The supplier of the characteristic blue flooring used for the Champions League matches is Gerflor. eurohandball.com talks to Xavier Nicolau, Gerflor’s Sports Federations & Events Manager.
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Top Conditions for Top Performances
 The official flooring supplier of the Champions League is Gerflor. The French company has been in partnership with the European Handball Federation since 2004. From the season 2006/07, all the men’s Champions League matches are played on the characteristic flooring with blue field, black surrounding and white lines produced and provided by the company. Starting with the season 2007/08, all CL matches will be played on the same floor. It means a big logistical and technical effort for clubs, Gerflor and the EHF.
eurohandball.com talks to Xavier Nicolau, Gerflor’s Sports Federations & Events Manager.
 eurohandball.com: How many people work in research and development of handball/sports flooring?
Xavier Nicolau: Gerflor has three research centres with 50 people working in research and development. Innovating is one of our major concerns.
eurohandball.com: What is the technological background of Gerflor handball flooring?
Xavier Nicolau: The Taraflex sports floors are designed to reduce the risk of injury through increased comfort and shock absorption without compromising performance. The unique laminating construction provides shock absorption to cushion athletes’ pounding, and reduces stress on their joints, thus helping fight fatigue and reduce the risk of injury. The multi-layered floors provide safety and performance through a laminating process that incorporates a 100% pure vinyl, hard wearing layer with reinforced fibreglass and patented closed-cell foam backing.
 eurohandball.com: Is there any special quality that handball flooring needs respect to other sports flooring?
Xavier Nicolau: Our first aim when developing our floors is to ensure the safety of the athletes and give them top conditions for top performances.
We look at areas like shock absorption, friction control, and skin burns when the players fall on the floor. The consistent ball bounce when players dribble comes in addition.
Taraflex Sport M+ offers the best compromise between comfort, sport performance and safety for players.
eurohandball.com: What do you think about EHF Champions League as partner and media platform for your company?
Xavier Nicolau: For Gerflor technical partnership is much more important than advertising. Partnership with EHF Champions League is an excellent way to demonstrate the high quality and the high sport performance level of our product. This is also a great opportunity to make public relations operations with our customers. We show them directly Taraflex Sport M+ used by the best handball teams in Europe. The same product is used for their gym halls. The business of Gerflor is based on B-to-B.
 eurohandball.com:Does it make you proud to see all matches played on a Gerflor product?
Xavier Nicolau: Gerflor is very proud to be the official supplier of the EHF Champions League. It is really impressive when you see all these games played on same designed court. This is the result of a great development job made by EHF members and staff. They lead this project with a lot of enthusiasm and it is a great pleasure to support the EHF Marketing team. TEXT: eurohandball.com
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