or is this a standard distance to travel for DC's sporting hobby?

[JesusTapdancingChrist]

DD plays football (she's almost 9) with a local team. This is her first season and it's the typical one week home and one away. The away games so far have been 10-20 miles away, this week's is 35 miles each way which seems a bit bloody excessive to me (esp as we have to be there for 9am Sat morning).

Am probably just being a grump as had agreed with Ex that one of us would take her to the away games and the other would have DS thus splitting the load but he (ex) has plans this week which mean I have to take DS as well.

Is a 70 mile round trip the norm for kids footy/sport?

When I was an under 10 playing ice hockey my parents had to do 75+ miles each way, field hockey got up to approx 150 miles each way by age 15 and now ice hockey in a national league also from age 15 has topped 300 miles one way in the last few years. My parents also did 20-30 miles regularly for football but less choice for girls teams possibly.

I'd say depending on the sport and level of competition (higher level or more minority sport = wider area) this will only get worse if she progresses through the levels.

I don't do football but go that far and further for swimming competitions sometimes. My niece did football though and travelled further sometimes. I've also known people to travel further for gymnastics, BMX, dancing, skiing.

Be glad she's not a judo player x

Do they not have a lift share thing? My kids didn't do much team sports until sec school when there were minibuses

Your poor parents .

No I get that the more serious the hobby the further the travel etc. This is just a casual weekend thing (don't even think there's an official league with fixtures etc). DD enjoys it fine but by no means wants to be a professional footballer. It's one of a few hobbies she does outside of school.

I am a lazy cow by nature though. While I would of course do whatever it took to support a DC in their dream (if it were a serious thing) I would hate giving up my weekends to drive around the country .

I think this is more of an issue for girls' footy, because there are not enough teams locally.

A friend had a DD who played football and a round trip of 40-70 miles for a match was not unusual.

With lads it's less far as there are usually dozens of teams within the nearest city.

rebecca I was going to ask the coach about lift-sharing but felt I'd be judged for not wanting to be there to watch my PFB play (which I won't be able to do anyway as will be trying to entertain/keep up with DS).

Can she play for a boys' team instead? Would probably be a lot more local. Trouble is she'd have to stop at ?? U11 I think.

That makes sense Clary. The coach does seem to be struggling to find teams to play.

Depends where you live as to how long that takes though.

I's say travelling up to an hour is normal.

Taekwondo mum here. In the last two months we've travelled from London to Liverpool, Motherwell and Manchester. Will be in Sheffield next month and Dublin the month after. I'd take 35 miles each way for a competition ANY DAY OF THE WEEK!! 😁

My bad, just checked and in fact the age was raised to U16 for mixed football a couple of years ago :) so she could do that for quite a few years yet. Though of course she might not want to!

Netball mum here- luckily dd plays in our local league but there are teams in it who travel miles to get the level of competition. I can think of 2 clubs that travel 40ish miles each way each week and another 30 miles. Those clubs have lots of teams so thats a lot of players coming so far each week. She plays in the regional league too but that's probably only once a month but coukd be anywhere in the north west. Looking at your replies I'd say yes it's common.

You'll find that because there are fewer girls' teams, then they accept teams from a much wider Geographical area to get enough teams to make up te league, so yes, girls teams do travel more.
Oh, and as dd has got older and the standard has got higher, the distances become greater - I think only 1 of dd's opponents are under an hour away this season. That said, the standard of the grounds are nicer in the league she is playing in now. Toilets you actually don't mind going in to

Thanks everyone. The lack of girls teams thing makes total sense. Am going to suck it up and have just ordered myself one of those thermal mugs so at least I can bring a brew with me for the drive .

Cheerleaders mum here. Competitions in this country and the US are normal.

35 miles would be a breeze to me as overnight stop are our norm

You should try having a horse.

It's a pain when you live in an area with little local competition. We used to have to travel up to two hours each way to take DC to competitions for their sport as their sport wasnt very common in our area. Definitely become pals with a couple of other parents to help spread the load. Our club also did some fundraising for a team minibus which I think is just about coming into play now.

Ursula Hell no! The dog takes up enough of my time. Did you not see my 'lazy cow' comment?!

Fairly hopeful sure that DD's bookishness will win out and she'll soon forget about these sporting activities. No doubt just in time for DS to start .
.

I travel miles for ds's sport. 150 mile round trips every other weekend on average

Fairly standard tbh. We take an air gazebo, camping chairs, lots of snacks, toys to entertain younger dc and thermos.

It also depends where you live. In the Greater London area a 35 mile trip could take well over an hour each way and that would seem a lot to me for an event that wasn't a very big match. Somewhere less built up it might only be 45 minutes which seems fair enough. I agree you need to talk to other parents about lift sharing, I am sure you are not the only parent who feels this way.