Groundhopping
Groundhopping is a hobby that involves attending matches at as many different stadiums or grounds as possible. Participants are known as groundhoppers, hoppers or travellers. Largely a football-related pastime, groundhopping probably found its origin in football in the 1970s in England. From the late 1980s fans in Germany started groundhopping as well. Currently it is especially popular in the United Kingdom, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium and Norway.
There is no universal set of rules for counting ‘hopped grounds’, although a generally accepted one is that a match must have been seen at the ground.
There are some formal organisations for groundhoppers, including The 92 Club in England, which consists of groundhoppers who have visited matches in all stadiums of the Premier and Football League.[1] With this there are also (mostly) charity based races to see who can go round the 92 Football League Stadia in the shortest amount of time, initially being called 92 Grounds in 92 Hours, the current record is 72 hours, set by four fans of Swindon Town in 2015.[2]
References[]
- ^ "Ninety-Two Club. Home Page". www.ninetytwoclub.org.uk. Retrieved 4 October 2017.
- ^ www.the92.net. "Doing the 92 League Grounds in 72 hours for a good cause". www.the92.net. Retrieved 2020-07-20.
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