Bernard Castets first played bare knuckles, becoming a school champion at the age of 8 in his village Labouheyre, before entering Saint-Bernard College in Bayonne. Entering professional life at the age of 15, he discovered the pala ancha and then the paleta in pelle in Hossegor.
Back in Labouheyre, he created a pelota club there. Installed in Dax, as a shoe dealer in 1973, he won several Landes, national and interleague titles for the USD in open spots, trinquet and left block. And later, five crowns of French veterans champion.
Very active leader and educator, Bernard Castets is a disabled sports referent. Every Monday he welcomes a group from the Medical-Educational Institute (IME) of Dax to the Colette-Besson stadium.
Ski instructor at USD and Ski Landes, he has also to his credit the ascent of Kalapatar (5,700 metres) in Nepal, near Everest. At the moment of the confidences he admits to having been a complaining partner on the gables. Incorrigible, he still moans today.
Volunteer
In the 1960s, Marcel Bourretère approached rugby (at US Dax, from rugby school to juniors) and discovered the pelota on the Gond gable. After leaving for Paris in the post and telecommunications sector in 1968, he played rugby at Poissy, Saint-Denis and the ASPTT.
In 1975 he returned to Dax: corporate rugby at the ASPTT, woodcock hunting and porcini mushroom picking kept him busy. In 1985, the wall to the left of the Sablar was built. Marcel Bourretère creates, on the advice of his friend Loulou Dachary, the pelota section of the ASPTT, which he still directs.
