100,000 gallons a day needed to irrigate the soccer fields during dry conditions, he said.
The current drought had basically turned the soccer fields “to concrete,” Finzel said. Providing irrigation will soften the ground and drastically reduce the number of injuries once the season starts this fall, he said. That’s another reason the soccer league wanted to make the investment.
“Their goal is obviously to have one of the nicest facilities in the state,” Finzel said. “With a little work, we’ll get it.”
Finzel’s company specializes in commercial, residential and athletic field irrigation. The company has provided irrigation at athletic fields for Terre Haute North Vigo High School, Terre Haute North Little League and Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology, Finzel said.
The ground at the soccer fields is currently so hard that recently Finzel has had two pieces of trenching equipment break, he said. Even 24 inches deep into the ground, the dirt is bone dry, he said.
“We haven’t had ground this hard in a long time,” he said.
For more information on the Vigo County Youth Soccer Association, visit the organization’s website at www.vcysa.org.
Reporter Arthur Foulkes can be reached at (812) 231-4232 or arthur.foulkes@tribstar.com.
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Related Photos
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Tribune-Star/Jim Avelis Dusty day: Alex Sober works with his boss, Rob Finzel, to cover water supply lines installed for the Vigo County Youth Soccer Association. The trencher in the background was out of commission for a while after the blade broke in the dry ground.
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Tribune-Star/Jim Avelis Phase two: Rob Finzel of Finzel Irrigation walks beyond the streams of water bringing life to the soccer fields of the Vigo County Youth Soccer Association. The work now being done is the second of three phases to bring water to the fields. Safety is part of the reason, with well-watered ground being a softer landing for the athletes.
Discussion
Going green: New irrigation system helping save fields at youth soccer complex
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