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Preparing for the
Iron Bowl By Dave Han, Ph.D., Auburn University
The
Al ab ama Tu rf Tim e s > >> Fa ll 2 011
Iron Bowl. Those three words conjure up a lifetime of images for college football fans in the South. If you are an Auburn Tiger fan, you remember Bo over the top, Punt Bama Punt or The Camback. If you bleed crimson and white, it’s Kenny Stabler running in the mud, The Kick or Bear Bryant’s 315th to become the winningest major college coach of all time. Though other rivalries have been played more often, none is contested so fiercely. For two people, however, the most important image they hope to provide for the Iron Bowl is an immaculate field, perfect in both appearance and playability. For Scott Urbantke, Director of Athletic Grounds and Facilities at the University of Alabama, and Eric Kleypas, Athletic Turfgrass Manager at Auburn University, and their crews, the Iron Bowl is the culmination of an entire year’s worth of hard work and preparation.
Game week begins
For Urbantke, a Texas A&M graduate who has been with Alabama since 1999, the week of the Iron Bowl starts pretty much like every week. “We start on Sunday, painting the practice field,” he
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says. “We spend much of Monday and Tuesday away from the stadium.” The same is true for Kleypas, who has been in charge of the athletic turf at Auburn for nine years and has worked with the athletic department ever since he was
a graduate student working on his master’s degree in agronomy. Both Urbantke and Kleypas must juggle responsibilities around the athletic department, since they are also responsible for the baseball, softball and soccer fields, plus track and field facilities and practice facilities. “Fortunately for us, by the week of the Iron Bowl, soccer is usually wrapped up,” says Urbantke. Monday and Tuesday at both BryantDenny and Jordan-Hare are fairly routine, with mowing and irrigation (if needed) being the main items on the agenda. Kleypas says that on the Tuesday before a Saturday game, he will check the lines on the field at JordanHare stadium to make sure that they haven’t wandered over the course of the season. “I’ll pull strings [from fixed reference points] and check because if