Portable bocce courts to fuel Special Olympics growth in Ireland

Special Olympics bocce players in Ireland will have access to high-quality playing courts following the purchase of 26 portable Packabocce courts by their national body.

The new courts are a major investment in the sport’s future and will help Special Olympics Ireland introduce bocce to athletes in new venues and locations.

Special Olympics Ireland Sport Development Manager Elaine Twomey said the courts arrived in the country in October and had their first outing last week at a two-day area advancement event attended by more than 190 bocce athletes in County Kilkenny. 

The event was a success and played an important role in determining which athletes would be eligible to advance to the Leinster Regional Games next year and Ireland’s National Games in 2022, she said.

“The convenience of the new courts really lightened our load in preparing for the event. Transporting them was much easier and more cost effective for our organisation and set up time was considerably less than for previous events.”

Ms Twomey said bocce was a popular choice for Special Olympics athletes in Ireland and participation numbers had grown from 30 athletes when it was launched in 2001 to more than 900 athletes today.

In the past organisers had used timber, plastic piping and even a metal court frame for the bocce court walls, but they had been “cumbersome” and difficult for volunteers to transport and set up at events.

The new portable Packabocce courts would be available to all regions and would fuel growth of the sport by standardising the playing experience for athletes and making life easier for organisers, she said.

Packaworld Chief Executive Peter Roberts congratulated Special Olympics Ireland on its commitment to making the joy of sport accessible to more people.

“Bocce is a great sport because there are no barriers by size or strength and athletes of all ages and abilities can play it.

“The Special Olympics Ireland bocce programme has been a success story for the sport and I take my hat off to them for the way they have grown player numbers and encouraged athletes to make use of the fantastic pathways to international competition bocce provides.”

Internationally, bocce is the fourth most popular sport among Special Olympics athletes, behind football, athletics and basketball. There were 440,887 people playing bocce in Special Olympics programmes around the world in 2018.

>> More information about our portable bocce ball courts is available on our Packabocce page.

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