Petanque / Boule techniques

Throwing techniques
Having played a little bit of petanque you will discover that it is impossible to roll the balls perfectly across the field. Stone and rubble will avoid the balls from going the intended direction and will make them stop before they reach the target. The best thing to do is to hold the ball in your hand with the back of the hand upwards and the ball pointing downwards. Swing your arm so that the back of your hand is pointing towards the ground. This will give you optimum influence on the ball and will make it spin so that it will be able to break/stop just after ground impact.

The throw can be done standing or squatting ...as long as your are concentrated, relaxed and balanced it doesn�t matter which position you take. The higher you throw the ball - the more sudden it will stop on impact making its roll-lane shorter.

Close to jack landing
If you would like to throw the ball so that it will be placed as close to the jack as possible you should throw it high.

Moving an opponents balls
If you wish to move an opponents ball ("bombing") your throw should be lower so that the ball will roll into your opponents ball and push it away. When choosing this tactic you shall be very aware of what you are doing - because an imprecise ball will roll out of the field and result in a wasted ball.