What Does It Take to Shape the World’s Most Demanding Playing Surfaces? UPOV Interviews Crystal Rose-Fricker to Find Out.
- McKayla Fricker
- Jun 2
- 1 min read
When global organizations take notice of turfgrass innovation, it is worth paying attention.
Recently, UPOV (International Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants) featured Crystal Rose-Fricker, President of Pure Seed & Pure-Seed Testing, in a conversation on plant breeding and sports.
But the real story is not the interview itself.
It is the years of work that go into every high-performance playing surface. Long before a field is installed, performance is defined through genetics. Turf that can handle pressure, climate variability, and reduced water use is built through a process that takes time, testing, and constant refinement.
That work shows up on some of the world’s biggest stages.
At the 2023 Ryder Cup in Rome, performance was built from the ground up:
Fairways and tee boxes → Pure Dynasty Seeded Paspalum
Roughs → PURELINKS Fine and Tall Fescue Blend
Greens → Pure Distinction Creeping Bentgrass
On another global stage, the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar demanded a different kind of performance, with stadium conditions requiring exceptional traffic tolerance and resilience under wear. See the solution built for that environment:
World Cup Game + Practice Fields → PURESPORT Perennial Ryegrass.
As expectations continue to rise, that work becomes even more important.
The full conversation offers a closer look at what it takes to deliver performance at the highest level.
Read the full interview with Crystal Fricker on UPOV: PVP and Sports: A Conversation with Crystal Rose Fricker, the Award-Winning Plant Breeder Behind the World's Most Iconic Pitches
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