Some weekends matter more than others in a sportsperson’s life. Not the finals. Not the selections. Tournament weekends — and Easter weekend above all.
Every year, the same ritual. Clubs empty their gyms and regular pitches, cram overexcited kids into minibuses that smell of wet synthetic turf and crisps, and hit the road towards a tournament somewhere in France. For two or three days, sport becomes what it should always be: a magnificent excuse to live together.
Nantes, a spring weekend
I was twelve. Under-14 category. Stade Français was taking us to a tournament in Nantes — one of those big youth gatherings where you cross paths with clubs whose names you’d only ever seen in Midi Olympique, never imagining you’d one day play against them. Except I didn’t play.
The week before, I’d had the brilliant idea of breaking my wrist skiing. Cast from elbow to fingertips, my forearm about as mobile as a goalpost. Any sensible kid would have stayed home watching telly with a hot chocolate.
I didn’t think about it for a second.
Because missing a match is nothing. Missing an Easter tournament is missing the whole point. The coach trips where you trade cards, the hotel rooms where nobody sleeps, the snacks, the organised chaos of thirty kids — what joy that was.
I spent the weekend on the sideline with my ridiculous cast, shouting encouragement that nobody heard, carrying the team bags with one arm, eating soggy sandwiches with the coaches. And it’s one of my best sporting memories.
Not a single memory of a score. Not a single memory of a result. But I remember every trip, every laugh, every stolen snack.
What Easter reveals about grassroots sport
Easter weekend has always been a special moment in the sporting calendar. The federations know it — it’s when the friendly tournaments, cohesion camps, and away trips that break teams out of their routine all converge. It’s the moment when a club stops being a training venue and becomes a family.
And that’s precisely what makes grassroots sport irreplaceable.
You can digitalise registrations. You can automate fee reminders. You can manage selections on a screen. But you cannot automate the moment when a twelve-year-old with a cast on his arm decides that nothing in the world will stop him getting on that bus.
That decision doesn’t come from sport. It comes from belonging.
The volunteer’s paradox
And yet, for that weekend to exist, a volunteer — unpaid, probably exhausted — had to organise the transport, collect the parental authorisations, check the licences, chase the three families who hadn’t paid their fees, find accommodation, negotiate with the host club, print the match sheets, and probably handle a last-minute crisis on Friday evening at 10pm.
All of that without even Excel or WhatsApp — it was the 90s, after all.
That’s the paradox of French grassroots sport: the most human moments rest on the shoulders of people drowning in the most inhuman admin.
Why I built Paak
I built Paak for the volunteer who, on an Easter Friday evening, should be packing the kits instead of chasing membership fees.
So the bus leaves on time. So the licences are up to date. So the authorisations are signed. So everything is in order — and the volunteer can finally enjoy the tournament instead of managing it.
The kids don’t need to know that all of this is organised. They just need to get on the bus.
Happy Easter. And for those who have a tournament: enjoy every soggy sandwich.
Cyrille Barraud — Founder of Paak. Former flanker, wrist repaired since.