National Sports Center Blog

Getting the Stadium field ready for the Stars home opener

By Barclay Kruse, NSC Chief Communications Officer

The National Sports Center's turf crew was busy working on the Stadium field today, preparing the field for the Minnesota Stars FC home opening game on May 5. Curtiss Conkright, the NSC's Turf Superintendent, and his crew were laying new sod along the sideline and bench area.

Today's work is just a part of a campus-wide program of field renovation that has started already and will continue right up until Schwan's USA CUP in July. If you play at the NSC this spring, you'll find that we're busy with field repairs and resting a number of our fields, including U1 (except for Stars games) throughout the spring and early summer. Heavy rains during Schwan's USA CUP last July caused some pretty serious field damage, and we're doing everything we can to bring our fields back to premier condition for this year's tournament.

Above: Curtiss Conright laying the new sod. Below: The crew grades the base level, ready for new sod.

Dominate your club's homepage

 By Scott Clasen, Director of Marketing

In an effort to expand our blog beyond just the walls of the National Sports Center, we've asked Carson Kipfer, co-founder and chief visionary officer with TST Media to contribute periodically to our blog. We've entered into a partnership with TST Media to remake our websites using their NGIN system, a platform that numerous clubs and associations that frequent the NSC use. Carson has great insight into how to fully leverage your club's web presence. Here's Carson's recent work about how to dominate your club's homepage:

It is common knowledge that your website is the official communication clearinghouse for your club. When someone is seeking club information, they hop online and head straight to your club’s website homepage.

But once they arrive on your club’s homepage, how easy is it for a visitor to find the content that they’re looking for?

Many website managers try to accomplish too much with their club’s homepage, which in many cases creates an overwhelming and unusable mess of disconnected content. With homepage design, less is definitely more. To accomplish this, think of your homepage as an easily scannable teaser that directs site visitors to more immersive and in-depth information located deeper within your website. (Example: don’t display the entirety of an important five paragraph announcement, just display the title, a sentence of teaser text, and a link to read more.)

To determine what to highlight on your site’s homepage, ask yourself one extremely important question: What content is most important to most visitors? Try and limit your response to 5-10 timely content areas.

Use this list of effective homepage content areas to help determine what to include on your club’s homepage:

• Recent news and announcement teasers (and a link to view all news and announcements)
• Recent, in-progress and upcoming games (and a link to view your entire schedule)
• Current stat leaders (and a link to view complete club statistics)
• Current standings
• Calls to action (such as registration, donations or joining a mailing list)
• Current promotions (link to more information)
• Shortcuts (link to the most frequently requested pieces of content)
• Social network connections (Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Flickr, Ustream, etc.)
• Multimedia previews (link to recent photos and video)

Research has shown that it takes less than 1/20th of a second for visitors to formulate their first impression of a website and the organization that it represent... so don’t overlook the value of great homepage design.

Our new Sport Expo Center nearing completion

By Barclay Kruse, NSC Chief Communications Officer

After a winter with great construction weather (much warmer and less snow than normal), the construction crew from Kraus-Anderson Construction has been able to move the NSC's new Sport Expo Center construction along at a breakneck pace. I stopped by today to take a look:

Below: Here's the view from the stadium. The turf is showing some mid-season form too - lush and green! (Again, thanks to our mild winter.)

The view along the south side of the building, toward the stadium field.

The new floor has been poured. This will be the new location for the PUMA World Store during Schwan's USA CUP. The high ceiling will accommodate sports use.

And just a few days ago, the glass windows were installed in the entry lobby.

We are on track to open the Sport Expo Center in early June, if not a little ahead of schedule. The Expo Center will be the new home of the NSC's two outdoor shows, the Great Waters Fly Fishing Expo and the Minnesota Bass Expo in 2013, as well as other shows throughout the year.

 

 

Victory Links' new golf carts are here!

By Barclay Kruse, NSC Chief Communications Officer

It's a big day over at the NSC's Victory Links golf course. The first of our fleet of 76 brand new golf carts rolled off the truck today. These new carts will have some great new features that are sure to be a big hit with Victory Links golfers. Most notably, they'll cruise along at 14 m.p.h., at least 5 m.p.h faster than our old carts.

"That should take 15-20 minutes off a typical round," said head pro Scott Roth.

Head pro Scott Roth with his new toy.

Each cart comes with a bi-fold windshield, which will be a great feature on windy days. Add in bag rain covers, more comfortable seating, and an awesome candy-apple red paint job and we're expecting some big smiles on our customers' faces starting ... Saturday morning! The forecast is for perfect golf weather this weekend -- sunshine and temperatures in the 70's. So come on out to Victory Links and take one of our new carts for a test spin this weekend!

 

Fly fishing, golf and hockey - a great spring weekend at the NSC!

By Barclay Kruse, NSC Chief Communications Officer

We're getting set for a big weekend of spring activities and events at the NSC. In fact, as I write this, on Friday afternoon, we're already well underway.

The Great Waters Fly Fishing Expo runs from 3-7pm today, and all day Saturday and Sunday. The event is held at the Schwan Center, with some classes and clinics held outdoors.

Below: Friday morning, vendors were putting the final touches on their booths at the Great Waters Fly Fishing Expo.

Over at the Schwan Super Rink, the Minnesota Elite AAA hockey tournament was already underway with three days of games for both boys and girls teams. If you're reading this from a non-Minnesota location, you might be puzzled that we call hockey a spring activity here. In truth, hockey is a year-around sport for many Minnesota players. In fact some of our biggest tournaments at the Super Rink are summer tournaments. Here's some game action from rink 2:

By the way, participants in the Minnesota Elite Classic will get special admission rates to the Great Waters Fly Fishing Expo. Youth will be admitted free, and adults can enter for just $5.

Then I jetted over the Victory Links golf course, where we were celebrating opening day on the big 18-hole course. We're opening a full three weeks earlier than last year, and the course conditions are close to perfect. In fact, you'll notice in these photos that the course looks close to mid-summer conditions -- and it's only March! And with warm weather in the forecast, the Victory Links staff is excited to have the course full of eager golfers this weekend.  Here are some photos to show you just how nice the course is looking:

Tournament Greens putting course:

A foursome was putting out on the 6th hole, a par 4:

 

How do our greens get green so fast? Read this post.

By Curtiss Conkright, Turf Superintendent

Whenever I tell someone what I do for a living there are usually two main questions they ask.

What do you do in the winter? And how do I make my yard green?

At Victory Links Golf Course one trick we use for getting our greens green before everything else is the application of black sand over our putting surfaces, which is done after the course closes in the fall. The sand is our normal topdressing sand dyed black and it offers protection to the crown of the plant over the winter months.  In the spring it has another benefit. Early green-up. The black sand will heat the surface of the green and raise the soil temperature to a level where growth is promoted.

Close-up view of the black sand covering the green

 

Assistant Turf Superintendent Ben Wallin using our Buffalo Blower making sure we get all the sand into the canopy of the turf.

 

After the heat we have been experiencing over the last week our greens have greened up nicely.

First glimpse of the interior of the new Sport Expo Center

By Barclay Kruse, NSC Chief Communications Officer

Yesterday, we got our first glimpse of what the interior of the NSC's new Sport Expo Center is looking like. Construction is still underway, but the project is on track to be completed in early June.

Located just feet away from the existing Schwan Center, this 21,000 square foot facility will be large enough to house sports activity like soccer and baseball training, and also mid-size consumer shows. It will also be the new home of the PUMA World Store at Schwan's USA CUP. The reason we were allowed into a construction zone is that Evan Olesh of PUMA and the staff of Eurosport were on campus to prepare for the 2012 USA CUP. Eurosport will be the new managers of all retail sales at the tournament, including the store. This space will be new for all of us, and the early verdict is that it's going to be awesome -- more centrally located and larger than then old store location in the Sports Hall.

Below: Representatives from Eurosport check out the new location for the PUMA World Store.

Below is another view of the main room at the new Sport Expo Center. This room is 18,000 square feet. The high ceiling will accommodate sport usage.

Here's a view of the lobby area, taken from where the front doors will go on the northeast corner of the building. Restrooms will be built in the back portion of this room. The doors to the right mark the entry into the big hall.

Here's another view from the lobby area, through the entry doors, and into the main hall:

Great Waters Fly Fishing Expo, March 23-25, kicks off NSC’s 2012 schedule of outdoor shows

By Scott Clasen, Director of Marketing

Below is our latest press release about the Great Waters Fly Fishing Expo that's next week here at the Schwan Center. The release includes details about the seminars we're conducting and a full list of exhibitors.

Blaine, Minn. (March 12, 2012) – The National Sports Center (NSC) in Blaine will launch its new menu of outdoor-oriented expos by hosting Tom Helgeson’s Great Waters Fly Fishing Expo, March 23-25. This year the Fly Fishing Expo will be held in the Schwan Center and will move into the NSC’s new Sport Expo Center for 2013.

This year marks the second year that the Great Waters Fly Fishing Expo has been held at the NSC, in a partnership with the Tom Helgeson family. The event was started by Helgeson, a Minnesota fly fishing legend. Helgeson published Midwest Fly Fishing Magazine and was a leading conservationist and advocate for clean water and trout habitat preservation. Helgeson died of cancer in November of 2010. His family is dedicated to carrying on the Expo and Tom’s passionate advocacy for fly fishing in the Midwest.

Read more here...

Zamboni pulling at the Super Rink!

By Barclay Kruse, NSC Chief Communications Officer

We stopped by the Ironman Adult Hockey Tournament Saturday afternoon to check out our newest event at the Schwan Super Rink -- the Zamboni Pull. This is a special event organized to keep the Ironman players busy during gaps between their games. I'm not sure why they need more activity, considering they'll play five games in three days, earning the "ironman" label. But for the players who showed up, they were game for the challenge and having fun too. Here's a look-in on our first Zamboni Pull:

Below: Tournament director Spencer Arvold helps the team called Off-in-the-Corner get suited up in their pulling harnesses.

Gregg Stutz from Centerville, Ben Adams of Mahtomedi and Andy Rammotz of Rochester give it their all for Off-in-the-Corner. Teams took 18-22 seconds to pull the Zamboni from blue line to blue line.

Below: Team Hat Trick, made up of Adam Knott of Otsego, Luke Molus of Becker and Adam Hayes of Big Lake.

Ellen Berce, left, and Erica Berthold represented the event sponsor, Muscle Milk. 

 

USA CUP alums playing on Japan's National Team that just beat USA

By Barclay Kruse, NSC Chief Communications Officer

Three former Schwan's USA CUP players were in the starting line-up for the Japan National Women's Soccer Team that beat the USA on Monday 1-0 at the Algarve Cup in Portugal. Aya Sameshima, Saki Kumagai and Asuna Tanaka all played in USA CUP for the Togiwagi Gakuen High School team from Sendai, Japan. Tokiwagi sends teams to USA CUP every three years. Togiwagi last played in the tournament in 2010, when they won both the weekend and weeklong championships of the U19 girls division.

Above: Asuna Tanaka.

Monday's win marked the first time Japan had ever beaten the U.S. in a regulation-time game. Of course, Japan defeated the U.S. in the championship game of the 2011 World Cup, but that was in an overtime penalty-kick shootout. (It was Kumagai who scored the winning PK goal in that World Cup final.)

Left: Saki Kumagai in action against Germany during the 2011 World Cup.

The Algarve Cup is an annual international tournament that this year serves as the major international tune-up for the 2012 London Olympic Games.

In the Algarve Cup championship game, completed earlier today, Germany defeated Japan 4-3, as Celia Okoyino da Mbabi scored Germany's winning goal in stoppage time. Asuna Tanaka scored in the 55th minute for Japan.

 

Left: Aya Sameshima.