Euskal Pilota - Basque pelota

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Basque pelota

Basque pelota, the best known and most international sport, exists in a number of variants, although the most popular are: hand pelota and cesta-punta. Both of these versions can be played in two ways mano a mano or one against one and parejas or two against two.

Hand pelota is the most popular in the Basque Country. Most of the villages, neighbourhoods and even little hamlets have their own pelota courts, often to be found against one of the walls of the church. Most villages and towns hold championships during their patron saints, and those that can afford the luxury hire professional pelota players.

Television has spread the popularity of this game to neighbouring provinces including La Rioja, Cantabria, Castile and Leon, etc.

Another version is the pelota played with a wooden pala or bat, while the most spectacular and internationally famous of all is the cesta-punta variant, known as jai-alai, due to the speed of the ball and the appearance of the players with their hands sheathed in the wicker baskets.

It is played widely in pelota courts throughout Florida, particularly in the Miami Jai-Alai, where the enormously popular sport is played by an important number of Basque sportsmen. Mexico, Buenos Aires, the Philippines, Shanghai, all figure on the long list of places in which this spectacular game can also be seen. The Mecca of this game in the Basque Country is Gernika.