Denmark - Sport

Danmarks Idræts Forbund is the Sports Confederation of Denmark and has more than 1.6 million members... not bad for a population of just 5 million!
website: www.dif.dk English and Danish 

DIF offers many kind of sports and sports clubs are to be found all over Denmark and are generally quite inexpensive.

The favourite sports in Denmark are football (fodbold) and handball (håndbold) and kids start very early playing these games after school in one of the many clubs available. Considering the small population, Denmark manges to produce some good players which end up playing professionally in their adult life.

When important games are played, especially football, football hooligans, or roligans as they like to call themselves (from the danish word for "calm": rolig), are many and passionate.

Given Denmark geography it is no surprise that sailing (a favourite sport of the male members of the royal family) and rowing are very popular sports. There are many rowing clubs along the coast around Copenhagen, including the club which produced few olympic gold medalists, on the lake of Bagsværd, just north of the capital.

Cycling is another sport (not only as a mean of transport) which together with running need to be mentioned as a popular activity. If you like to run/jog there are frequent competitions organized and you can participate without being a member of a running club. For a list of runs have a look at www.motionslob.dk.

Playing golf in Denmark is an all year round activity as the climate is ideal and the gentle hilly landscape seems created with golf in mind. Becoming a member of a golf club though might be a little bit tricky as clubs may have a waiting list. For the Golf Courses in Denmark, click here.