super bowl turf.jpg

A small piece of turf from Bent Oak Farm in Baldwin County, which is providing the playing surface for the Feb. 1 Super Bowl in Glendale, Ariz. (Mike Cason/mcason@al.com)

MONTGOMERY, Alabama --- When 100 million or so people tune in to watch Super Bowl XLIX on Feb. 1, they'll be looking at green grass that was grown in Alabama.

Thirty refrigerated tractor-trailer trucks this week hauled the turf some 1,700 miles from Bent Oak Farm in Baldwin County to Glendale, Ariz.

Doug Lipscomb, co-owner of Bent Oak, said it's the fourth time for the grass farm near Foley to provide the playing surface for what many consider the biggest sports event of the year.

The grass is a hybrid Bermuda grown on layers of dirt atop plastic. Lipscomb said crews are installing it at University of Phoenix Stadium in Glendale today.

Lipscomb said the NFL and other sports stadium customers want a field that's both pleasing to the eye and tough. It's not good if the grass is a perfect shade of green but comes up in chunks when players plant their feet and turn.

"A lot of fields look good and play bad," Lipscomb said. "A lot look bad and play well. It's kind of hard to put everything in one package."

Lipscomb, whose business partner is Mark Paulch, doesn't reveal details on how Bent Oak's turf, which they call Lay and Play, can meet those standards.

"Experience and failure teach us what we can do and can't do," Lipscomb said. "There have been failures. We're testing and trying new things all the time."

Lipscomb said Bent Oak also provided the turf for Super Bowls XLII in Glendale, XLIII in Tampa and XLIV in Miami, the last three that were played on natural grass.

Bent Oak also provides the turf for Bryant-Denny Stadium in Tuscaloosa and Jordan-Hare Stadium in Auburn, as well as the major league baseball stadiums of the Atlanta Braves and Miami Marlins and the NFL stadiums of the Jacksonville Jaguars and Miami Dolphins.

Alabama and Auburn replace their turf annually, Lipscomb said.

One reason Alabama has to is because the stands are so tall since the stadium was last enlarged that the grass only gets about two hours of sunlight a day, he said.

Lipscomb said he considers the repeat business from Bent Oak's customers an affirmation that the company has a great product. He's appreciative that the NFL is willing to use turf hauled almost all the way across the country.

"They're going to go by a lot of grass farms between here and there," he said.