Welcome to the Midwest Petanque Alliance BLOG. The MPA includes: Zanesfield Petanque Club, Chicago Petanque Club, Minneapolis Petanque Club, Rocket City Petanque Club, and Detroit Petanque Club. The main purpose of this BLOG is the promotion of petanque and petanque related news and photos for the Midwest community. See the links to actual club sites on the right...
Proud parents, Pavel Kral and Renca Kralova have a new petanque player in the family, Alenka Kralova - born on June 28, 2007. 
Big thanks to Pavel, Jirka and Renca (and the rest of the Fenyx Adamov Petanque Club) for sending these great shirts to us in Detroit, Michigan. I wore mine today for the afternoon games and won every game (I think the shirt is very lucky!) In our final game, Mike and I played against Bob and Juwan. Bob & Juwan were winning: 12 to 5 but we squeezed in points and beat them 13:12 !!!I fly to York Beach, Maine tomorrow night, and will bring petanque boules and my lucky Fenyx shirt to play there for the week. See you all back in Michigan on the 24th (Sunday).
Brigitte D'Arpini organized the annual Alliance Francaise de Grosse Point Picnique et Petanque this past Saturday. We had quite a few folks from all over, including the French Institute of Michigan, Alliance Francaise of Detroit, and Mark Anthony from Albion college who is setting up his own club (we welcome an infusion of youth Mark - good work!).
Brigitte D'Arpini organized the annual Alliance Francaise de Grosse Point Picnique et Petanque this past Saturday. We had quite a few folks from all over, including the French Institute of Michigan, Alliance Francaise of Detroit, and Mark Anthony from Albion college who is setting up his own club (we welcome an infusion of youth Mark - good work!). Brigitte D'Arpini organized the annual Alliance Francaise de Grosse Point Picnique et Petanque this past Saturday. We had quite a few folks from all over, including the French Institute of Michigan, Alliance Francaise of Detroit, and Mark Anthony from Albion college who is setting up his own club (we welcome an infusion of youth Mark - good work!).
PARIS, June 5, 2007 (AFP) - France celebrates the centenary of petanque this year but the party is being gatecrashed by a new wave of Asian challengers.
Regarded by most as a pedestrian game played in southern France by old men in berets, fuelled by potent glasses of pastis, the sport is now becoming increasingly globalised.
The annual world championships will be held this year in Thailand and the French, keen to see their sport win Olympic recognition, are actively promoting the game internationally.
Claude Charbonnier, of the French Federation of Petanque, recently led a mission to Taiwan where they introduced the sport in universities and helped to select and train a national team.
"They are eager to learn and accept advice much more readily than Europeans. It's because of this that they are becoming so good so quickly," he said.
The game has become popular in Thailand where it was promoted by Princess Srinagarindra who is said to have played petanque almost daily. Petanque is now an official military sport in the country.
France's reigning world champion Michel Loy said: "Thai players are not far behind the French. It's because they are mainly in the military, or they are policemen. They are very disciplined and train very hard."
Thailand has already made its mark at the world championships.
In 2005, they reached the semi-finals for the first time and added two gold medals last year.
Buoyed by such a breakthrough, the president of the Petanque Association of Thailand boasted that "Thai petanque athletes are the world's best".
This year the French will also face pressure from other Asian countries such as Cambodia and Taiwan.
Petanque, whose name comes from the French 'pieds tanques' or 'stuck feet' was invented in the southern French town of La Ciotat one hundred years ago.
Its creator, Jules Le Noir, suffered from arthritis who was unable to play the energetic game of boules. To get over the problem, one of the basic rules of petanque is that one must play from a standing position, with feet together.
Despite the global challenge, France still boasts a solid foundation of petanque players with over half a million registered players.
But Loy believes their Asian counterparts will eventualy surpass them.
"One day they're going to beat us. I just hope it's not this year on their own turf when I'm playing," he said.
Copyright AFP
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It was the perfect spot, right at the center of the Midwest - on baseball field #7 of Grant Park. The 2nd Chicago Midwest Doubles Tournament took place and a whole day of wonderful competition was had by all.
With the sun beating down on the clay pistes, the boules were getting hot enough to cook eggs!
This year, the Michigan and Detroit Petanque Clubs were represented by:Joe Z. (with partner Mamary)
Jeff B. and Kerry
Denise B. (with partner Kono)
Roland and Gerard
James and Cheryl
Jeff W. and Hal
After the tournament had ended, the teams didn't fare too badly, with Jeff & Hal in 4th place (facile!) and the others not far behind (sorry Jeff B. & Kerry...)
Actually, Dan was explaining to the Chicago policeman that the "shooting" that was going on during the tournament was not with firearms.
The event went off like clockwork, with a neat gridwork of pistes and dead-boule lines stringed off on the field to allow for 12 perfect courts.
