The International Jugger Blog

So you are very fond of Jugger and put time and love into this wonderful sport. You spread the fascination to others, educate them how to play or how to make good spars. Or you struggle organizing that one big tournament every year that the community loves to attend.
Yet, what about motivating your team mates to get a bit more involved in the organizational hassle of Jugger themselves, by making their engagement a bit more visible, so that their work may be appreciated by others?

To achieve this, I thought about creating these Jugger merit roundel. They offer a way to show the merits you earn during your Jugger life with an »evolving« emblem, without having to change the roundel itself. So you can print the basic roundel on your jersey in your first year and than just add all that which you achieve over time.
[Download the PDF with all the definitions here.]
[Download hi-res PNG elements here.]
Continue reading "Show your Achievements: Jugger merit roundels"

In the words of Maka:
"We gathered some testimonies of female players of Jugger, regarding their experience as women in the sport. This is what they had to say."



This is not only a brilliant video, it also fits perfectly: I am currently planning an Uhus Jugger Tutorials about training aspects in regard of teh specific needs of women. If you have any expertise on that, you are welcome to share your knowledge for the UJT.

Wonder how to make your own Jugger Pompfe/spar?

At Uhus Jugger Tutorials, a playlist on spars making has been launched.
Featuring a step-by-step guide on solid rod core spars (shortsword, longsword, Q-Tip, staff), shield making, including different shield core materials like plywood, plastic, EPP and basics on suitable materials, grip and chain making and more.

I have prepared a poster for Projekt: Jugger i Sverige which offers an overview over some basic training techniques. It also fits well to my Uhus Jugger Tutorials IIX: Training techniques YouTube video.
The draft version, available here, is in English, while the final will be in Swedish and available at the Swedish Jugger Association Svenska juggerförbundet.

Download the PDF version here.

Fellow German Jugger Gnome has started a blog specifically about training questions in connection with Jugger, for example "How to avoid injuries".
He recently published an article about warm-up techniques with some tips that you might consider quite helpful.

Go ahead and have a look (and don't fear that bit of sweat you might get):
Jugger Coach: The Art of Warmup

The Projekt: Jugger i Sverige, together with the Swedish Jugger Association, has recently published training material for spars makers (Baumeister/byggmästare) and for team leaders and referees.
They will be used as hand-outs and as a base for the project's workshop in End of September, which will be held at the Största Älgen Svenska Mästerskapet.

Quite cool web comic project on Jugger, with excellent drawings of the teams Wild Geese and Drop Bears, is offered by Schwartz and merc. There is also a comic story ongoing.


(© Schwartz & merc)

"I am Jugger" is the upcoming documentary prepared by Alejandro Asensi Barbera. He currently raises funds through IndieGoGo to realize this quite impressive sounding project, which should become very international:

I am Jugger follows Jugger players all around the world and will share the lives of these young athletes; their impressions and styles of play, capturing the passion they feel for this sport and show the differences to other major sports and the activity in different countries like Spain, Germany, Ireland and United States. We travel with a select group of jugger players to the World Tournament in Berlin, where they will try to win the ultimate prize in this relatively unknown sport.

We will see different explanations of the rules, styles and strategies used by different teams, and follow them as they train and prepare for games together.

(Just a word of warning, IndieGoGo seems to think that eating processor time through shiny app overload is a good idea).

After the discussion on the behaviour of a Spanish team has spread, here is a summary of the statements. This is the first time that a team is banned internationally from taking part in certain tournaments in Germany, Ireland, Sweden and the US.

There are official statements from Setanta Ireland Jugger Club, over 60 Juggers of Germany (and other countries), Jugger Vancouver and some individual voices of tournament organizers.
Of course, a statement of TE in the matter would be welcome here as well.

Click on "read more" for details. Continue reading "Statements banning Tercios Españoles"

Update: Since creating this article, an extensive discussion on the topic has arisen both in local forums and on facebook, resulting in ban declarations done by players organizing tournaments.

After incidents at the Deutsche Meisterschaft 2014, with an Irish shield player being injured and numerous reports of unfair an unsportive play on the side of the Spanish team Tercios Españoles, a discussion has arisen at the German Jugger forum about the team with over 70 entries right now -- this time not about their history of a fascist team name (historical discussion ⇒ here) but on sportsmanship.

Now players prepared an open declaration to ban the team from German, and even other, tournaments. ⇒ Read it here.
This is the first time a team get's banned from tournaments in a specific country. There had been only one ban of a team in the past in Germany, from one single tournament, and that was due to the heated history between them and the tournament's organizers.

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Addendum: Because of the facebook discussion on refreeing: To understand the uproar, it is important to keep the development of Jugger in Germany in mind (see Uhus books on the history of the sport).
One core feature there is Fair Play. Not the soccer way (hurt them when the ref doesn't look) but real fair play: Jugger has long been a fun sport, with no need for extensive reffing. Now, where it begins to be more and more competitive, German tournaments are handling usually over 25, even over 40 or 60 teams at one single week-end. This means that a team that is not playing has to do the refereeing – it is simply impossilbe to have enough "professional" referees. Not having professional refs is considered positive by many players: More control can mean less personal responsibility, thus less fair play. And the need of playing fair is seen as a crucial treasure of the Jugger sport by some.


Update:
Kaiser, Qwik of the Valencia Ravens, has written an interesting two-part insight into mentality differences that could explain the behaviour that has been critizised. It is in German – sorry. Read it here: Part 1 | Part 2

Update II:
Setanta Jugger club has published an official statement. The complete statement is to be found ⇒ at the German Jugger forum, here.

Read on for more voices and statements in the next entry.