Switzerland fans travel 1,240 miles on TRACTOR to watch World Cup match against Serbia

Swiss soccer fans Beat Studer, Josef Wyer and Werner Zimmermann travelled to Russia on an antique tractor
EPA
Tom Powell22 June 2018

A group of dedicated Swiss fans have travelled 1,240 miles on an antique tractor to watch their team take on Serbia in the World Cup in Russia.

Traversing German autobahns, city traffic and endless country lanes, Beat Studer and two friends completed the epic journey in 12 days.

They began just outside of Lucerne and crossed through Germany and Poland before reaching Kaliningrad, in the Russian enclave on the Baltic Sea, ahead of Friday night’s match.

Mr Studer, who owns a tractor museum, took turns driving the 1964 'Buhrer' model with his friend Werner Zimmerman.

Swiss fan Beat Studer owns a tractor museum near Lucerne
REUTERS

He said: "We saw many different landscape, different kind of people, nobody booed us because we were travelling with the tractor. This was so nice."

Another friend, Josef Wyer, drove a support van and handled logistics for the trip.

The tractor arrives at the Arena Baltika Stadium in Kaliningrad
EPA

"With the tractor we have no problems," he said. "I had the problem with the two drivers because every night when they finished driving I would tell them they are like the two on the Muppet show because always they are like children.

"Normally a man one time in his life can do something like this so we had really, really good time together."

"Stupid ideas come only when you are a little bit drunken," he added.

The Swiss trio are not the only fans to find unconventional ways of reaching this summer’s World Cup in Russia.

One Briton sailed from Bulgaria to Volgograd in a yacht to watch the England's opening Group G clash against Tunisia, while many have biked from near and far.

German football fan Hubert Wirth also drove his tractor from Germany to Moscow to catch a glimpse of his national team.

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in