“Who wants to throw his wife? It would be easy for you”, laughs one of the members of the charity association of Sadirac jugs, addressing a man who is a good head taller than his spouse. It’s a pitcher throwing championship and you’ll have understood it without finesse… It was organized this Sunday, on the Gardonne site, in Loupes, in the Entre-Deux-Mers.
The event is above all the pretext for a friendly moment and large tables honored the specialties of local breeders. The children delight in pancakes which they carefully carry on a napkin. Prizes are then awarded to people with disabilities, who competed in the morning, in a nightclub atmosphere animated by a DJ. But at 2 p.m., the competition is approaching: “I remind you that we throw with one hand, with the gesture of petanque, summarizes before the first throws Alain Darmian, the president of the association. In 2019, the world champion sent her over 25 meters”.
“It’s quite heavy”
“It’s heavy, testifies Christelle, 52 years old. The pitcher is full so you have to have the pendulum swing but I don’t claim to compete, I tried for the joke”. Other competitors take the matter more seriously: “I had made plans for the comet and I thought I would be among the first but it’s quite heavy and the trajectory is not easy to manage, I’m disappointed “says Yohan, 33, yet keen on petanque. At the rate of three euros for three throws, he plans to try his luck again.
There is already a pinecone throwing event in Biscarrosse and a flip-flop throwing event in Hourtin, and Alain Darmian wanted to give a nod to these competitions by keeping local roots. “Sadirac is a pottery town,” he says. When the village had 800 inhabitants, there were 60 potters’ kilns in operation. There remains today a pottery and otherwise they are artistic ceramists”.
The jugs used for the championship are made by a ceramic potter from Sadirac. “They don’t break because they are not made of sadirac soil but of sandstone,” he explains. They are very thick and we put polystyrene to avoid breakage”. But the prizes reserved for the best pitchers are indeed large jugs which are made of Sadirac clay. Phew, honor is saved.
Every year since 2008, the event has attracted around 500 people, half of whom venture to try pitcher throwing. “We donate according to our surplus, around 500 euros each year, to a different association each time”, specifies the president.
“It’s a bit exaggerated world championship but who cares, we’re the only ones,” he concludes. We had some doubts…