The Tarnos Stadium Boucau, a horse rugby club between Landes and Pyrénées-Atlantiques

This Sunday, April 20, 2025 (at 3:15 p.m.), the Boucau Tarnos Stade played a decisive match for its maintenance in Federal 2 against the US Bazadaise. After more than a century of existence, this emblematic club of French rugby is at the crossroads. Between Landes and Pyrénées-Atlantiques, the Boucau Stade, which became Boucau Tarnos Stade (BTS) in March 1988, is a dynamic association which records 390 licensees. At his head, José Foncillas, 74, president of the club for twenty-five years, and member for forty-seven years, returns to the history “of blacksmiths”.

Founded in March 1907, the club has long relied on “its training”. Close to the Forges de l’Adour, the BTS has managed to hatch some big names in French rugby, such as the second emblematic line of the XV of France Jean Condom. “At the start, those who join the club are people who work the land,” explains the president. In a club where he “is good to live”, the manager wished, upon his arrival in 2000, to put a forward the triptych “transparency, loyalty and probity”.

Federal B title

For its centenary, in 2007, the club won a title of Federal B. “What joy it was to touch this piece of wood”, recognizes, nostalgic, the president. He still has a regret. “In 1994, we lost a second division final in Saint-Vincent-de-Tyrosse, against Peyrehorade, ahead of nearly 10,000 people. At that time, I am the coach. »»

From his national player career between 1970 and 1980, José Foncillas has pretty memories, he, the kid of Boucau who went to the stadium of pitchy with his bag on the shoulder. “I had an exceptional captain in the person of Louis Damestoy. “Since then, he has” passed the step “by living on the other side of the” border “, in Tarnos, and most often attended the match on the lawn of the inter -municipal stadium of the Landes town.

Even if the fate of the club has not yet been fixed, José Foncillas thinks about it. And hopes that “the next generation” will be able to ensure the time. So that the history of the Tarnos stadium Boucau continues to write.