Dukes

The Ingolstadt Dukes went into 2024 by pulling themselves out of the German Football League and dropping back to the Landesliga. Before that they had spent seven seasons at the top of German American football, reaching the GFL quarter-finals in both 2017 and 2023.

The climb to get there was fast by any measure: in 2008 the team was playing in the eighth-tier Aufbauliga, and by 2017 it had worked its way into the GFL — Landesliga Bayern in 2009, Verbandsliga Bayern-Süd in 2010, Bayernliga in 2011, Regionalliga Süd in 2014 and again in 2021. The GFL2 championships of 2016 and 2022 both came with unbeaten seasons, not just titles.

The Dukes grew out of TV 1861 Ingolstadt, a multi-sport club, when the American football section was formally established on 8 October 2007. The Oberbayrisches Derby against the Munich Cowboys is the fixture the city marks on its calendar; the Kirchdorf Wildcats supply the other rivalry.

Off the field, the club runs its mascot, Happy the bear, in partnership with the local charity Happy Bears e.V. Matches are played at the Bezirkssportanlage Nord-West TV 1861.