FootGolf's Dutch origins traced to 2008 invention and 2009 championship

FootGolf’s modern form was built in the Netherlands in 2008 by Bas Korsten and Michael Jansen, who turned an experiment at the agency Nothing into a new sport with its own attire, etiquette and rules. Michael Jansen later tied the idea to Tottenham Hotspur training culture, saying the spark came from a post-training kicking game he had learned about from former Spurs player Willem Korsten.

That Dutch origin quickly moved from an office curiosity to a real competition. The first official Dutch NK FootGolf was staged on 6 September 2009 at Golfbaan Het Rijk van Nijmegen, and the final gave the sport an early marquee result: Theo Janssen beat Kenneth Perez to become the first Dutch champion. Contemporary coverage described the event as a national championship that drew Dutch and Belgian professional footballers, with participants including Patrick Pothuizen, Rutger Worm and Lorenzo Davids.

The Nijmegen tournament mattered because it gave FootGolf a structure that looked less like a stunt and more like a sport. A description of NK Footgolf 2009 said the rules were nearly the same as golf, but with larger holes, while the early dress code, argyle socks and knee-length shorts, helped give the game an identity of its own. FootGolf Holland later dated the sport’s introduction in the Netherlands to mid-2009, placing that first championship right at the moment the game was finding a wider footing.

From there, the sport’s organization hardened fast. FootGolf Holland says the original bond later ended and a new organization was founded at the end of 2011, while the Federation for International FootGolf was established in 2012. The governing body’s own materials say the first FootGolf World Cup was held in Hungary in June 2012, with 79 players from eight countries, a sign that the Dutch invention had already outgrown its local roots.

The sport’s scale is now far beyond that first Nijmegen field. FIFG says the 2026 World Championship is scheduled for May 27 to June 7 in Acapulco, Mexico, with 1,240 players and 64 teams, and its current system includes member countries, rulebooks, rankings, committees and player licensing. In the Netherlands, the Nederlandse FootGolf Federatie describes itself as the umbrella organization for clubs and says it serves both experienced players and newcomers, a reminder that the country where FootGolf was invented still helps define how it is played.