'This game humbles every single person who plays it' - Footgolf has given soccer players a new life, and they can't stop playing it - FOGOLF

Bart Wojtyla was one of the thousands – if not millions – of players chewed up and spat out by professional soccer. Originally from Poland, he moved to Chicago as a child. And then the journey started. He tried out for clubs back home, bouncing from team to team in unsuccessful trials. A flirtation with German football followed.

He had a go in second division Polish football, but the team went broke. College soccer was his last hope. He had his moments, but, like for so many, the MLS call never came. There he was, in his mid 20s, out of soccer, with nowhere to go professionally.

That’s when his story gets weird. Wojtyla ended up in Hollywood, working odd acting gigs. And just when it seemed that soccer – at least, in a traditional sense – had passed him by, he got an unexpected call. “

A friend of mine was like, ‘Hey, another one of my buddies who’s in the soccer league in LA is hosting this little get together for soccer players to introduce them to this game,’” Wojtyla recalled.

And the name of that game?

“It’s called footgolf.”

Wojtyla loved it from the first kick. That day, he played all 18 holes, skipped the award ceremony, and went back to play another round. Fast forward, and he is now captain of the United States footgolf team. Yes, that’s a real thing.

He is now part of a weird and wonderful soccer-ing subculture, one that takes those who can no longer play the beautiful game at the professional level and gives them a new platform to kick a ball around.

And it’s entirely addictive.

“It’s like having an itch, and someone says, ‘Don’t scratch it.’ But you just keep kind of scratching at it,” he told GOAL.

‘This game humbles every single person who gets out on it’

The concept is simple enough. You take a standard golf course, and essentially shrink it. “Tees” are moved closer to the pin, while “cups” are stationed off traditional greens. From there, it’s played just like golf, except participants kick a standard size soccer ball into a 21-inch diameter cup on footgolf “greens.”

Players are scored according to normal golf rules. And like regular gold, “par” for each hole is determined based on difficulty and distance. Bunkers, hazards and golf course characteristics help to improve the challenge of the game.

The game is more suited for footballers who understand golf than for golfers who fancy trying it with their feet. That doesn’t make the learning curve easy, though.

“This game humbles every single person who gets out on it,” Wojtyla said.

Of course, there’s a charming origin story. Footgolf was supposedly founded in 1929 by a doctor from Chicago, William Edward Code, after his friend expressed an interest in wanting an outdoor game outside the constraints of a playground – but not do too much damage to his bank account.

He, very humbly, called it “codeball” and the Midwest loved it. By the mid 1930s, there were at least 12 codeball courses in existence. St. Louis hosted a codeball championship in 1935. A man named Bert Gates won it, and it was worthy of a write-up in local papers. It was a headline sports story in Time Magazine, too, featured ahead of a brief paragraph describing the achievements of a certain up-and-coming runner from Ohio State named Jesse Owens.

After that, it fell back into relative obscurity. For nearly 100 years, the game lay dormant. Then, in 2008, a duo in the Netherlands ripped off a training exercise from Tottenham Hotspur and founded “footgolf” as it is known today. Since then, it has gained momentum. The first tournament was held in September 2009 by a series of Belgian and Dutch ex-footballers. Argentina, Hungary and Belgium caught on by 2010.

‘What a beautiful sport!’ 'What a beautiful sport!'

‘What a beautiful sport!’

And then the Americans took the lead. In 2012, an Argentinian immigrant to the United States, Roberto Balestrini, founded the American Footgolf League. An opportunist before anything else, Balestrini was waiting for a Boca Juniors match to start on TV, and saw Argentinian League legends kicking a ball on a golf course. He was struck immediately.

“I saw it and said ‘What a beautiful sport!’” Balestrini told GOAL.

His wife was also sold. A savvy business owner, she registered the trademark and Balestrini started working on expanding the sport full time. He called golf courses left and right, asking them to allow him to, effectively, play soccer on manicured fairways and sparkling greens.

“You can imagine, with my accent, calling the golf courses, asking them to allow me and a group of soccer players to kick a ball,” he said.

He visited 36 states in two years, spreading the word and pleading with wealthy golf course owners to invest in the sport – or, at the very least, create space for it to be played. Eventually, a golf course owner in San Diego took the bait. He looked at the landscape, saw that soccer was growing in popularity, while golf was plummeting. This was an opportunity to test both theories, and marry the best of both worlds.

“He said ‘Listen, I want to be the birthplace of footgolf in America’,” Balestrini recalled. Contact with the PGA followed, and in 2014, the league hosted their first official tournament – 24 players showed up, with the league itself paying for their flights and expenses. It was a success, but they needed spaces nationwide to continue to grow.

“You can get a sponsor and spend a million dollars a day on advertising,” he said. “But if your players don’t have a place to play, you don’t have a sport.”

They didn’t have the money to build courses, but with a growing body of evidence – and more serious financial backing – they could piece together a more compelling pitch. Over time, more courses expressed their interest. There are now over 500 courses nationwide that adhere to standard footgolf rules, and offer regular tee times for both amateur and professional footgolfers.

‘We had never played, but we knew how far we can kick a ball’ 'We had never played, but we knew how far we can kick a ball'

‘We had never played, but we knew how far we can kick a ball’

Jo Reid lives in Anchorage, Alaska. She had a solid soccer career, and played for four years at Creighton. They were briefly a top-25 team during her stint, but professional soccer was never in the cards. After graduating, she moved to Alaska and immersed herself in the youth soccer coaching scene.

Footgolf, for her, was a natural fit, having played both sports as a child. She was sent a video – originally made by Balestrini.. And she was sold immediately.

“Of course, the next thing you do is you Google ‘Where can I play footgolf near me?’” she told GOAL. “And there happened to be a course that popped up in Anchorage. It was like 10-15 minutes from my house.”

There was just one problem: the course didn’t properly exist. It has been advertised online, but it was clear that the owner had no idea how to set it up properly. Reid was so enamored with the idea of the sport that she and her friends offered to, in effect, build it in their free time.

“So we went over and helped them,” Reid said. “We had never played, but we knew how far we can kick a ball, and understand how the ball rolls. And so we helped them… we just put down cones and kind of helped them design this course.”

Still, it never quite worked out. Reid tore her ACL that summer – not, it must be emphasized – playing footgolf. But she helped set up a series of tournaments. The owners eventually grew disgruntled at the prospect of having relatively inexperienced footgolfers on their posh course. But they gave Reid the equipment to set up elsewhere.

She turned to a lower-budget par-three course and honed her craft. Reid found that her mixture of experiences made her quite the player.

“I started traveling and playing, and then discovered I was pretty good at it, and just kind of didn’t look back,” Reid said.

The new course owners, however, decided that they, too, no longer fancied the sport in their spot. Reid was given the equipment again. But Anchorage no longer had a regulation course for her to play on.

Of course, that did little to deter her from playing. She took her training indoors, practicing the right kicking and chipping methods. She used normal soccer equipment, and utilized the spaces offered by the local youth club she runs. And whenever she travels out of state, she manages to find time to play.

Youth soccer, ironically, helps facilitate that. Clubs travel long distances these day. And for Reid, who has flown extensively to support her daughter’s burgeoning soccer career – extra time in new places allows her to hit the course.

“When I travel, I’ll always look up golf courses near me,” she said. “Last fall, there were two different courses that I played in Missouri, just there by myself. So I try to do that as much as possible.”

Her family is forgiving enough to let her disappear for a day or two, she emphasized, saying, “My family’s been super supportive. You know, my husband does a great job supporting me and my time and effort.”

Her relative skill is reason enough to let her experiment. Reid plays in four tournaments per year, but has traveled worldwide. Last year, she spent time in Scotland and England to participate in professional events.

She has been part of the U.S. national setup since 2016 and won the national championship in 2019. She has claimed four domestic tournaments in the last 12 months. She finished third at last year’s Scottish Open, too.

“I’ve been kicking a ball my whole life, and it was different, but also the same… when you’re out there, it’s just you,” Reid added.

‘What is this Team USA?’ 'What is this Team USA?'

‘What is this Team USA?’

Wojtyla, meanwhile, latched onto the competitiveness of it all. He couldn’t handle the fact that someone – anyone – could be better than him. He finished his first round at even par, but watched someone else win the round by shooting 12-under.

“My first instinct was like, ‘No f*cking way, that is not possible, someone is cheating on this course,’” he said. “And as a soccer player, you’re like, ‘Man, I have a shot, I got a strong leg. I can do this.’”

It later turned out that the winner of that tournament was part of the U.S. team that had claimed victory in the World Cup in Argentina. Wojtyla decided that he had to be on it – no matter what it took.

“I needed more information,” Wojtyla said. “First of all, like, I don’t know how you even got 12- or 13-under. I think you’re cheating. Number two, what is this Team USA? Where is there another course?”

And it took off from there. Wojtyla drove around Southern California, traveling from course to course, determined to improve at this sport he had never played before. He had never been a golf fan – it had never been on his radar. The one time he played, he couldn’t hit the ball in the air.

Five events later, he was taking part in the US footgolf national tournament in Palm Springs.

“I was just driven. You got to join the American Football League. You got to look where the tournaments are being held, and you just got to get out and start competing,” Wojtyla said.

Such was his appetite to play that Wojtyla started his own league in Los Angeles, and utilized all of the courses in the area. His successes and improvement allowed for further expansion, and before too long he’d made the cut for the U.S. national team. It took him all over the world. He appeared at the World Cup in Morocco in 2018, and helped the U.S. finish third.

They did the same again in 2023, pipping Scotland for the bronze medal. Last month, he and the U.S. team – which he now captains – secured qualification for next year’s World Cup in Mexico.

‘As long as you can kick a soccer ball and walk a mile, you’ll be alright’ 'As long as you can kick a soccer ball and walk a mile, you'll be alright'

‘As long as you can kick a soccer ball and walk a mile, you’ll be alright’

Of course, there is a business interest here. Although Reid’s courses may have closed down, the game still represents a lucrative opportunity in the right spots. Such is the case for Alex Forsyth. A Scotsman who moved to America nearly 30 years ago, he tried his hand at college golf before going into the ownership business.

He has lived in Orlando for two decades now, and started working at the Walt Disney World Golf Resort in 2011. The complex is massive. They have three championship-level courses, and one relatively simple nine-hole course. Forsyth realized an upgrade to the latter could help bring in a few extra dollars – especially with foot traffic decreasing year on year.

“We decided to run with it,” Forsyth told GOAL. “So in March of 2018, we designed, built and opened a footgolf course on Disney’s Old Trail golf course. And at this point now, we are doing around 8,000 rounds a year, and that is only operating at four afternoons a week.”

He is helped, he admitted, by the tourism in the area. Florida gets millions of visitors from all over the world year round, and also has a significant South American population. It is, in effect, the perfect demographic for pros and amateur footgolfers, alike.

“Grandma and Grandpa can do it, the little kids can do it. Mom and Dad can do it. And as long as you can kick a soccer ball and walk a mile, you’ll be alright. The learning curve is all about 30 seconds,” Forsyth said.

And the money is not trivial. The operating costs are low – generally around $5,000 per year for maintenance. The course, meanwhile, generates roughly $250,000 in profit.

‘Can we get the sport into the Olympics?’ 'Can we get the sport into the Olympics?'

‘Can we get the sport into the Olympics?’

And things are only growing from here. There will always be a market for the sport, Balestrini argued. After all, it has appeal for former pros, college rejects and eager families alike.

Right now, it doesn’t generate enough revenue to be a full time profession for most players, but there is still cash to be won from domestic and international tournaments. Wojtyla argues that it should be an Olympic sport, and hopes it will be considered in the future.

“Everything that the [global governing body] is doing currently with footgolf in the world is all geared towards, ‘Can we get the sport into the Olympics?’” he said. “And then actually see it grow and flourish.”

Until then, there are tournaments to play, World Cups to win, and new sports to become obsessed with – even if professional soccer lets you down.