Competition
Table football is often played for fun in pubs, bars, workplaces, schools, and clubs with few rules. Table football is also played in official competitions organized by a number of national organizations, with highly evolved rules and regulations. Organized competition can be traced back to the 1940s and 1950s in Europe. But the professional tours and big money events began when the founding father of modern professional table soccer, Lee Peppard of Seattle, Washington, United States announced a "Quarter Million Dollar Tour" in 1976. Portland Oregon's John Napa went on to win the US championship. Bobby Brown (of green felt billiards), also of Portland, still holds the record for most points scored in a season with 1305. Several organizations and promoters have continued holding large purse professional table soccer events worldwide.
The ITSF now regulates International events including the annual World Championships and the World Cup. The World Cup was originally intended to coincide with the FIFA World Cup, but since January 2009 it has run annually. In 2006 – the inaugural ITSF World Cup – Austria, Germany and Belgium took the Gold, Silver and Bronze respectively.
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Famous quotes containing the word competition:
“Playing games with agreed upon rules helps children learn to live by rules, establish the delicate balance between competition and cooperation, between fair play and justice and exploitation and abuse of these for personal gain. It helps them learn to manage the warmth of winning and the hurt of losing; it helps them to believe that there will be another chance to win the next time.”
—James P. Comer (20th century)
“Every sect is a moral check on its neighbour. Competition is as wholesome in religion as in commerce.”
—Walter Savage Landor (1775–1864)