City of Sports and Allianz Arena

Munich – City of Sports

Soccer players such as Oliver Kahn, Lucio, and Ali Karimi are known all over the world – in Munich, you can regularly watch them play or practice. Their club, FC Bayern Munich, fields Germany’s most famous and successful soccer team. For decades, the German record champion and its stars have celebrated major wins even on an international stage

Allianz Arena / Soccer

Bayern Munich’s most recent star is none of the famous players on the club’s roster. Rather, it is the club’s new stadium on the northern outskirts of Munich. Built jointly by FC Bayern Munich and Munich’s other professional team, TSV 1860 Munich, “Allianz Arena” only opened in May 2005. However, the spectacular building that holds a crowd of up to 70,000 has already evolved into a major attraction for visitors to Munich. The new stadium’s most spectacular features are its outer shell and roof, which are made of 2,874 transparent air cushions that can be illuminated in the colours of the two host teams – red and blue -, or in a neutral white in case of a national team match. Thus, the stadium façade sports the world‘s biggest membrane shell.
During the 2006 Soccer World Cup in Germany, Munich’s new stadium played a central role. This is where the German national team opened the tournament, playing the official opening match. During the tournament, 32 soccer nations competed for the title of world champion in summer 2006.

A guided tour will provide you with an opportunity to take an inside look at Europe’s most modern soccer stadium. In addition, specialized tourist office guides offer city tours in soccer’s footsteps. The original Bayern Munich team bus is even available for you to ride to Munich’s many soccer-related locations.

Tennis

Munich burnished its reputation as a tennis mecca on the strength of the international “BMW Open” tennis tournament. At the event, top players from all over the world play against each other on MTTC Iphitos’ beautiful courts on the edge of the English Garden.

Golf

In a poll conducted by a German Golf magazine, its readers voted Munich the “best metropolis for golfers“. In Munich’s vicinity, you have a choice of 45 golf courses. At the Munich-Eichenried course, the world’s elite players get together once a year to compete in one of the European Tour’s most prestigious tournaments, the “BMW International Open”. Thus, Munich provides an attractive choice of options for fans of all kinds of sports.

In addition to soccer, golf and tennis, the year in Munich sports has in store a variety of other high-calibre events for fans of ice hockey, snowboarding, swimming, streetball, judo, horseback riding, and tennis, to name just a few.