GOOOOOAAALLL, via Brooklyn Bridge Park’s Facebook

Now that Brooklyn Bridge Park’s got some brand new soccer fields, they’re ready to start filling them with players. Mini-future soccer stars ages 6 to 11 can sign up for the Brooklyn Bridge Park Conservancy’s youth league at $25 a kid. If you didn’t spend your middle school soccer days subbing out so you could sit on the sidelines eating Oreos (like I did), you can join an adult league yourself. (more…)

Use this coupon to stock up on, say, singles kickball gear. Somehow it helps the 78th Precinct youth sports leagues.

USA is simply the best at beach volleyball. Follow in their footsteps.

Did your nonstop watching of the Olympics only highlight your own growing waistline as you dip your Santitas in queso between the Mustafina’s uneven bars routine and Canadian superduo Benfeiro & Fillion’s synchronized diving bronze medal performance? How often have you thought “I could do that!” while watching the pint-size Mary Whipple scream and nag the Women’s Eight to a gold medal on Dorney Lake? Well, as it turns out, Brooklyn is the birthplace of more than 100 Olympic athletes across 25 sports, so opportunities abound for the general public to train like — and perhaps become — an Olympian.

Sure, you could plop down $85 for a one-hour beginner’s riding lesson at the Jamaica Bay Riding Academy or $129/month for once-a-week lessons at the Brooklyn Fencing Club in Gowanus, but those are a bit pricey. With that in mind, I set out to find the freest and least expensive ways to train your way from eating the crushed powder in the bottom of an off-brand Smile-O’s to being on the front of a box of Wheaties. (more…)

Can you attend without paying a princely sum?

I spent the summer of 1996 glued to my living room TV set mimicking Dominique Moceanu’s floor routines at the summer Olympics. The U.S. Women’s gymnastics team went on to win the gold medal on their home turf in Atlanta, and I told my mom that someday I, too, would go to the Olympics. Like most 8-year-olds, I didn’t realize that I would grow into an adult with neither flexibility nor disposable income. If you’re in the same boat, the torch-bearing dream isn’t totally dead. There are tons of £0 (that’s zero dollars, American) events at the Summer Games in London — if you can afford to get there. But unless you’ve developed a sudden talent for competitive canoe slalom, it’s going to cost you. (more…)

Now sold on Etsy.

You’re burned out on Brooklyn, you can’t afford Manhattan, you’re too bratty for Queens, so what do you do? My friend Ben, a recent Brooklyn ex-pat, has the answer: “If you want to live in Brooklyn and pay half in rent, move to Philly!” he proclaimed, the night before he left the island for good.

I moved to Brooklyn from New Orleans a year ago, and the way I look at it, I got myself into this mess, so now I’m committed to see the suffering through while trying to put together a career in publishing. But Ben got me thinking more critically about this life of unrealistic expectations and disproportionate salary-to-rent ratios, physical and mental jaundice. And he’s not my only friend to flee what is sometimes (condescendingly) referred to as the “sixth borough.”

With lower rents and cheaper beer, is Philly the dream of Brooklyn, actually realized? Or was Daria right when she said, “Life sucks no matter what, so don’t be fooled by location changes”? I asked three friends who cashed in their Metrocards for SEPTA passes. (more…)

Pickup soccer in Prospect Park every Sunday. Photo by Flickr's DiscoContinental.

[To bring you this comprehensive guide to pick-up games, Brokelyn turned to someone on the front lines: our friend Pete of BrooklynFans.com, a new site for BK sports fans to gather. Take it away Pete!]

A great way to trick your body into exercising this summer is through social and semi-competitive sports. Whether you’re looking to push yourself and see if ya still got it, or you’re just trying to re-create recess magic and feel better about that IPA you’ll pound immediately after. Brooklyn has an endless supply of pickup games, adult leagues, and tournaments waiting for you, most of which are free to join! (more…)

Circle Rules Football. You got what it takes?

We all know the story: you pay something ridiculous for a gym membership and swear that this time, you’re gonna use it. Really. But 5 p.m. comes around, and the last thing you want to do is run like a hamster for 30 minutes in front of a flat-screen. You want something more from your workout, something… alternative. Lucky for you, you live in Brooklyn—where football is circular, bar-hopping is aerobic and exercise need not be boring. (more…)

NYC Public Ultimate League

The warm weather seems here to stay, and we’re itching to cure one serious case of spring fever. A winter in the gym gets the heart pumping and all, but there’s nothing like getting out there, letting loose and playing some good-old, adrenaline-filled, sweat-flying-off-your-brow sports. Luckily, Brooklyn’s pretty well set-up for this sort of thing, with great parks and spaces, and plenty of amateur leagues to bring everyone together. So whether you’re one for some pick-up hoops, or if organized cricket’s more your cup of tea, here’s how to get out and play. (more…)

By now most fans have heard that the $5 seats at the new Yankee stadium sit next to the massive Mohegan Sports Bar, leaving the field only partially in view. But how much do you have to pay to actually catch the action? Maybe if you’re a serious fan as well as a hardcore budgeteer you’ve already created your own personalized iPhone app that identifies all available seats with the perfect equation of value and field visibility. If you haven’t, here’s a good look at what you see from the various cheap seats at both Yankee Stadium and Citi Field.

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