On a rainy Friday afternoon, a few hundred people have gathered in the south of Paris in a large building complex that looks like an empty warehouse from the outside and inside. If it weren’t for the eight green linoleum fields that are flanked by two high stands. There is frenetic clapping and whistling when a ball rolls to its intended place.
Boccia is a precision sport: Most people will know it from city parks, where the ageing German society has even built its own lanes in some places, because in a precision sport nothing can be left to chance. Paralympics It has been represented since 1984 as a sport for wheelchair users. It is never a big crowd puller, always something for the gourmets.
Psychological tricks, self-made pressure
The special feature of this exotic sport is that completely unexpected turns are possible at any time. The throws of the athletes can serve both the offensive goal of placing their own balls as close as possible to the white ball that was thrown at the beginning, and also to move the carefully thrown objects of the opposing player away. In order to balance these possibilities cleverly, the players are allowed to drive onto the field during the game or be driven.
They have a certain amount of time available to them, which they divide between the different throws. Those who know how to use this time psychologically, for example by interrupting the opponent’s momentum after a successful throw by delaying, gain an advantage. At some point, the roaring rain in Paris is so loud that you think the stadium roof is going to give way. Below, the athletes are already throwing themselves in before their competition starts in an hour.
Also taking part: Anita Raguwaran, who at this point is the only German still with a chance of making it to the finals. The day before, she had already managed to become the first female German boccia player to ever win a Paralympics. On Friday, she faced the Brazilian Laissa Polyana Teixeira in the decisive match to reach the knockout round.
That this will be a difficult undertaking is already apparent in the first few sets, which tip quite closely, first in one direction, then in the other. Raguwaran is not throwing her best balls this late afternoon. Later she says that she put pressure on herself to win the match and that more could have been achieved.
Next goals: specialist examination and Los Angeles 2028
Towards the end of the match, the Brazilian pulls ahead of her on points and secures her place in the finals. For the German athlete, the Paralympics were nevertheless an exhilarating experience: “I’ve never experienced anything like it before. My brain still has a lot to process,” she says, and speaks of a “lovely community” in the Paralympic village.
In addition to reflecting on the Paralympic experience, the German boccia player also has a lot of work ahead of her: in a few months she will take her exam to become a specialist doctor. After that she wants to think about how she can combine her career and sport. Her sights are firmly set on the 2028 Paralympic Games in Los Angeles.
As dusk begins to fall outside in Paris, the athletes are given a warm welcome by friends and family. In the preliminary rounds, bocce remains a sport whose audience consists largely of the athletes’ personal circles.
