The Reforma Athletic Club is a Mexican
sports club
A sports club or sporting club, sometimes an athletics club or sports society or sports association, is a group of people formed for the purpose of playing sports.
Sports clubs range from organisations whose members play together, unpaid, and ...
located in
San Juan Totoltepec,
Naucalpan
Naucalpan, officially Naucalpan de Juárez, is one of 125 municipalities located just northwest of Mexico City in the adjoining State of Mexico. The municipal seat is the city of Naucalpan de Juárez, which extends into the neighboring municipa ...
. The club is mostly known for its
football team that played in the
Liga Mexicana de Football Amateur Association prior to the development of the professional
Mexican first division. The squad currently plays in an amateur league in
Mexico City
Mexico City ( es, link=no, Ciudad de México, ; abbr.: CDMX; Nahuatl: ''Altepetl Mexico'') is the capital city, capital and primate city, largest city of Mexico, and the List of North American cities by population, most populous city in North Amer ...
.
Apart from football, Reforma hosts a large number of activities, including
aerobics
Aerobics is a form of physical exercise that combines rhythmic aerobic exercise with stretching and strength training routines with the goal of improving all elements of fitness ( flexibility, muscular strength, and cardio-vascular fitness). ...
,
ballet
Ballet () is a type of performance dance that originated during the Italian Renaissance in the fifteenth century and later developed into a concert dance form in France and Russia. It has since become a widespread and highly technical form of ...
,
basketball
Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular court, compete with the primary objective of shooting a basketball (approximately in diameter) through the defender's h ...
,
boxing
Boxing (also known as "Western boxing" or "pugilism") is a combat sport in which two people, usually wearing protective gloves and other protective equipment such as hand wraps and mouthguards, throw punches at each other for a predetermine ...
,
cricket
Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two bails balanced on three stumps. The batting side scores runs by str ...
,
dance,
karate,
racquetball
Racquetball is a racquet sport and a team sport played with a hollow rubber ball on an indoor or outdoor court. Joseph Sobek invented the modern sport of racquetball in 1950, adding a stringed racquet to paddleball in order to increase velo ...
,
swimming
Swimming is the self-propulsion of a person through water, or other liquid, usually for recreation, sport, exercise, or survival. Locomotion is achieved through coordinated movement of the limbs and the body to achieve hydrodynamic thrust that r ...
,
tennis
Tennis is a racket sport that is played either individually against a single opponent ( singles) or between two teams of two players each ( doubles). Each player uses a tennis racket that is strung with cord to strike a hollow rubber ball ...
,
water aerobics
Water aerobics (waterobics, aquarobics, aquatic fitness, aquafitness, aquafit) is the performance of aerobic exercise in water such as in a swimming pool. It is done mostly vertically and without swimming typically in waist deep or deeper water. W ...
,
yoga
Yoga (; sa, योग, lit=yoke' or 'union ) is a group of physical, mental, and spiritual practices or disciplines which originated in ancient India and aim to control (yoke) and still the mind, recognizing a detached witness-consci ...
and
zumba
Zumba is a fitness program that involves cardio and Latin-inspired dance. It was founded by Colombian dancer and choreographer Beto Pérez in 2001, and by 2012, it had 110,000 locations and 12 million people taking classes weekly. Zumba is a ...
.
History
The club was founded in 1894 by a group of English migrants in order to play sport and as a social club. The members would practice
cricket
Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two bails balanced on three stumps. The batting side scores runs by str ...
, among other sports, and it became a tradition to drink tea every afternoon at 5 o'clock.
In 1901 the players included James Walker, A.J. Campbell, T.R. Phillips, A.T. Drysdale, F. Robertson and E.W Jackson. They played friendly matches against local Scottish and English clubs representing their countries of origin.
In 1902 the club first participated in a football competition in the
Liga Mexicana Amateur de Asociación Foot-Ball in Mexico City. The clubs taking part were
Orizaba Athletic Club,
Pachuca Athletic Club, Reforma Athletic Club,
Mexico Cricket Club
The México Cricket Club was a former Mexican football team that played in the Liga Mexicana de Football Amateur Association. This club was founded in the small town San Pedro de los Pinos, which is now subsumed as part of greater Mexico City. F ...
and
British Club. This was the first organized football tournament in
Mexico
Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...
.
Before the first match in the new league took place the club played numerous friendlies against Pachuca Athletic Club in order to unite the English migrants living around
Mexico
Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...
. The club paid its first game in the league on 19 October 1902 against the eventual champions Orizaba Athletic Club in
Orizaba
Orizaba () is a city and municipality in the Mexican state of Veracruz. It is located 20 km west of its sister city Córdoba, and is adjacent to Río Blanco and Ixtaczoquitlán, on Federal Highways 180 and 190. The city had a 2005 census ...
,
Veracruz
Veracruz (), formally Veracruz de Ignacio de la Llave (), officially the Free and Sovereign State of Veracruz de Ignacio de la Llave ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de Veracruz de Ignacio de la Llave), is one of the 31 states which, along with Me ...
with a score of 2–0.
In 1906, Reforma Athletic Club won the league for the first time. It did so again in 1907, 1909, 1910, 1911 and 1912.
In 1914 the club suffered a big blow when almost all of its players returned to Europe in order to take part in
World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
. Most of its players were British and had decided to fight for their homeland.
In 1920 the club was revived, this time with more
Mexican players, people who had been born in
Mexico
Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...
but had English parents, along with players returning from the war .
The club played its last league match on 6 July 1924 losing 1-0 to
Club de Fútbol Aurrerá
Club may refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media
* ''Club'' (magazine)
* Club, a '' Yie Ar Kung-Fu'' character
* Clubs (suit), a suit of playing cards
* Club music
* "Club", by Kelsea Ballerini from the album ''kelsea''
Brands and enterprises ...
.
The club was revived again in 1948 as a founder member of the Liga interclubes de fútbol soccer Amateur along with the clubs Tecaya, Canarios, Deportivo Chapultepec, Tiburones, Titingo, Osos and Lusitania. The club still participates in this league.
1905-06
In the 1905/06 season, Reforma Athletic Club won the Mexican championship, the first club from the capital to do so. The club was dominated by British players but did also allow native players. It was remarkable that in 20 league matches, there were 16 games where one or both sides failed to score. Champions Reforma had two excellent full-backs in the brothers Robert and Charles Blackmore, while most of their goals were not scored by a forward but by right half-back Charles Butlin. Mexico Cricket Club, which had changed its name to San Pedro Golf Club, were runners-up.
1908-09
The Mexican championship was going through a critical period. Only three teams had entered the 1908/09 season, at the end of which Reforma Athletic Club (Mexico City) won for the third time after 1906 and 1907. Only eight players remained of the 1907 team. Except for the three forwards Vicente Etchegaray, ''Jorge Parada and Julio Lacaud, the other players all came from Europe, mostly Great Britain.
Honours
Liga Mexicana de Football Amateur Association
*Champions (6): 1905–06, 1906–07, 1908–09, 1909–10, 1910–11, 1911–12
*''Runners-up (3)'': 1902–03, 1903–04, 1912–13
Copa MX
The Copa MX (formerly called Copa Tower Monterrey, Copa Eliminatoria, Copa México and Copa Corona MX (for sponsorship reasons)) was a Mexican football cup competition that was established in 1907. After a lengthy hiatus that began in 1997, it wa ...
*Champions (2): 1908–09, 1909–10
*''Runners-up (3)'': 1907–08, 1911–12, 1923–24
Topscorers
*1903-04 Julio Lacaud (4 Goals / 8 games)
*1905-06 Claude M. Butlin (6 Goals / 8 games)
*1908-09 Jorge Gomez de Parada (3 Goals / 4 games)
*1909-10 Robert Blackmore (4 Goals / 6 games)
*1910-11 Claude M. Butlin (2 Goals / 4 games)
See also
*
Football in Mexico
Mexico's most popular sport is football (called fútbol in Mexico). , the top tier leagues in Mexico are Liga MX for the men and the Liga MX Femenil for women.
In Mexico, football became a professional men's sport in 1943. Since then, Mexic ...
References
External links
Official Site
{{Primera Fuerza
Football clubs in Mexico City
Association football clubs established in 1894
1894 establishments in Mexico
Primera Fuerza teams
British association football clubs outside the United Kingdom
British diaspora in North America