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Pentecost Bouleste tournament - Boules Championship

Pentecost Bouleste tournament - Boules Championship

Name: Pentecost Bouleste tournament - Boules Championship
Telephone: 04 78 37 16 10
Price range: Free of charge.
Start: 2025-06-07
End: 2025-06-09

Games & Sports

Last updated date : 06/06/2025

Each Pentecost weekend, the crème de la crème of Boule Lyonnaise (Lyonnais boules) does battle on Place Bellecour.

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Pentecost Bouleste tournament - Boules Championship

04 78 37 16 10 Site web

Every year, the ceremony is the same. Terraced seating on Place Bellecour, pitches, the sound of boules on the wooden barriers, focused teams running and tossing… and amazed tourists wondering what on earth this strange spectacle could be!

You will find no pétanque here, thank you very much! During this three-day event, which has been held for the past 107 years, Lyon is the French capital of ‘Boule Lyonnaise’, or ‘la longue’. Created in Lyon in the eighteenth century, this sport is the ancestor of pétanque and is highly popular in the region.

The ‘Tournoi de Pentecôte’ is the major tournament, drawing teams from all over France and even abroad. More than 14,000 participants take each other on, under the gaze of Louis XIV, until the grand final on the Monday!