Rackets at Harrow School
Harrow was the first school to play Rackets and in 1865 the first to build a covered court for the game. The project was to repair the 1865 court and upgrade its playing surfaces to modern standards.
The need for change
- After more than a century and a half in use the playing surfaces had become patched and uneven.
- The court was built before size was standardised, as a ‘doubles’ court. For championship play it had to be reduced in width and length.
- The viewing angles from the gallery were too shallow, only the front row could see the 10 foot line.
The project
A standard rackets court is 30 ft x... Read more.
Rackets at Harrow School
Harrow was the first school to play Rackets and in 1865 the first to build a covered court for the game. The project was to repair the 1865 court and upgrade its playing surfaces to modern standards.
The need for change
- After more than a century and a half in use the playing surfaces had become patched and uneven.
- The court was built before size was standardised, as a ‘doubles’ court. For championship play it had to be reduced in width and length.
- The viewing angles from the gallery were too shallow, only the front row could see the 10 foot line.
The project
A standard rackets court is 30 ft x 60 ft x 30 ft high, (9.144 m x 18.288), with a tolerance of +/- 0.13% or 24 mm in length and 12 mm in width.
The game uses the front wall to reflect the ball back into play, like squash but bigger and faster.
The ball is covered in white tape, quite hard and small [38 mm diameter and 28 g in weight], and travels fast [up to 180 mph]. It’s a game of quick reactions and predictions. The ball is often behind the players, out of sight, so they rely on the performance of the court, its predictability and the sounds of impact and the ball in flight to help spatialise. In this sense the court as a whole is an instrument for the players, like the racket or the ball. They depend on it.
The walls and floor of the court must be flat, hard enough to receive and reflect the ball, with enough friction to respond to spin.
Early courts had flagstone floors. The 1865 court at Harrow had an [unreinforced] concrete floor laid in 10 ft segments laid over compacted gravel, the concrete varying in thickness from about 70mm to 100mm with a thin black coat of granolithic material forming the top surface.
The new floor was constructed as a 250 mm thick power-floated concrete slab, incorporating some trace underfloor heating to prevent condensation, over a layer of insulation. It is a covered rather than an indoor court, so the space is unheated. The floor finish is epoxy resin in a ’bright tomato’ red: RAL – 3013.
Specialist dense, black plaster is used for the walls. This is installed without expansion joints so it forms natural hairline cracks without delaminating from the wall behind. A different plaster finish is required for the front and side walls. If the front wall is too slippery, a ‘foul cut’ occurs. The front wall has more grip and side walls more ‘slip’.
The walls behind should match closely the thermal expansion properties of the plaster. This means ‘wet’ construction: brick or dense block work, allowing time between the various stages of construction for materials to cure and reach equilibrium. In modern rackets courts walls are typically 140 mm thick 11 N/mm2 dense block work. In this case the new inner walls were constructed in dense block work with stainless steel bed reinforcement in alternate courses, varying from 100 mm tied to the brick on the side walls, to 215 mm on the front wall.
New lighting was designed to achieve minimum 750 lux over the playing surface with minimum glare. Illuminance was modelled and fine tuned to suit the the different areas of play, so that higher levels are achieved in most of the court without hotspotting.
The technical analysis stage of the project included visiting precedent projects to learn lessons, and generous technical and practical advice from experts at the Queens Club, Harrow School Rackets Pro. John Eaton and former world champion Howard Angus who provided detailed advice on lighting.
Conservation and heritage
The design approach was to retain as much of the historic fabric as possible, to alter only what was necessary to achieve the project objectives, and for new work to be either invisible or clearly distinguishable from old.
Environment
Floor and walls have high thermal mass. Temperature was further stabilised by insulating the floor and external walls. The existing roof is not insulated.
Logistics
Forming foundations for the new inner walls, on a sloping site where the existing foundation stepped deeply, required the removal of over 500 tonnes of spoil across Harrow’s famous ‘100 steps’ whilst the school was in operation. This involved a conveyor belt bridge across the steps and down the hill for collection at the base. The ground levels also necessitated installing a drained cavity.
Project execution
The project was carried out from April to October 2019, and the court was officially opened, after a pause for the COVID shutdown, on 27 April 2022.
The project met exact technical performance requirements and was successfully completed in an historic building within an existing, operating school.
Points to consider for rackets courts
Always allow time in the programme for drying out.
Logistics, programme and method are crucial where large amounts of spoil and goods need to be moved.
Develop good collaboration between users and specifiers, specifiers and specialist contractors, so everyone understands the requirements.
Preparation and precedent studies include interviewing users of past projects to understand technical performance in use.
Use dark grey/black netting when separating the gallery form the play area.
External links
Case study of the Harrow court: https://www.tennisandrackets.com/rackets/court-development/case-studies/harrow
Harrow School Rackets Campaign: https://www.harrowschool.org.uk/support/rackets-campaign
How to play rackets: https://www.tennisandrackets.com/rackets/how-to-play
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