Vice President, Sales and R&D: Robbins Sports Systems
In addition to his family, Mike’s passion has been protecting athletes and performers of all ages and disciplines, from the effects of both acute and long-term overuse injuries. He considers himself to be extraordinarily fortunate to have had the opportunity to work directly with many premier teams, top players, team owners, and trainers throughout his 49-year career with a laser focus on the protection of players, every team’s most valuable asset.
Mike Niese began his hardwood flooring career in 1975 as a carpenter with the Cincinnati Floor Company. In 1982, Mike transferred to Robbins Sports Surfaces where he became the new Technical Service Manager. With Mike’s analytical mindset, aided by his educational background in sciences, mathematics, and Mineralogy, he was assigned the additional responsibility of designing new flooring products and systems for Robbins Sports Surfaces. In the coming decades Mike would serve as a NOFMA flooring instructor at their national flooring school for more than 12 years. He has also served on MFMA’s Technical Committee for more than 35 years where he worked with many other committee members in crafting and co-authoring many of the MFMA System Specifications, MFMA Position Statements, enhancing and fine-tuning MFMA Grading rules for both RL and FJ, and assisted in the establishment of the MFMA PUR testing standards. In 1987, Mike was instrumental in bringing the DIN testing protocols to North America working with Peter Knauf and Hans Schmid of the Otto Graf Institute in Stuttgart, Germany.
During his career Mike authored and co-authored more than 25 patents in the Recreational Sports Flooring industry. Many of his pioneering designs continue to be promoted by the industry to this day.
Over the past several decades Mike has dedicated much of his time studying the bio-science of athletes interacting with the flooring systems we all know and promote.
We all have a more sophisticated and safe industry thanks to individuals like Mike.