3 ms·

What other sports have a non-participant with such a critical impact on the experience and results? Soaring comes to mind with tow pilots, for one.

• codyb 5y ago
  I’d imagine almost all games do? Most courts and pitches require a decent amount of maintenance.
• have_faith 5y ago
  Bowling alley waxing seems very similar
• rjsw 5y ago
  Alpine Skiing. The person who picks where to put the poles to ski around, and at higher levels of competition the person in charge of how the snow is prepared.
• joezydeco 5y ago
  Seems like there's plenty of allowance for variation in the air pressure of footballs (American NFL). So much so that we ended up with Deflategate in 2014: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deflategate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deflategate
• pmyteh 5y ago
  Cricket is somewhat like this. Preparing a 'good' pitch (not too green or uneven, which favours bowlers, but also not too flat and lifeless) is hard. And in the longer forms of the game the pitch seriously deteriorates over the days the game is played. So a good groundskeeper also has to try to arrange a pitch that degrades gracefully. Coupled to that, the surface is very climate and soil dependent, so there are significant differences between grounds (especially between different continents!) even if they all had the same ground staff.
  • Someone 5y ago
    From what I can understand the challenge with cricket pitches is that you don’t want grass on the surface, but you need strong grass roots, to prevent degradation as balls are hurled into a small part of the pitch at high speed hundreds of times. Wimbledon similarly has groundsmen who can almost kill grass without killing it. There, the ideal into have very short grass (8mm, according to https://www.thesun.co.uk/sport/6667985/wimbledon-head-groundsman/ https://www.thesun.co.uk/sport/6667985/wimbledon-head-ground...) and a strong root system. Still, two weeks of tennis each year changes the courts from fully green to, at places, small dust bowls. Relatively recently, football groundsmen have gotten more important, too. Top clubs want smooth grounds with short grass (https://www.theguardian.com/football/2021/jun/15/silicon-valley-of-turf-uk-perfect-football-pitch https://www.theguardian.com/football/2021/jun/15/silicon-val...)
• fifilura 5y ago
  Maybe I am misinterpreting the question slightly, but I wanted to highlight nordic skiing, where each team has a team of ski-waxers. Preparing the skis for the current condition based on temperature an snow texture is absolutely critical for success. And every day is unique.
• chrismcb 5y ago
  Lawn tennis? Golf... There are things that can impact a game. A basketball court on top of an ice rink for example.