Petanque is a French game that is popular all over the word and here in the U. K.

The Basics

Petanque can be played on almost any surface but mainly thin gravel. The area needed is roughly 12m by 3m.

The game itself is much like bowls but instead of rolling, the boule, which are made of metal, are thrown through the air.

The game can be played with 1, 2 or 3 players on each team. When there are 1 or 2 players on a team, each player uses 3 boule, when there are 3 players, each player only has 2 boule.

The game begins when one team throws the cochonnet onto the piste (terrain). The same team then throws a boule as close to the cochonnet as possible. Now a member from the other team throws and tries to do the same. A team continues throwing until they get closer to the cochonnet than the other team, or run out of boules.

Scoring

When all boule have been thrown, the end is finished at it is time to add up the score. A team scores a point for every boule they have that is colser to the cochonnet than the other teams closest boule. When the scores have been added up, the team that won the previous end throws the cochonnet.

The game continues untill one team reaches a score of 13.