5 Obscure But Awesome Sports Found in New York
Say you want to join a recreational sport to keep fit and active. But softball is too cliche and perhaps waking is too pedestrian. Here are 5 obscure but totally real and awesome sports played in New York.
- 1
Bocce
Bocce is not just the ancient Italian bowling game that dates back to the Roman Empire. In New York State, Bocce is serious business. The Toccolana Club is Rome hosts tournaments year-round and hosts the World Series of Bocce, nearing its fiftieth year and boasting a purse of $25,000.
- 2
Quidditch
Quidditch, yes the fictional game featured in Harry Potter, is now very real with college intermural teams and two governing bodies, US Quidditch and Major League Quidditch.
In USQ, there are two college teams in metro NYC and Rochester United Upstate.Major League Quidditch features 8 pro teams in two divisions including the Rochester Whiteout and New York Titans
- 3
Pickleball
Call it a cross between tennis, ping pong and badminton and you're still not quite defining what exactly Pickleball is. If you want to try it, there are 120 different Pickleball leagues across the state including the JCC in Utica.
- 4
Curling
Perhaps Curling is a sport you only think about every four years when the Winter Olympics roll around. Or maybe you stumbled on to it some winter weekend afternoon flipping channels and landed on CBC. But curling is played each winter in clubs across New York. According to the Grand National Curling Club, the sports governing body in the Northeast, there are 11 curling clubs in the Empire State including the Utica Curling Club, which traces its history back to the 1860s is among the oldest and is the largest in the Eastern US.
- 5
Kan-Jam
Kan Jam is New York's homegrown sport. It was invented in Buffalo and its played on an intermural level at SUNY campuses, recreational in backyards and in the Adirondacks and and organized league in Western New York hosts an annual championship.
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