Study finds slower sprint times, acceleration, and agility vs. other natural infills

CALHOUN, GA / ACCESS Newswire / June 10, 2026 / Key Takeaways:

• Wood particle infill ranked last in sprint, acceleration, and agility testing, delivering the weakest athletic performance.

• Cork, corn cob, and olive pit infills showed characteristics closely aligned with natural grass and SBR, performing better than wood.

• Wood's lower sprint performance is linked to greater surface compliance and reduced energy restitution, meaning more of the athlete's input is absorbed by the surface rather than returned as propulsion.

• Lower bulk density makes wood particle infill less stable under load, limiting an athlete's ability to generate horizontal force and acceleration.

• Research published in Sports Engineering confirms that infill selection directly affects athletic performance and injury risk, and that not all natural infill systems perform equally on synthetic turf fields.

"On WC [wood particle] and PC [pine cone] fields, players recorded their slowest sprint times, and overall performance was lower compared to NG [natural grass] and ELT [end-of-life tires]."

"These infills tend to compress more and return less energy, meaning more of the athlete's effort is absorbed into the surface rather than used for propulsion."

The conclusions above highlight one of several findings from a recent study published by Sports Engineering, a prominent peer-reviewed journal, authored by a group of researchers from FIFA and leading university sports departments across Europe.

Through an extensive series of tests, the research shows that artificial turf with wood particle infill delivered the weakest overall performance compared to other vegetal/natural infills, natural grass, and ELT (end-of-life tires / styrene-butadiene rubber) used in the study.

ELT or more commonly referred to as SBR in North America, is a common and popular infill choice for synthetic turf sports field installations. Thousands of fields in the U.S. are installed with SBR, many FIFA Quality and/or Quality Pro certified.

Not All Infills Are Created Equal

FieldTurf offers a leading collection of natural infill solutions, designed to provide optimal traction, performance, and durability. With their proven benefits, natural infills are a viable alternative to high-performance SBR infill, which continues to provide consistency and durability at the highest levels of play. In addition, natural infills offer additional heat reduction benefits. But with any product choice, it's important to understand the advantages and considerations.

The published study, A field-based analysis of artificial football pitches with different vegetal infills, compared the effects of artificial football surfaces with different natural infills on players' physical performance. A field experiment was conducted with 30 amateur male football players who completed a battery of tests across the seven surface types.

Five vegetal infills alongside one with SBR infill and a natural grass surface were evaluated. Every surface evaluated complied with the FIFA Quality Programme and was verified using FIFA-standardized mechanical test procedures for surface-player interaction.

• Cork

• Corn Cob

• Olive Pits

• Pine Cones

• Wood Particles

Evaluating Natural Infill Performance

According to the study, its aim was to "compare how fields with different vegetal infills affect players' kinetic performance and to assess the differences between these fields and the most common football surfaces: natural grass and traditional artificial turf with [SBR] as performance infill."

The results were telling, especially regarding the efficacy of wood infill, which proved to be lacking in key areas. The below shows how wood infill performed:

Index: WC = Wood Chips, OP = Olive Pits, PC = Pine Cone, Corn = Corn Cob, Cork = Cork

When comparing the average performance of each solution across these three tests, focused on speed, acceleration, and agility, the resulting ranking places wood infill at the very bottom. Moreover, it deviated most from SBR behavior, behaving least like a conventional infill system of all products tested.

The study further expounded on the wood particle infill's performance in the 5-0-5 agility test:

Concerning the [change of direction] test, all vegetal fields showed lower times in the 5-0-5 test compared to the [SBR] field and similar times to the [natural grass] field, except for the [wood particles], suggesting that these materials may provide traction levels closely aligned with [natural grass]. Excessive or insufficient traction has been associated with increased injury risk and impaired performance, highlighting the importance of achieving a functional balance in surface design.

The research also emphasized the lower force production and slower sprint performance observed on the wood and pine cone systems, stating that this could be explained by their mechanical behavior.

Both infills showed characteristics consistent with greater compliance and lower effective energy restitution, implying that a larger fraction of the athlete's input is absorbed by the surface and not returned during propulsion.... Additionally, the irregular particle geometry and comparatively lower bulk density of these infills likely decrease infill stability under load, further limiting horizontal force transmission and acceleration.

Test results, combined with these assessments, show that wood particle infill can be detrimental to athlete performance in key areas, and that decision-makers should strongly consider other natural infill solutions instead.

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SOURCE: FieldTurf