Bocce will soon be booming across the islands of the Florida Keys thanks to the recent arrival of eight high-quality portable bocce courts purchased by Special Olympics Florida.

The revolutionary courts, developed by Packaworld International, will be provided to schools in the archipelago so they can run school-based and inter-school unified bocce competitions for students. Generous grants from the Ocean Reef Community Foundation and the Community Foundation of the Florida Keys helped make the purchase possible.

“The portable courts allow us to offer the sport of bocce to a wider range of individuals with disabilities and also provide inclusive opportunities for those without disabilities," said Ruth Coleman from Special Olympics Florida.

When the first bocce balls of this year’s Special Olympics NZ National Summer Games were thrown by athletes in Hamilton earlier this month, it signified something of a milestone for the portable Packabocce courts being used.

This year was the first calendar year the portable courts have appeared at National or State Games in three separate continents, following their use at multiple major events in the USA and Europe.

New Zealand’s premier Special Olympics event was hosted at Claudelands Event Centre and attended by around 1,000 athletes. Bocce is one of 10 different sports included in New Zealand’s National Summer Games programme and this year’s bocce athletes competed in both doubles and teams events.

Students from across Minnesota mixed and mingled on portable bocce courts from Packaworld at the Minnesota Unified Bocce State Tournament earlier this month.
​
M Health Fairview Sports Center in Woodbury rolled out some of the 31 Packabocce courts owned by Special Olympics Minnesota to host more than 140 students from 17 schools at the tournament.

Katie Howlett from Special Olympics Minnesota said the event was “fantastic” and she was impressed with the convenience of the inflatable courts.

“Everyone loved using the Packbocce courts, particularly the event managers, because they were just so easy to move around and set up.”

Anticipation was high as Gibraltar faced off against the Isle of Man at the start of the Special Olympics Gibraltar National Games 2022.

The competition rolled into action at the Bayside Sports Complex on 22 September after a three year delay due to Covid, with two portable Packaworld’s Packabocce courts setting the stage for an international bocce battle.

This year’s National Games were the first in Gibraltar to feature bocce – a sport for people of all abilities that has become the fourth most popular sport in Special Olympics programmes globally.

Special Olympics Gibraltar President and CEO Annie Risso said the bocce competition had been a success for athletes and organisers, who commented on the “high quality” playing experience offered by the courts, as well as their ease of setup.

Malta is the tenth-smallest country in the world by area, a city-state floating in the Mediterranean Sea, and for a week in May, it played host to the Special Olympics Malta Invitational Games.

The games were the first Special Olympics tournament in Europe since the Covid—19 pandemic hit, and the excitement was palpable. Nowhere was the atmosphere more electric than at the bocce event, a homecoming of sorts for a game long played on the island, albeit in a different form.

Long ago, in the time of the Knights of St. John (1530–1798), a game called maghio was played on the island. Using cylindrical bowls instead of spherical, the game would eventually become known as bocci. Today, its Italian cousin, bocce, has returned to the island’s shores, its surge in popularity fuelled in part by new portable bocce courts from Packaworld that are helping organisers grow the sport globally.

Bocce athletes at the Special Olympics Germany National Games in Berlin last week were rolling for gold on revolutionary portable courts that are quickly becoming the benchmark globally.

Developed by Packaworld International, the ‘Packabocce’ courts are inflatable yet fully rigid, providing for a top-quality playing experience while also being easy to set up and transport.

They are widely used in the USA and at national and regional Special Olympics competitions in many other places globally, but their arrival for Germany’s premier event marked the first time they had been used at the very top level in Europe.