BOULDER — Helping to celebrate the “topping off” construction benchmark of Colorado’s $156 million athletic facilities project Monday, CU football coach Mike MacIntyre said the upgrades will give the Buffaloes the best facilities in the Pac-12.
“I say that because we’re the last to do it, and we have taken ideas from others,” MacIntyre said.
The project, originally contracted for $143 million and requiring an additional $13 million to cover cost overruns, began nine months ago. Much of the 375,000-square-foot project is scheduled to be completed this summer.
Monday, the final beam was put in place by steel workers atop the building housing a “high-performance sports center” and football operations center attached to the northeast corner of Folsom Field. Workers affixed an American flag and a CU flag to the top beams.
“To watch (construction workers) do what you do, it makes us proud to be part of the team,” Colorado athletic director Rick George said. “This is going to be transformational and vital to our athletic department, in the short term and with a long-term vision. This will allow us to recruit an even higher-level athlete and compete for championships.”
The facilities project includes the football center, more space for sports medicine and academics, expanded office space, meeting rooms and lockers for CU’s Olympic sports in a redesign of the Dal Ward Center, a high-performance center to also be available for public use, and an indoor practice facility that will include a 100-yard football field and a 300-meter indoor track.
All facilities except the indoor practice facility are scheduled to be completed by early August.
George said CU representatives visited Pac-12 athletic departments and also examined the facilities of other schools to get ideas.
The refurbished Dal Ward Center and the new facilities will be connected.
“This all works together,” George said. “For example, once you come from academics in the Dal Ward Center, which a lot of our student-athletes are going to do, as soon as you go into the new building there will be a nutrition bar. That will connect to our Champions Club, which is where we’ll have training table (dining). It all fits.”
MacIntyre said the new facilities should help recruiting for the 2016 class.
“This year, it helped. But with the next class, we’ll be able to show that it’s for real,” MacIntyre said. “Recruiting last year, we’d just broken ground. When (prospects) come this summer for camps and visits, they’re going to be blown away.”
Tom Kensler: tkensler@denverpost.com or
