Background
Valentine Sports Park was announced as a training facility for the FIFA Women’s World Cup 2023. The issue was the current lights were not up to scratch, achieving less than 200 lux on Field 1, which was not up to competition standards. Football NSW had a short timeframe to upgrade the lights to semi-professional competition standards in time for World Cup pre-competition training.
The project
Following discussions with Football NSW, it was agreed to stage the project. Stage 1: upgrade the lights to semi-professional competition standards (300 lux) in time for the World Cup, but ensure the engineered design of the poles and footings were prepared for stage 2. Stage 2: upgrade the lights to professional competition standards (700 lux).
We achieved this by firstly designing a layout which exceeded 700 lux. This was no easy feat with close neighbouring households, but we were able to reach 700 lux with 50 x 1500W Rippon Mk3 LED Sports Lights. Secondly, we had our partners Ingal EPS design new poles, footings and brackets which could take the weight and size of 50 new LEDs. Once the poles were erected, we implemented stage 1 by installing 24 x 1500W Rippon Mk2 LED Sports Lights, with space for more lights to be installed in the future.
The project was completed in record time, with our usual 12 week installation time line condensed into eight, just in time for the World Cup.
Results
Valentine Sports Park Field 1 now achieves the lighting standards for football semi-professional competition with an average of 306 lux. The poles, footings and brackets are ready for 26 more lights to achieve football professional competition lighting standards in the future.
