Sunday saw four Petanque Wallingford players (Adrian, Christiane, Roger and Thérèse) in Little Marlow at the Kings Head, on the purpose-built terrain to play for the Memorial Trophy in the Thames Valley Petanque Association Triples Charity Melee. There were 12 teams in total (35 people). Snowy did a super job organising the whole event and everyone had a lovely time.
Two of the PW squad (Christiane and Thérèse) were chosen to play with 2 extremely good players (father and son - Paul & Dean) whom Thérèse had first encountered a few weeks ago in the Regional Triples! So Christiane was in the team with Paul, a terrific shooter and Louise a young fine pointer. Thérèse was in Dean’s team (him a fiendish shooter) and Brenda a sharp pointer. Christiane and Thérèse had to make sure they did not disgrace themselves.
The piste was pretty fast as we had had a fairly long spell of sunshine so the light drizzle at the start of the morning had no effect. It only lasted 10 minutes. Three games were played, then everyone broke off for lunch in the pub – while the sky ominously got darker and darker. Lunch was just finished when the heavens opened and we were subjected to a MEGA downpour. Everyone grabbed their chairs and rushed for cover on the verandah. Some hardy souls, including Thérèse and Adrian stayed under the umbrellas in the garden, when suddenly Adrian remembered the kit had not been covered at the terrain! He rushed back to do something about it. When Adrian didn’t come back Thérèse took up the big red umbrella and went to see what was going on.
When she got to the terrain Adrian was huddled under the brown brolly with all the boules bags and jackets in a pile in front of him and the rain cascading down the umbrella. Unfortunately she couldn’t take a picture as she had no free hands! However, the rain only lasted about 20 minutes and passed as fast as it had arrived. Snowy and some of the others moved the ropes to redefine the pistes from 4m each lane to 3m, so as to avoid the lane on the end which was knee deep in water (well, not exactly knee deep, but the cochonnet would certainly have floated), and everyone got on with the next 3 games for the second half. The thorough soaking changed the nature of play, but it was still great fun.
And the end result of the day was Paul, Christiane and Louise got first place and their names on the Memorial Salver (plus 2 bottles of wine each). Adrian and Christiane also each won a bottle of wine in the raffle. The Petanque Wallingford squad went home with weary limbs, happy hearts and a clinking backpack.
Two of the PW squad (Christiane and Thérèse) were chosen to play with 2 extremely good players (father and son - Paul & Dean) whom Thérèse had first encountered a few weeks ago in the Regional Triples! So Christiane was in the team with Paul, a terrific shooter and Louise a young fine pointer. Thérèse was in Dean’s team (him a fiendish shooter) and Brenda a sharp pointer. Christiane and Thérèse had to make sure they did not disgrace themselves.
The piste was pretty fast as we had had a fairly long spell of sunshine so the light drizzle at the start of the morning had no effect. It only lasted 10 minutes. Three games were played, then everyone broke off for lunch in the pub – while the sky ominously got darker and darker. Lunch was just finished when the heavens opened and we were subjected to a MEGA downpour. Everyone grabbed their chairs and rushed for cover on the verandah. Some hardy souls, including Thérèse and Adrian stayed under the umbrellas in the garden, when suddenly Adrian remembered the kit had not been covered at the terrain! He rushed back to do something about it. When Adrian didn’t come back Thérèse took up the big red umbrella and went to see what was going on.
When she got to the terrain Adrian was huddled under the brown brolly with all the boules bags and jackets in a pile in front of him and the rain cascading down the umbrella. Unfortunately she couldn’t take a picture as she had no free hands! However, the rain only lasted about 20 minutes and passed as fast as it had arrived. Snowy and some of the others moved the ropes to redefine the pistes from 4m each lane to 3m, so as to avoid the lane on the end which was knee deep in water (well, not exactly knee deep, but the cochonnet would certainly have floated), and everyone got on with the next 3 games for the second half. The thorough soaking changed the nature of play, but it was still great fun.
And the end result of the day was Paul, Christiane and Louise got first place and their names on the Memorial Salver (plus 2 bottles of wine each). Adrian and Christiane also each won a bottle of wine in the raffle. The Petanque Wallingford squad went home with weary limbs, happy hearts and a clinking backpack.
Prizes won by Christiane at the Kings Head
and 2 raffle prizes as well (C and A)
and 2 raffle prizes as well (C and A)
