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OTTO Sport Technology in the Emirates |
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 For non-professionals it’s difficult to understand why to ship sand to a desert region. For Otto Sport this process has become usual business in the meantime: During the past year the German surface specialists have successfully managed several major projects in the Middle East, among them construction of a 3,000 m race track in the United Arab Emirates.
„Sand is not like another“, said general managers Werner and Wolfgang Otto in order to explain the reason why their company had delivered approx. 20,000 tons of sand to the Arabian Peninsula in 2009. „Professional equestrian sports requires high-quality sand with a very high quartz proportion, desert sand is not suited for this purpose.”
Three imposing equestrian facilities in the Emirates are now happy to possess a state-of-the-art equestrian surface: the race track at Palm Sports Resort in Al-Ain (Abu Dhabi) measuring 68,000 square metres in total, and the outdoor arenas at the renowned Zabeel Stables of Dubai (10,000 sqm.) and the Abu Dhabi International Shooting Club (15,000 sqm.).
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| To achieve an appropriate footing consistency for professional equestrian sports, sand has to be blended with special additives. The Otto Sport team on-site meticulously monitored the mixture process in order to make sure the perfect mixture ratio at any time. Only the mixture process for the Al-Ain project took three months. |
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For the outdoor riding arenas 25,000 of Otto Sport’s patent-registered mats were additionally delivered and set underneath the sand layer. The family-run company is satisfied with the projects: „We have implemented projects that have underlined our image within the equestrian sector“, said Wolfgang Otto. Certainly, the German surface experts have strengthened their position on the Arab market in the past year. They are prepared for new projects even if that requires shipment of sand into the desert.
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