“How do we create a world-class facility?” Chargers executive Fred Maas said of The Bolt. “Nothing is ever perfect, but I think we came pretty close.”
The Chargers unveiled The Bolt, their new training facility and headquarters in El Segundo, to members of the media on Thursday. The 150,000-square foot facility is three stories and sits on 14 acres. The equipment room has jerseys, helmets and shoes. (Photo by Brittany M. Solo Press-Telegram/SCNG)
The Chargers unveiled The Bolt, their new training facility and headquarters for members of the media in El Segundo on Thursday, July 11, 2024. The 150,000 square foot facility is three stories and sits on 14 acres. This team meeting room located on the second floor, seats 160 and each seat has a pull up desk table for tablets. (Photo by Brittany M. Solo Press-Telegram/SCNG)
The Chargers unveiled The Bolt, their new training facility and headquarters for members of the media in El Segundo on Thursday, July 11, 2024. The 150,000 square foot facility is three stories and sits on 14 acres. The ground level, focused on the athletes houses the locker room, weight room, lap pool, and a practice field the size of three football fields, with real grass, and many more amenities. (Photo by Brittany M. Solo Press-Telegram/SCNG)
The Chargers unveiled The Bolt, their new training facility and headquarters for members of the media in El Segundo on Thursday, July 11, 2024. The 150,000 square foot facility is three stories and sits on 14 acres. The ground level, focused on the athletes houses the locker room, weight room, lap pool, and a practice field the size of three football fields, with real grass, and many more amenities. (Photo by Brittany M. Solo Press-Telegram/SCNG)
The Chargers unveiled The Bolt, their new training facility and headquarters for members of the media in El Segundo on Thursday, July 11, 2024. The 150,000 square foot facility is three stories and sits on 14 acres. The ground level, focused on the athletes houses the locker room, weight room, lap pool, and a practice field the size of three football fields, with real grass, and many more amenities. (Photo by Brittany M. Solo Press-Telegram/SCNG)
The Chargers unveiled The Bolt, their new training facility and headquarters for members of the media in El Segundo on Thursday, July 11, 2024. The 150,000 square foot facility is three stories and sits on 14 acres. The weight room is indoor/outdoor. (Photo by Brittany M. Solo Press-Telegram/SCNG)
The Chargers unveiled The Bolt, their new training facility and headquarters for members of the media in El Segundo on Thursday, July 11, 2024. The 150,000 square foot facility is three stories and sits on 14 acres. The third floor has a private members only club with an outdoor area that overlooks the practice field. (Photo by Brittany M. Solo Press-Telegram/SCNG)
The Chargers unveiled The Bolt, their new training facility and headquarters for members of the media in El Segundo on Thursday, July 11, 2024. The 150,000 square foot facility is three stories and sits on 14 acres. The equipment room has jerseys, helmets and shoes. (Photo by Brittany M. Solo Press-Telegram/SCNG)
The Chargers unveiled The Bolt, their new training facility and headquarters for members of the media in El Segundo on Thursday, July 11, 2024. The 150,000 square foot facility is three stories and sits on 14 acres. The weight room is indoor/outdoor. (Photo by Brittany M. Solo Press-Telegram/SCNG)
The Chargers unveiled The Bolt, their new training facility and headquarters in El Segundo, to members of the media on Thursday. The 150,000-square foot facility is three stories and sits on 14 acres. The all-positions meeting rooms are adjacent to a turfed walk-through space, allowing coaches and athletes to run through concepts immediately amid discussions. (Photo by Brittany M. Solo Press-Telegram/SCNG)
The Chargers unveiled The Bolt, their new training facility and headquarters for members of the media in El Segundo on Thursday, July 11, 2024. The 150,000 square foot facility is three stories and sits on 14 acres. The ground level, focused on the athletes houses the locker room, weight room, lap pool, and a practice field the size of three football fields, with real grass, and many more amenities. (Photo by Brittany M. Solo Press-Telegram/SCNG)
The Chargers unveiled The Bolt, their new training facility and headquarters for members of the media in El Segundo on Thursday, July 11, 2024. The 150,000 square foot facility is three stories and sits on 14 acres. The ground level, focused on the athletes houses the locker room, weight room, lap pool, and a practice field the size of three football fields, with real grass, and many more amenities. (Photo by Brittany M. Solo Press-Telegram/SCNG)
The Chargers unveiled The Bolt, their new training facility and headquarters for members of the media in El Segundo on Thursday, July 11, 2024. The 150,000 square foot facility is three stories and sits on 14 acres. The ground level, focused on the athletes houses the locker room, weight room, lap pool, and a practice field the size of three football fields, with real grass, and many more amenities. (Photo by Brittany M. Solo Press-Telegram/SCNG)
The Chargers unveiled The Bolt, their new training facility and headquarters for members of the media in El Segundo on Thursday, July 11, 2024. The 150,000 square foot facility is three stories and sits on 14 acres. Chef Jack takes a finished pizza out of the custom mosaic oven. (Photo by Brittany M. Solo Press-Telegram/SCNG)
The Chargers unveiled The Bolt, their new training facility and headquarters for members of the media in El Segundo on Thursday, July 11, 2024. The 150,000 square foot facility is three stories and sits on 14 acres. The cafeteria offers smoothie and coffee bars, pasta, salad, carvery and pizza stations. (Photo by Brittany M. Solo Press-Telegram/SCNG)
The Chargers unveiled The Bolt, their new training facility and headquarters for members of the media in El Segundo on Thursday, July 11, 2024. The 150,000 square foot facility is three stories and sits on 14 acres. The ground level, focused on the athletes houses the locker room, weight room, lap pool, and a practice field the size of three football fields, with real grass, and many more amenities. (Photo by Brittany M. Solo Press-Telegram/SCNG)
The Chargers unveiled The Bolt, their new training facility and headquarters for members of the media in El Segundo on Thursday, July 11, 2024. The 150,000 square foot facility is three stories and sits on 14 acres. This team meeting room located on the second floor, seats 160 and each seat has a pull up desk table for tablets. (Photo by Brittany M. Solo Press-Telegram/SCNG)
The Chargers unveiled The Bolt, their new training facility and headquarters for members of the media in El Segundo on Thursday, July 11, 2024. The 150,000 square foot facility is three stories and sits on 14 acres. The entrance leads directly to the media room where press conferences will be held. (Photo by Brittany M. Solo Press-Telegram/SCNG)
The Chargers unveiled The Bolt, their new training facility and headquarters in El Segundo, to members of the media on Thursday. The 150,000-square foot facility is three stories and sits on 14 acres. The ground level, focused on the players, houses the locker room, weight room, a lap pool and a practice field featuring three full-sized grass football fields. (Photo by Brittany M. Solo Press-Telegram/SCNG)
EL SEGUNDO — The first thing you notice as you approach the Chargers’ gleaming new 150,000-square foot practice facility is the Walk of Fame leading to the lobby entrance, listing each member with his own terrazzo tile and brass inlay in the manner of the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
Once inside, you are dwarfed by the three-story big screen TV, which plays Chargers highlights from seasons past on an endless loop. Deeper inside the facility, dubbed The Bolt, you find a huge new locker room, a huge new weight room, a huge new sauna and three huge new practice fields.
The Chargers’ journey from San Diego to Costa Mesa to El Segundo won’t be complete until training camp begins July 24, and even then there might be a few finishing touches remaining. The third-floor, members-only club remained a work in progress as of Thursday’s media tour.
But long gone are the cramped quarters of the Chargers’ temporary headquarters in Costa Mesa, stuffed into a two-story building that was designed as an office complex and with only room outside for two fields. Their new headquarters sit on a former parking lot for a defense contractor.
So, so long Orange County, hello Los Angeles County.
Fred Maas, the Chargers’ chief of staff and counselor, toured dozens of other facilities around the country in order to help fashion the team’s new headquarters. He visited with the NBA’s Lakers, located just up the street, for instance. He also saw the blueprints for LAFC’s MLS training facility.
In the end, Maas had one task in mind.
“How do we create a world-class facility?” he said. “Nothing is ever perfect, but I think we came pretty close. We had some basic parameters we needed. Three grass fields became non-negotiable. Setting up an environment for our players that was equaled by no one was non-negotiable.
“Sometimes a building is more than a building and this is more than that.”
Finding suitable land in Los Angeles County was another issue to be overcome. The El Segundo location turned out to be just what Maas and the Chargers had in mind, however. For starters, it’s only a 10-minute drive to SoFi Stadium (presumably without traffic on a Sunday morning game day).
It was at least 45 minutes from Costa Mesa.
Plus, if the Chargers really wished to establish a beachhead in Los Angeles after leaving San Diego following the 2016 season in search of a modern new stadium, then they needed to be in Los Angeles. Or, at the very least, in El Segundo, with the Lakers and the NHL’s Kings as their close neighbors.
“We always knew we were coming here,” Maas said of L.A. County. “It was extremely important to the brand and who we are and the identity of the team. It’s not easy finding the opportunity to build a complex like this. This was a parking lot for the Raytheon Corporation, that’s what made it possible. They had 55 acres they were opening up for development and this became an opportunity for us. It wasn’t an opportunity when I started. It emerged over the course of time.
“So, it was fortuitous on our part. It just worked out.”
Starting from scratch enabled the Chargers to create a home unlike any other in their history. Plans for the facility were not set in stone, however. After all, Maas didn’t know when he started that Jim Harbaugh would be their new coach or that Joe Hortiz would be their new general manager.
There were tweaks to be made here and there since Harbaugh and Hortiz were hired earlier this year. Through it all, it’s been a labor of love for Maas and the Chargers organization, and never more so than in recent days.
“I was taking some of the players on a tour (recently) and I realized Joe Alt was 13 years old when I started this (project), and now he’s a first-round pick,” Maas said, referring to the Chargers’ 21-year-old offensive lineman who was picked fifth overall in the NFL draft in April.
“It’s incredible. We broke ground May 19, 2022. We laid out a schedule when we got started that we would open between June 8 and June 15 and on June 8, 2024, we opened our doors. … There are a few things that still need to be done, to be frank. If camp wasn’t coming up here pretty quick. I would like to have another month to test some of the fiber optics, test some of the systems. We still don’t have TVs (throughout the facility operating) yet. We’re working through all of that.
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