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Emma Grivotte
Published on
Oct. 18, 2024 at 10:30 a.m.
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It’s an unusual sport, straddling darts and athletics javelin. In September 2024, the French champion Kevin Cornet launched a javelin club target shooting in Normandy, in Beuzeville (Eure). The very first in the region.
And for good reason, this traditional sport comes from the North of France and remains mainly practiced there: “in the mining basins of the North of France and in Picardy”, or even in Belgium and Hungary, specifies Kévin Cornet, 29 years old, himself originally from Picardy and settled for six years in Beuzeville.
This consists of throw small javelins, equipped with a steel tip and colored feathers on the back, on a target.
A very ancient and warlike sport
“It’s one of the oldest French sports, it dates from the 14th century, it’s a warrior sport,” explains Kévin Cornet, the president of the new association “Beuzeville Javelot Club”.
This discipline had its heyday at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century in the courtyards of cafés or “estaminets” in mining regions before also being practiced in community halls or “javelodromes”. It is also nicknamed “the pétanque of the North”.
A game born from a ban?
The origins of the target shooting javelin seem very ancient. According to the specialist Philippe Plouviez, the most probable hypothesis concerning its emergence dates back to the period of the Hundred Years’ War: “A royal order of 1369 prohibited all games of choule (soule), puck or marbles and other nonsense of no use on the battlefield [sous peine d’amende]. This is why archery, crossbow shooting or any other game that can introduce you to the handling of a weapon or develop a sense of aggression are strongly encouraged. We then understand why some preferred to test their skill at the game of javelin, which could pass for a throwing weapon, rather than at bowling.”
Conversely, when in 1790, war games were pilloried during the French Revolution, the javelin game escaped restrictions.
The French javelin target shooting federation was only created in 1984. Today in France, there are around 1,000 licensed players and 10,000 practitioners.
Kévin Cornet and his partner and secretary of the club, Coline Pray, 25 years old, held a stand at the Beuzeville association forum, and the new club has won over several members, children and adults, who find themselves in an atmosphere friendly every Friday from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. at the André-Quillé gymnasium.
The javelin is accessible to all ages from approximately 7 years old, as well as to people with disabilities.
Three times French champion
But success in this game is not guaranteed to the first comer.
At the start, you have to persevere. There is also concentration work.
Then, the victory is all the more delicious. “It’s a sport that allows you to surpass yourself. »
But what is the difficulty? The size of the target. It is only 21 cm in diameter and is placed 8 meters from the shooter. For each javelin thrown, hitting the red zone earns 1 point, and the central zone, 2 points.
Coline Pray got into the game after meeting Kévin Cornet:
Very quickly, I found it pleasant, she says. This requires dexterity and precision. To improve, you need patience and a lot of training.
The young woman is preparing to compete in her first competition.
The president of the club is not an amateur. He has been practicing for more than 10 years and has risen to the top of the players’ basket. Kévin Cornet was crowned three times French champion ! He also reached the Coupe de France final.
A track record that the young man, a landscape gardener by trade, intends to expand on by continuing the competitions!
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