President's Report
The year 2002 has been a very
busy and successful time for
petanque in New Zealand, both on
the international scene and with
the continued development of the
sport within New Zealand. The
following are some of the
highlights for the year:
National Championships
Congratulations are extended to
the following national champions
for 2002:
Triples -
Georgio Vakauta,
Seti Mailei, Andrew Mailei
Doubles -
Christian Fouquet
&
Niau Ruta
Singles - Gordon Dykes
Trans Tasman Interaction
2002 saw increased contact with
Petanque Ausiralia which has
resulted in the setting up of a
Trans Tasman test series to be
held in Melbourne during 2003.
We are also sending (in
conjunction with Petanque
Auckland) three people to attend
a coaching seminar which will be
run by a technical expert from
France. We thank Petanque
Australia for the invitation and
look forward to sharing in the
information and experience that
Ron Sandilands, Clive Bartleet
and
Bernadette Lawton
will bring back to us.
Oceania Championships
A team of six men, six women and
a management team of two
attended the Oceania
Championships in
Noumea.
The team performed very well and
enhanced New Zealand petanque’s
reputation both on and off the
piste. Congratulations to
Barbara Johnston from the
Masterton club on her winning
performance in the women’s
singles championship and also to
the Khandallah triples team of
Neil and Gordon Dykes and
Michael Rocks for their
excellent 4th place in the men’s
triples championship.
There were also some other very
good performances by the team
including finishing in 3rd place
overall. There was a tremendous
team spirit amongst the team
which impressed the other
participating countries. The
team was very appreciative of
the excellent support crew that
travelled with us.
World Championships - Grenoble
Congratulations to Seti and
Andrew Mailei and Georgio
Vakauta for their great finish
of 17th= at the World
Championships. This is the
highest ranking a New Zealand
team has ever gained at this
level of international
competition.
The highlight was an 11-13 loss
to the eventual runners-up
Morocco which must rank as one
of the best performances by a
New Zealand team at a world
championship. Once again, thank
you to the supporters who
travelled with us.
Umpiring
We now have a structure in place
to enable people to sit the
umpiring (Arbiters) examination.
We have already had several
players sit this exam (including
all of the national committee).
The opportunity is there for
others to sit this exam.
We need a pool of knowledgeable
arbiters at all levels of our
game. At the National Doubles
Championship Terry Holt from
Dunedin performed the duties of
a non-playing arbiter which was
much appreciated, thank you
Terry.
Constitution and Regional
Structure
Work has continued on the new
constitution which is to be
presented for adoption at this
meeting. Work has also continued
on the formation of regional
structures which will be vital
to the development of coaching ,
junior petanque, and club
support in the future.
In conclusion I would like to
thank the committee members of
Petanque New Zealand for their
hard work and support during
2002 and also our valued
sponsors and everyone else who
contributed to the development
of our sport during the year.
All the best for a productive
and fulfilling 2003.
Graeme Morris -
President
Masters Games Queensland,
Australia – September 2002
Petanque, as we
say in Christchurch is the
‘friendliest game in town’. The
ASPAC Masters Games (Asia
Pacific) was just that.
The competitors
were mostly French in origin so
each day began with greetings of
kisses (always two) and ending
with kisses. Each game began
with a kiss and ended with a
kiss no shaking hands as in
Christchurch.
The days were
long as we Kiwis were shuttled,
along with players from
Melbourne, from the Games
Village at Broadwater up to
Nerang. This meant leaving at
7.30am and on most days not
getting back until 7.30pm.
The competitions
were played over 8 days in very
high temperatures 6 or 7 games
each day - hard work.
On the first day
I played with Marcel and Louis
from the Gold Coast club in the
Mixed Triples and won the silver
medal
On the Women’s
Triples day the players all
decided that it would be much
easier to toss to see who’d won
and retire to the shade with a
few bottles of wine! But no, the
games had to go on. That day
with Brenda and Christine (from
the Gold Coast) we won the
bronze medal.
Elated we headed
to the on site bar to find it
closed! The barman had closed it
to go to the opening ceremony
and parade and wondered where
all the petanque players were!
The parade began at 5.00pm and
our games did not finish until 6
p.m. so we missed out.
Joy Moss from
Feilding partnered me in the
Women’s Doubles our first game
together. We were enjoying
getting to know one another and
suddenly found we were getting
way behind on points. We caught
up to 12 all then won and
surprised ourselves by going on
to win the gold medal. Joy says
that now she’s at home her club
expects her to be ‘Superwoman’!
Day 7 was the
Men’s Triples and the women did
the decent thing and left the
men to fight it out and headed
to the Games Village.
We watched Rock
and Roll and then swimming. Two
young women from New Zealand,
Ann & Shirley, were competing
and played petanque as a second
sport at the games. They went on
to win bronze in the Women’s
Doubles.
The last day was
the shooting competition -
everyone had a go. There were
players from Melbourne, New
Castle, Deception Bay, Harvey
Bay, Brisbane, New Zealand and
the Gold Coast. This is the
first time petanque has been
included in the games which are
now to be called the ‘Pan
Pacific Masters Games’. They
will alternate annually between
Sacramento, USA and the Gold
Coast with the next competition
in Australia in September 2004.
Pam Vernal
Christchurch Petanque Club
Coach of the Month
Congratulations
to Maureen Jones from
Silverstream Petanque Club who
was voted Coach of the Month by
Sport Upper Hutt in
December2002.
For the past two
years Maureen has been coaching
members of the blind community,
in particular Paul and his black
Labrador Liam.
No, the dog
doesn’t go up and bark as a
guide for placing the boule, but
is very well trained and sits
with his paws on the edge of the
piste watching. Paul’s eyesight
is minimal but he can crouch
down and study the boules, walk
back to the circle and throw a
fairly accurate shot.
Maureen has a
friendly personality, patience
and a conscientious attitude,
which have endeared her to her
pupils.
Thanks to Maureen
and people like her who
selflessly give their time to
promote petanque in New Zealand.
Tahitians Go South
As part of the
prize for winning the NZ Open in
2001, 4 Tahitian players were
invited to Christchurch to
demonstrate and share their
petanquing prowess. The 4
players included:
-
Terei -
President of the Tahitian
Petanque Association for the
last 22 years - and his
playing partner Noel. These
two won the NZ Open in 200l
and 2002.
-
Robert - who
was a member of the Tahitian
Triples team who beat the
French World Champions in
1995, member of winning
Doubles Team - NZ Open 1998,
1999, 2000, reached the top
8 in the French Nationals
and a member of the winning
Oceania Team.
-
Mr Chan or
‘Kapu’ who was, in his words
“Coach of Robert!”
-
Mrs Chan,
Robert’s wife Nora and Ian
Baker - who performed the
roles of Team
Manager/Coordinator/Translator
- accompanied the 4 players.
All flights
arrived on time and everyone was
ready to commence the fun melee
tournament as planned at 3.00pm.
Teams were drawn to ensure
unseeded players were drawn with
the Tahitians so players could
watch and learn their cunning
techniques.
The weather was
not exactly tropical and only
two games were played. In spite
of the rain, all had fun.
Tuesday January
28 was a beautiful summer’s day
and the morning was spent
showing the visitors around
Christchurch. The views from the
Port Hills and Gondola were
fantastic and fun was had
exploring Mona Vale and the
shops at Riccarton Mall.
The ‘serious’
tournament consisting of 6 local
doubles teams and the 2 Tahitian
teams got under way at 3.30pm
with the 2 Tahitian teams
winning their respective pools.
The standard of play was high
and all the Christchurch members
enjoyed the opportunity to test
themselves against
internationally competitive
players.
Perhaps, not
surprisingly, the visitors
played each other in the final
that was eventually won by Terei
and Noel whose shooting was
impressive - but yes they do
miss occasionally so there is
hope for us all!
A big thank you
to all who helped to make this a
very successful few days for the
Tahitian visitors and maybe one
day some of you will travel to
Tahiti to compete in their big
tournament held in July each
year where over 300 Triples
teams take part. I wouldn’t like
to be on the match committee for
that one!
Neil Satherley –
Christchurch Petanque Club
Peugeot 2003 National Triples
Championships
It all started
about a year ago when it was
suggested that Petanque Mt
Albert apply to the PNZ to hold
a National event. After all, the
club hadn’t been hosts before
and Auckland was well overdue to
be given the nod!
The forms were
filled out and the application
sent to hold the 2003 Peugeot
National Triples. In due course
the Auckland Petanque
Association was awarded the
Nationals with instructions to
let PNZ know the final choice of
venue. After a bit of back room
politicking and a final vote (Herne
Bay had also applied) at the APA
meeting Mt Albert found itself
the host club for the Peugeot
2003 Triples Championships with
Herne Bay picking up the NZ
International Open Doubles,
three weeks earlier.
The club now had
to approach the council to agree
to extensions to the terrains,
which also involved the pruning
back of trees - Auckland City
Council, were very supportive
and cooperative. Initially they
wanted the club to pay for 50%
of the developments but when the
club cried poor, agreed to foot
the bill in its entirety. Well
done Auckland City Council.
A working bee was
held the Saturday before the
nationals with more than thirty
people turning up from not only
Mt Albert but virtually every
other Auckland club. A huge
thanks to everybody involved.
The working bee included,
restringing and raking all the
terrains and trimming back any
overhanging branches.
To the weekend
itself - luckily the weather got
progressively better on Friday
after heavy rain during the
week. Everybody I spoke to
marvelled at the location and
the natural shade provided by
the trees. People were also
amazed by the variety of
terrains to choose from - heavy
shell, light shell, no shell!
Sloping north to south, east to
west and both directions at the
same time.
Talk about
emulating the terrains of
France! Also as they dried out
over the weekend, terrains that
seemed easy early on the
Saturday were now difficult and
vice versa.
As to criticisms
- well the idea of two teams
services not being required at
all on the Sunday was not well
received by all accounts and the
draw whereby people stayed on
one half of the draw all
weekend, resulting in many
cases, teams having to play each
other several times over the
weekend was not popular.
In summary would
I do it again - you bet but next
time I don’t think I would play,
it simply wasn’t fair on my
team.
Grant Hackert –
President – Petanque Mt Albert
2003 Peugeot National Championships Results
An interview with the 2003
National Triples Champions
The winners of
the National Triples in February
- Seti Mailei, Andrew Mailei and
Georgio Vakauta will again
represent New Zealand at the
World Championships in July.
Petanque NZ’s roving reporter
caught up with the players after
some training at the Victoria
Park terrain.
-
Q.
Congratulations to the three
of you for winning the
National Triples. Now you
get the chance to go to the
World Championships as a
team for the second year in
a row. Are you looking
forward to it?
Georgio:-
Yes, I certainly am. It’s a
great challenge, but it’s a
really great event, you get
to play against some
fantastic players from
around the world, and many
are also great
personalities. So as well as
competing I’m looking
forward to meeting old
petanque friends and making
new ones.
-
Q. When and
where are the World
Championships this year?
Seti: - in
Geneva, Switzerland from
16th to 20th July.
-
Q. Have you
set any goals for what you’d
like to achieve at these
World Champs?
Seti: - I’d
really like to do better
than we did last year. We
were pleased with last
year’s results, but we were
so close to doing even
better.
Andrew: - I’d
really like us to make the
top 10. It’s realistic.
Georgio: - I
want to bring back the
Trophy! Get stuck in and
beat some of these top
teams... (team laughs as
Georgio’s language was not
quite so polite)
-
Q. What have
you got to do to succeed at
this tournament?
Andrew: -
it’s about us all getting it
right together, at the right
time. You have to respond
properly to the huge
pressure of the competition.
Seti: - the
draw is different every
year, so at this time we
have no idea who we’ll be
playing. So we have to be
prepared to adapt to
whatever style is played by
our opponents. I think you
need three things to
succeed: consistency,
confidence and the right
attitude.
Georgio: - we
have to cope with the
pressure of the tournament
and the huge distractions.
In Grenoble last year there
were up to 35,000 in the
crowd. Because the
tournament goes for a long
time people in the crowd are
always moving. And they are
so noisy.
-
Q. It’s not
easy is it?
Andrew: - no
it’s not. But going a second
time as a team, and each of
us for the third time in
total, we now know we are
playing the right style of
petanque to win. So if we
can get our game working at
the right time we’ll do
well.
-
Q. What do
you mean by ‘your style of
petanque’?
Georgio: -
what I’ve learnt from
watching top teams is that
players aim for a very high
level of precision and
accuracy. It’s not good
enough for a shooter just to
try to hit the opponents
boule out. He must go for a
carreau, be aware of what
rebounds may occur. The
target is to get the
opponents ball completely
off the terrain, and yours
staying on it. Pointers are
expected to be really
specific with where their
boule ends up. Perhaps not
just to take the point, but
to position it to make it
more difficult for the
opposition to shoot out.
Seti: - when
we played
Belgium
last year, they finished the
game when they shot our last
boule out, even though it
was 2 metres from the
cochonnet. And it was shot
by their pointer, and his
carreau gave them 5 points
for the game. That’s the
standard and style of play
needed to win.
Georgio - so
we aim to play an aggressive
game, being prepared to
shoot a lot.
-
Q. I think we
saw a great example of this
style of play in the final
of the National Triples. For
those who weren’t there
explain what happened on the
final end.
Georgio: - we
were on 9 points. Andrew had
played 1 boule. They had
played all 6, but were
holding two points. I said
to Seti, “I want you to
shoot the Cochonnet”,
knowing that if he did, we
would win the game with the
4 boules in hand. And……
Seti: - So I
said OK. And I did shoot the
cochonnet, first time.
Georgio: -
but he shot it quite a long
way to the side, and we made
the 4 points for the game.
-
Q. How are
you going to prepare for the
World tournament?
Andrew: -
well we all practice a lot
on our own. But hopefully we
can get as much preparation
as we can by playing against
other top teams in Auckland.
We’re also going to a Sports
Psychologist, to get us
mentally prepared to peak at
the right time.
-
Q. Well, I
don’t think another issue of
the magazine comes out
before you go, so we wish
you all the best.
Seti: - Thank
you very much. We’ll do our
best to represent NZ the
best we can. And perhaps on
behalf of the team can I say
that we really appreciate
all the support we get from
around New Zealand. It’s
great.
Michael Emerson –
President –
Auckland
Petanque Association
Caversham Festival Tournament
2003
With entries from
Invercargill to
Christchurch and a cross section
of experienced players through
to first time boullists the two
day event started in brilliant
sunshine. The South Island
champs Mark Stewart and Robin
Adamson from the home club were
top seeds above the strong
Christchurch
pairings of Steve Thwaites and
Karel Los and Reed and Pat
Jamieson. At the end of Day 1
the above teams plus Anne
Sinclair and Mark Richardson
were unbeaten, so all the seeds
were safely through to the
trophy section.
Day 2 and slight
overnight drizzle saw the
terrain playing slower and some
of the favourites struggling
with both Christchurch teams
losing early games.
By Round 5 (the
last of round robin) any of
seven teams could be finalists,
the only unbeaten team, the
South Island Champs, lost to Pat
and Reed in their final game,
and in Pool A the top three had
beaten each other and an upset
was in the offing with the
Waikouaiti team of Stu and
Lenore Buchanan winning
narrowly.
Meanwhile Pool B
was having its problems and
finally only one team managed
four wins out of five, and
another giant killer in John
Brown and Janet Goodin. No one
could have predicted this script
with two of the most popular
teams playing in their most
important final. The nerves were
clearly visible in a final where
the standard never reached their
earlier efforts and Stu and
Lenore running out the winners
13 - 9.
There were some
outstanding efforts from less
experienced players from Milton,
Timaru and Waikouaiti reaching
the trophy section. The Plate
was won by Grandad Lindsay
Richardson with Granddaughter
Jamie (who had been part of the
victorious pairing in the
schools tournament in November)
with victory over Neill Welsh
and Wally Crawford from the
forming Alexandra Club, an
excellent effort by them. The
Bowl went to Yvonne Baxter and
Kaye Moodie (Caversham) over
Alan and Jenny Garth (St Kilda)
13 - 3.
The newly forming
Invercargill club’s
representatives Terry Keene and
Diana Cade won two games in this
section in their first
tournament and the promise they
showed matched their keenness
for the game of petanque, while
the youngest competitor, ten
year old Gina Maton, did enough
to show she has a good future in
the game.
Terry Holt -
Caversham |
