'Nearly missed my plane home several times': PDC referee Kirk Bevins documents German rail chaos as grand plan goes wrong

On the darts stage, Kirk Bevins gives goosebumps with his legendary "180!" calls - away from that, he is a passionate train spotter. After the European Tour weekends, the PDC caller is regularly drawn to German railroad lines. By his own account, he has even traveled on every line in the country.

His latest rail adventure actually started according to plan: early in the morning, he was supposed to take the Eurocity from Kiel to Hamburg, then continue on the next EC to Wittenberge. A relaxed tour for the self-proclaimed "trainspotter". After the European Tour tournaments, Bevins prefers to spend his free time on Germany's transport system train spotting - before heading back to England.

He was even 25 minutes earlier at Kiel Central Station - where Gerwyn Price had won the title the day before. And that paid off at first. Because his train was cancelled at short notice.

Just in time, Bevins caught a slower regional train to Hamburg, where he can change trains. But shortly before Hamburg, the next German classic: 25 minutes unscheduled stop - and the connecting EC to Wittenberge was gone.

The next one? Not for another two hours. Not an option for Bevins - after all, his plane was waiting that evening. And this was far from the first time Deutsche Bahn had messed up his schedule.

"People who live in Germany know this isn't a rare occurrance, this happens all the time. I thought I'd maybe make some videos to show the trials and tribulations. I've nearly missed my plane home several times due to this sort of thing. Now I can't get there at all."

Bevins regularly shares his rail odysseys on X (formerly Twitter) wrote back in May: "Train woes part 1,348,338. This is the THIRD DB train today that has been cancelled on different routes! It is ridiculous. What's even more annoying is you can't get compensation as im using a Deutschland Ticket."

Perhaps Kirk Bevins should no longer be known only as a referee - but as the man who has seen more canceled trains than perfect legs.