The surprising revival of road bowling, Ireland's ancient sport

https://www.rte.ie/brainstorm/2025/0709/1522577-road-bowling-ireland-sport-heritage-tradition-cork-armagh-tiktok-instagram/

27•austinallegro•4mo ago

Comments

Mistletoe•4mo ago

No disrespect to Ireland at all but this does not look like a real game.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gyomkya9qG8

It looks like something Michael Scott would have made up. And how do you avoid getting run over?

clickety_clack•4mo ago

This is a more accurate depiction of throwing the bowl. It’s a bit more athletic than that guy made it look. https://youtu.be/OwjNenO259Q

secondcoming•4mo ago

There are people ahead who warn/stop cars. It's only really played on quieter country roads.

physarum_salad•4mo ago

"this does not look like a real game"...turns off computer and plays beer pong

donohoe•4mo ago

It makes much more sense to me than golf does.

jmclnx•4mo ago

Sounds lots of fun, but I would not be able to play. Well I probably could but I have always been an extremely slow runner.

Bicycling was different, but running, could never do :)

Molitor5901•4mo ago

This sounds cool! I remember when I came upon HURLING (the sport) late one evening and it was absolutely incredible. A bunch of guys with no helmets running around bouncing a baseball on the end of a short hockey stick, and then slamming that ball across the field.. I thought surely someone was about to get beaned. Incredible sport.

rgblambda•4mo ago

Hurling should be played with helmets. If it's just a group of friends in a park casually passing the sliotar (ball) to each other and taking practice shots then okay, but not if they were playing a proper game.

WorkerBee28474•4mo ago

+1 to helmets. In youth, the very similar sport of lacrosse actually has a higher risk of concussion than football [0].

[0] https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10883126/

esperent•4mo ago

Any serious hurling game since at least the early nineties is always played with helmets (as a legal requirement, but also just common sense). Sure, you might have a friendly knockaround without them, but not a real match.

illwrks•4mo ago

You need to wear a helmet with it. Years ago a colleague played in the local team and one weekend took a hurley (the stick with the metal band at the end) to the face and had his jaw broken. Never forgot his helmet again.

physarum_salad•4mo ago

It's "hedge petanque". Looks more fun too. Line of sight to the ball is not optimal though.

SpicyUme•4mo ago

This looks like it could be bastardized into a fun neighborhood event with some planning.

codeduck•4mo ago

What a quintessentially Irish thing to do.

i_don_t_know•4mo ago

The same sport is played in the Netherlands and north-western Germany: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Klootschieten

German names are Klootschießen and Boßeln.

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