Rob Bradshaw, head groundsman at Peterborough United FC’s Mick
George Training Academy, has praised both the product and the service he
receives from Limagrain UK.
Rob has admitted that he is currently ‘living the dream’. As a
lifelong Peterborough United fan, not only is he working for the club that he
loves but he is also doing a job that he loves.
After starting his career working for Huntingdon District Council
he accepted the head groundsman position at One Leisure sports centre in St
Ives and during his time here he picked up two Institute of Groundsmanship
(IOG) national awards.
In between his current full-time role at the Mick George Training
Academy, Rob is a pitch advisor for the Huntingdonshire FA and also runs a
Sport England funded grounds association in the areas of Cambridgeshire and
Huntingdonshire. So passionate about providing the best surfaces he can, he
even admits to sleeping in his car after tending to the pitches through the
night.
“Yes, I’ve had nights out in the car park but you have to do it
sometimes,” he said. “I take pride in my work and I want what is best - for the
players and for the club.”
Rob has been at Peterborough United FC for two years now and after
a season of settling in he soon decided it was time to make his mark.
“It got to February time when I really wanted to start planning,
make some improvements and finalise where we were going to go with our end of
season renovations. Firstly, I needed to choose a good grass seed because I
only want to use the best products here. I did my homework on various products
and gave a number of companies the opportunity to come in.
“The Limagrain MM60 seed seemed to be the number one choice in my
opinion. I know that a lot of other professional clubs use it and I have used
various Limagrain products in the past – it has always been a proven package.”
Limagrain’s MM60 grass seed is renowned for producing an excellent
playing surface on a number of winter sports pitches. It is a 100% Ryegrass
formula which is perfect for renovation and divot repair, has a high disease
resistance, fantastic aesthetic qualities and offers extremely fast germination
– which is boosted by the inclusion of Headstart GOLD.
Developed using the latest scientific findings and field
experience, Headstart GOLD® is a natural revolutionary grass seed treatment
that ensures rapid germination and is perfect for enhancing performance on
grass seed coatings for sports fields, golf courses, lawns and amenity turf.
“We had good germination within 10-12 days and we had excellent
coverage,” said Rob. “It’s important that I have a seed like MM60 which
recovers quickly from damage and wear because of the amount of usage we have
here. Last year, as well as training, we had 260 games on the two pitches so to
have that dense, hard wearing sward which the MM60 provides is ideal.
“I’d also like to add that, aside from the success of the
products, I have been really impressed by the service, the back-up and the
advice I receive from Limagrain UK. When I was deciding on what seed to use
Richard Sheppard (amenity seed specialist for Limagrain UK) came in and was
very helpful. In my experience you don’t always get that level of professional
back-up and I just can’t fault the company in any kind of way.”
