Canadian Womens Team 5th at World Championships

Sept 8,9,10 at Hyères, France the Canadian team of Bergeron,Ringuette and Picard placed 5th after losing to Belgium in the 1/4 finals. Belgium then beat Denmark to win the Title.

Maryse Bergeron, with her strong shooter skills, who in past years has help lead previous womens teams to victory; joined with Mary Ringuette and Johanne Picard to show why Canada continues to be amoung the top pétanque countries.

On September 8,9,10, the trio, and FPQ secretary, France Filion, and Canada's Womens' Vice champion Muriel Filion (spare) met at the World International Womens Championship. Muriel Filion, also was acting as a respresentative for the 2002 World Championships which will be hosted in Canada at La Tuque in 2002.

Play in Hyères, France.
Day one:
Canada playing in Group (Poule) 6 wins against Seychelles (13-9) and Hungary (13-5) but lost to Spain-2 (13-4). Spain-2 and Canada qualified.

Day two:
Canada's team is grouped with Japon, Portugal and Luxembourg in the second elimination. Canada wins against Luxembourg (13-11) and Portugal (13-3) but lost to Japon (6-13). Japon and Canada qualified.

Day three (final day)
Canada starts the 1/8 finals against Algeria and with a 13-11 victory advanced to the 1/4 finals to meet Belgium. Now, only 8 countires remain to respresent the best of womens' pétanque in the world, (Canada,Madagascar, Thailand, Switzerland, Spain and Denmark); they met Belgium.

Canada loses in 1/4 Final against Belgium who goes on to win the championship. This final game ends Canada's team change as they lose 13-2. However, because of overall scoring Canada is placed at a 5th World Championship standing.
In the semi-finals Thailand lost to Belgium 6-13) and Spain-1 lost to Denmark (10-13) In the Final match Belgium creamed Denmark 15-1.
(Results are available on Petanque.org/hotboule with a search of 'womens')

Canadian Pétanque History
In Canada, at the end of each summer petanque competition season, the Canadian Selection Championships are played to choose the new Canadian Team. The teams advance and the winner is send to the world Championship to respresentative Canadian Pétanque.

Last August 14,15 1999 at Lafontaine Park in Montreal, Maryse Bergeron and her team won there place. The game reporting is available on http://captain_quebec.homestead.com/championship2000.html.

We now wait for the Canadian mens' Pétanque to play the World Championships in Faro, Portugal. This team of Mickaël Drouin, Sébasien Drouin and Claude Laulhé should be interesting to watch as the two younger Drouin brother are able to use the wisdom of the wise fox of Canadian Petanque, Claude Laulhé. Claude has been on the petanque scene longer than anyone knows and has the experience of several international competitions.