The International Jugger Blog

¡Feliz año nuevo! Frohes Neues! Happy New Year!

nospam@example.com (Uhu - Admin) — Sun, 01 Jan 2012 00:01:00 +0100

2011 passed like a flash. Yet many things have happened that I would call remarkable in the Jugger world:

Item. Development in Spain.

The Spanish community is growing even stronger. Spain held an International Tournament. Galicia has posted a nice intoduction on its Association on Jugger at the IJB, showing the high spirits for the sport.
Also there had been an unpleasant, yet important discussion on a spanish team that had symbols and names associated with the fascist movement Falange, leading to a declaration at the IJB and at other places against such ideologies.

Item. Development in the U.S.
U.S. Jugger developed further to a stable sport Jugger community, also it might be the country with the most different ways of (current) Jugger styles.

Item. Development in Germany.

The re-formed Jugger League has made its second year now.

For the first time, the German Championships have not been held in Berlin, but in Waidhaus, Bavaria.

The Ostdeutsche Winterliga has started (East German Winter League games). For a detailed description, see Jugglers Jugg.

The Jugger e. V. Berlin has now its own official training grounds at the former Tempelhof Airport airfield.

Item. Miscellaneous Jugger stuff in Germany.

The Jugger-Wiki has been set up by Nalf and Uhu and is expanding as a good resource on the sport (only in German yet, sorry). Editors welcome.

Inspired by Munchkin(r), Falco jugger player Leo initiated an own card game called "Pompfkin". Get it for free at the web page of team Falco jugger.

The (up to my knowledge) first printed issue of a fanzine has been published and released at the 14th German Championships. It is still ready for download.

A patch was made by Falco jugger for those teams who expressively do not want to play in a highly structuralized Leauge but have sportive ambitions nevertheless, "Jugger libres".

Item. Uhus stuff.

The team I founded in January 2007 has had a very successful year, in all tournaments except Hamburg we got ranks 2-4. And even in Hamburg, we were part of the top one-third. The falcon is flying high!

Last, the first factbook on Jugger has been "freed", thus becoming a free-to-download ebook/PDF in English at uhusnest.

The International Jugger Blog: Reject Fascism

nospam@example.com (Uhu - Admin) — Thu, 24 Nov 2011 13:18:52 +0100

foreword: I hope this post is OK for all current editors of The International Jugger Blog. I felt it necessary because of some discussions, see below.

Fascism is not just another political point of view.
Fascism is not a joke.
Fascism is not history.
But well learn of fascist history.

Fascism, and its associated ideologies like Nazi/Neonazi ideologies, negates basic human rights. It is responsible for the death of millions of millions of people, in Germany alone for over 6.000.000 (!) Jews being murdered just for their belief, or just for being what they were; in addition to so many others murdered for their belief, sexual orientation or political engagement. Look it up in the history books.

There is no way we can tolerate such an ideology. This is not a matter of left-wing bearings or similar. This is a duty to anyone respecting human rights.

Politics should not be intermixed with sport. But especially in extremist tendencies, an intermixing is inevitable. So "Politics has nothing to do with sports" does not solve, merely ignore the problem in this case. And ignoring all too quickly equals accepting.

The International Jugger Blog hereby states that it, as well as anyone posting entries on it (at least after 11-24-2011), declares that he or she stands for tolerance, democratic tenets and human rights.
The founder and chief editor of the Blog, Uhu, in November 2011

Examples for images for web pages (click to enlarge), CC nc-sa 3.0 (for more logos etc., see the Jugger Wiki):

You will find this post as a permanent page at http://juggerblog.net/index.php?/pages/jugger_vs_fascism.html .
--
Reason for this declaration is a discussion on a Spanish Jugger team, ⇒found here at the Jugger forum.

Jugger Ohio (Jugger in the USA that has nothing to do with LARPing!!)

nospam@example.com (Wess A-M (Wess The Destroyer) - Jugger Ohio) — Mon, 14 Nov 2011 23:14:35 +0100

The rise of German-style, European Jugger began in October of 2010, in the small and historic town of Marietta, Ohio by Wess Apshaga-Meaux. He had been a fan of The Blood of Heroes movie since seeing it in the early 1990s but had no idea it was being played for real as a sport until he ran across German and Australian videos online.

Within a week, he had made two complete sets of pompfen (including chains), a mock dog skull and goals. By the following week he had the first Jugger game in that part of the world organized and "Jugger Ohio" was born.

Utilizing social media to plan everything, weekly Jugger matches continued to draw people both of a young and of an older demographic. This use of social media also allowed Jugger Ohio to communicate with the handful of other Jugger groups spread out over the USA as well as groups worldwide.

Wess and Jugger Ohio, with the help of Chad McCann of Oklahoma City's Red Dirt Jugger Club, organized the first ever American Jugger tournament. Two teams from Oklahoma traveled over 1,000 miles (1,682 km) to compete against two teams from Ohio in the innagural tournament, "The Dogskull Classic". The hosting team, The Marietta Murder prevailed as the winning team and the first official American Jugger Champions.

Though still a small community compared to elsewhere in the world, the American Juggers are very dedicated to the promotion and growth of the sport we all love so much!

Contact Jugger Ohio via their facebook page by searching for "Jugger Ohio" or email us at jugger.ohio@gmail.com

---
((/ Note of the Moderator, please clear [IMG] tags to display pictures properly, and set width="450", thanks))

My personal Jugger Photo of the Year

nospam@example.com (Uhu - Admin) — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 07:10:00 +0200

My personal favorite as Jugger photo of the year 2011. Taken by Linus.

And here, the truly awesome video Linus made at the Berlin Masters this year (iframe):

Finally: Free-to-download PDF of the English Jugger book!

nospam@example.com (Uhu - Admin) — Thu, 15 Sep 2011 10:08:52 +0200

Finally, it is done: After having prepared a layout for the Jugger fanzine, I decided over night that it might be just the time to do what I had planned long before: To publish the English translation of the first Jugger book for free, as a PDF file.

→ Free download of the Jugger book, beta version

What you will get right now is a quick-and-dirty beta version of the book.
I wanted to make it available now, so please forgive me
spelling and translation errors. The content will be revised at the next update (including the history section).

Yet I depend on your help. It would be great if you could contribute details on your different ways in playing Jugger compaired to the German version, so I can include your "national" rules into the update of the book and make it more international. The book is not meant as a "so you have to do it", but just to give an insight on German and other countries Jugger and inspire own ways of playing.
So, the International section is designed to grow, but since I simply lack time, it is still quite small at the moment.
Also, any reviews are very very welcome! Just keep in mind that it is a beta "quick shot", since I had to re-design the complete layout (due to legal reasons).

Please refer to http://jugger.uhusnest.de/en_juggerbook.shtml as the download location, since I haven't decided about a final publisher for the free version yet (the link at uhusnest will be updated while the deep link to the file itself will soon be out of date).

If you have good experiences with a publishing platform for such an English handbook, please drop me a note! It must be free to use, and must accept PDF files as well as file revisions (deleting the old file and replacing it with the update). Also, copyright has to remain by me re. the photographers.

Galician Association of Jugger

nospam@example.com (Lebor Corbalis - Jugger España) — Wed, 14 Sep 2011 22:16:30 +0200

Greetings jugger warriors!
I am pleased to announce the “Galician Association of Jugger”, born in December of 2010 in the city of “A Coruña”, Galicia (northwestern Spain).

As many other associations, communities or groups about jugger, we seek to play and expand this awesome sport around our homeland, hoping one day we can reach a high level of players and teams to make several tournaments, leagues and other competitions and activities.
Along with our jugger partners in Spain, we also wish to see the birth of a "Spanish Federation of Jugger", (actually been cradled for a, maybe, near future).

It’s been a hard path since December 2010 (especially if everyone knows nothing about jugger) but at last we succeeded. In May 2011 we were celebrating a historical point of our association: after participating in an exhibition called “ExpOtaku” we reached near 150 different players in just 9 hours of jugger sessions (near 210 players altogether). From this moment, teams became to appear and others began to be founded.
Nowadays we have lots of people interested but few teams really active and compromised with our organization (near 8); some others are still waiting to have more time and more teams near their cities and towns. This is the next big point we want and also need to improve.

This weekend, on 18th of September, we’ll be playing our first league among 6 teams. It will take near 5 or 6 weeks, playing six matches per Sunday, and we wish this to become our first quite big event where players can enhance their experience, training and of course enjoy playing and make friends (beer is also included!). The first step to a better future…

Visiting our website and forum you may find everything about us; you can watch some videos and pictures and read about our activities, events, tools tutorials, rules and teams as well.

Feel free to contact us in jugger.galicia@gmail.com (preferably in English; we also have one German speaker); I will be happy to assist you answering all your questions or even speak about future meetings and events among our beloved Europe.

Hope to meet you all in the “battlefield” someday. Best wishes from Galicia!
“Abur” / “Auf Wiedersehen” .

Signed: “Lébor Corbalis”,
Founder of the Galician Association of Jugger.
http://juggergalicia.comze.com/

Jugger in Austria

nospam@example.com (Daniel Ebbert - Jugger Netherlands) — Tue, 13 Sep 2011 13:54:38 +0200

A few weeks ago I heard of Jugger in Austria, espacially in Vienna so i asked them for an introduction and a few pictures and here is it all for you.

Sunday. 8pm.
3 friends rest from a long
battle in a greek restaurant. The waiter tries to understand the
story behind a handful of battered people, having a bunch of taped
self-made weapons leaning at their table. Completely worn out with
marks, only a juggerian warrior could bear, they enjoy their first
served beer. And in the blink of an eye, all scratches, bruises and
tiredness dissolve in pure pleasure. Jugger Vienna most certainly
turned out to be one of the best sport experiences of all our team
members.

Well.. who startet that wonderful madness?? Two enthusiasts
from germany founded the first Austrian Jugger team in 2010. It never
stopped growing since. Compared to other Juggerians, our style might
be a little different. Why? Many reasons. For one thing, we have more
female players than male. There is an age variance, reaching from
young kids to parents and there is only one strict rule in our
colourful community: have fun to the fullest and treat everybody as
an equal.

You can find us taunting, fighting, running, tumbling,
succeeding and laughing in the parks of Vienna - mostly Praterwiese
and Donauinsel. We learned, that between slagliners, rugby players,
football artists and sun bathing beauties - Jugger always takes the
throne in attention! Give us enough weapons to equip all curious and
interested people - we could play at least 3 games at a time. Only a
couple of months passed since the first steps were taken, and each
and everyone of us became a believer in one of the best team sport
experiences ever. And every time we try to explain the magic of our
sundays to our clueless friends, there will be that moment in which a
mischievous smile flashes over our faces. That moment when all those
memories of amazing days we shared cross our minds. "Jugger?
Can't be explained. Must be played!!"

Here also a picture of the team ...

... and the two founders.

And if you want to contact the Jugger players in Vienna, this is they're E-Mail-adress: jugger.wien@gmx.at

Articles / reports for the Fanzine / 3rd German Open welcome!

nospam@example.com (Uhu - Admin) — Fri, 09 Sep 2011 07:53:00 +0200

After the first Fanzine (a fan-made, noncommercial magazine) on Jugger has just arrived here from the printers and just looks awesome (I mean the print quality, the content is up to you to judge) I decided that there has to be a second issue at the 3rd German Open next year!

I would like to invite you to write an article about Jugger, or aspects of Jugger, or a great tournament in your country, or on your way of playing, Pompfen making, whatever! Just grab the pens!

As for the length, it should be less than 3,000 characters, something like 1,000 would be perfect – yet more or less will not be a problem. Also, I would love to include pictures to your article (even if it may be just one).

If you could write a short synopsis in English (just some sentences), the rest of the article may well be written in your own language!

So, I would love to get your articles, the sooner the better. Just send them to me, and if you don't have my mail adress, look up the user Ein Uhu at http://forum.jugger.org and contcat him

3. German Open at 2nd week-end of September, Berlin

nospam@example.com (Uhu - Admin) — Mon, 29 Aug 2011 16:03:07 +0200

The date for the 3rd German Open is set: It will be at the 2nd week-end of September,

September 8th/9th 2012

The location is now definite as well: Berlin. We think it will be at the Ludwig Jahn Sportpark (where the Berlin Masters were held this year).
Book your flights!

Addendum: Teams may now register! See here: http://jugger.projekt-internet.de/tournament.php?id=72

updating the blog

nospam@example.com (Uhu - Admin) — Fri, 11 Mar 2011 15:48:50 +0100

Due to an important software update, it will take a bit until the original layout is restored. Thanks for patience!

A kind reminder to the blog editors:
Please include the tag
width="450"
in the IMG SRC tag if you put bigger pictures in your blog post. Otherwise the blog gets "oversized".
Thanks!

A comparsion of the german and the irish Jugger Rulebook

nospam@example.com (Daniel Ebbert - Jugger Netherlands) — Tue, 01 Mar 2011 11:49:57 +0100

A few months ago when I came back from a training I though about all that stuff that we discuss very often. But in the four weeks I spend in Dublin we had not one discussion like this. So I started to compare the Rulebooks.

The version of the irish Rulebook I used was written by Peter Houlihan. This version isn't final but there will be an election about his Rulebook.

Let's start with the point that everybody knew who played once against an irish team. In irish Jugger an double is only a double if the two players hit each other exactly in the same moment. Here I always have the discussion if it's a double or not if I hit somebody with my chain first, but he hits he too. "Was it a half second or not?" Who can make that decision? In this point I think the irish rule is more practicable and more precisely. Here's the part from the irish rules:

The first player to hit the other wins, no matter how close behind the other player was. However if two hits land so close together that the gap between them cannot be distinguished they are considered to have „doubled“ [...]. Either player may call a double and if they insist (if they call it three times or more) both players must accept the double [...]. Also, if one player hits another at the same time as they strike a third the second two players are considered hit.

Another point that is discussed on every tournament is about standing up: A few say you're risen once you stretch your leg, the others say you're risen when you made the first step. And a few others mean you're risen when you make the first move. Once again the irish rules are more precisely:

After a player has completed their count they must attempt to rise immediately if they are unpinned, runners are exempt from this and may stay down as long as they wish. When rising a player may block with their spar as soon as their knee is off the ground, but their hits will not count until half a stone after they have begun their rise.

Well, now we could discuss if it's need's to be a half stone or if that's a too long time to rise, but in this way you don't get a discussion when you're risen or not. In my point of view that's better than the german version.

For the runners it's allowed to stay down tactically. The same for spar players but only if another spar player is in range, after that he must rise immediately. In the german rulebook there isn't an exact definition:

Den Spielern ist es erlaubt, aus taktischen Gründen über die Strafzeit hinaus knien zu bleiben. Für die Dauer des Kniens dürfen Spieler nur gepinnt werden.

In comparison the part from the irish rulebook:

Other players have the option of staying down if another spar player is already within hitting distance. For fixed spars this means that the spar player could touch the rising player without moving their feet, for chain players this means that the chain is within range and half a swing of the rising player.

Another little difference is about pinning. In the german rulebook is written that you can't pin two people at the same time. In the irish rulebook it is:

Only one player may be pinned with one spar at a time however a player with two short swords [but not q-tips] may pin two other players.

That could be useful if you have someone who is good with two short swords.

And what about the chains? In irish rules only a 180° wrap counts as a hit, and if you wrap a spar the first 360° count as a hit if the ball gets you. In my point of view we should add this to the german rulebook and as I know a few teams already handle it this way.

Now the differences for the runners. A point in irish Jugger counts once the skull is in the goal, not when no runner touches it:

A runner is considered to have scored from the moment any part of the skull enters the goal.

Another point is that if you leave the court within the range of a chain you must get down for eight stones.

And about the stones, according to irish rules a stone is 2 seconds and not 1,5 as in the german rules. Also there aren't any limitations for changing players. And the last point is that the court lines aren't part of the pitch.

At the end I can say that in the german rules is more space for interpretation and that the most rules in the irish rulebook are easier. I for my part prefer the irish rulebook.

Continue reading "A comparsion of the german and the irish Jugger Rulebook"

International tournament in Spain

nospam@example.com (Santiago García - Jugger Espania) — Wed, 02 Feb 2011 11:51:55 +0100

Hello all,

After some time of work, here you have the publicity of the first Spanish International Tournament.

Also I copy the information that HL have posted in the forums with information:

Hello there!

The Aragoness Jugger Asociation is preparing the International Zaragoza Tournament, which will take place in Leciñena (a town 20min away from Zaragoza) during the 2nd and 3th of April. The Registration fee will be 5 € per person, and each team has to bring his own equipation. The Tournament itself will be played the 2nd and part of the 3th of April (Saturday and Sunday) in the Football Field of Leciñena. There is a Sports Hall/Pabillion where we can sleep (and play the Tournamente in case of bad weather) for free, however anybody willing to pay de Hostel-like stablishment will be able to sleep in a warm bed XD. Any doubts, questions or even sugestions you have, please feel free to share them with me (if you prefer in English; no german sorry) and we'll see what we can do.

Once that's been said, I would like to ask you a couple of things. Do you know how are you gonna come? How many teams, players and/or fans are you gonna come? If you need help with anything at all: contacts, special diets, jugger material or slipping material; please feel free to ask us and we'll find a solution together.

See you soon.
Greetings, HL

Hope we can see you in the field.

2011

nospam@example.com (Uhu - Admin) — Sat, 01 Jan 2011 00:00:00 +0100

Happy new year! Frohes Neues Jahr! ¡feliz año nuevo!

Quite a bit has happened in 2010, the community in Span is growing rapidly, more and more teams are forming - we may look forward to an interesting new year 2011! Happy Dog skull hunting!

As a personal side note, thanks to all who contributed to the new book on Jugger with interviews, photos and other input. Great!

Jugger in Amsterdam

nospam@example.com (Daniel Ebbert - Jugger Netherlands) — Sat, 30 Oct 2010 15:21:53 +0200

Jugger has arrived in Amsterdam 1,5 years ago. Two Jugger players form Münster in Germany moved to Amsterdam after they played Jugger in Münster for a long time. After they got used to life in Amsterdam, they started building weapons and promote Jugger. Now there are always enough players to play at least 3 against 3 or some training games.

At the weekend of the 16./17. October two people (@nalfion and @p0Ldi_MS) from Münster visited Amsterdam. They brought a strong chain with them, since you can only buy chains with a small diameter in the Netherlands, probarbly the same problem as in Spain.

On the first day we built the chains and on the second day we trained in the Martin-Luther-Kingpark, you can watch pictures of this training on flickr.

If you want to join the training there is a doodle and a forum to coordinate the trainings, so feel free to use them and join the training.

Jugger in Spain

nospam@example.com (Pablo J. Dominguez - Jugger Espania) — Sat, 09 Oct 2010 18:04:36 +0200

Greetings from Spain, players and Jugger fans over the world!

It’s been a while since our last post with news about the development of Jugger in our country. This wonderful sport has been spread faster than expected, and now there are great teams and brand-new tournaments in a few cities and towns, but the most activity it’s focused on Valencia, Zaragoza and the capital, Madrid.

Let’s write a bit about the different competitions that are running nowadays.

The main tournaments are the National ones. There are three of them over the year, and each one is independent from the others. They’re called Winter Tournament (Zaragoza), Summer Tournament (Valencia) and “Tuna” Tournament (Madrid). The name of the “tuna” one comes from a pun in Spanish, as “tuna” is said “atun” in our language, a word with a similar spelling as the word “autumn”.

The champions in the last editions of the national tournaments were Old Ducks in Zaragoza (with finalists Plan B and Black Dragons), and Black Dragons in Valencia (with finalist Spuggers).

The first “Atun” Tournament will be held on October 23th in the Juan Carlos I Park, starting at 10am. This event seems to be the first ever to join together teams representing all Spain, including some of the most veterans. Since today, eight teams have confirmed their assistance. If you’re interested in it, check the Jugger Madrid forum

In Valencia exists another kind of regional competition: the JuggerSlam is a set of three tournaments wit a playoff system that run from September to March. The scores are accumulative, so the team with most points at the end of the season is the ultimate champion. The first competition, Senpai Tournament, was played on September 25th, and the results left Valencia Juggernauts as the champion (7 points), with finalists Black Dragons (6 points) and Skatmen (4 points). You can check the matches, player’s hit ratios and more information in the JuggerSlam website
http://juggerslam.info

Also, there are two Leagues running at this time in Zaragoza and Valencia. The one located in Valencia is the biggest, as 18 teams compete for the Best Team title in the city. Valencia League started on October 3rd, and will last until early June with games each Sunday in the Turia River’s fields. Follow the league’s progress entering in its website, which is updated weekly with news, interviews and photographs (http://www.wix.com/avjugger/liga-valenciana-de-jugger).

As you can see, Spain has welcomed Jugger with expectation and hard work. Each city or tournament still has a few “home rules”, but we’re working together to unite Jugger definitely. Our players are improving their skills, so don’t surprise yourselves if you find any of us in an international tournament sooner rather than later, rising to the top.

Since that day, salutes from the Spain Jugger!

Text by Pedro Kat