Pitching Horseshoes in the backyard. A quasi-guide to construction with rules to horseshoe pitching..
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A "woodsy" backyard Horse Shoe Court |
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Stuff needed: 4 horseshoes, 2 stakes, 2 pits, bag of quickrete or sackrete, enough land. I also used some leftover cardboard concrete tube forms I had from the barn renovation. |
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| CLICK HERE FOR RULES. |
| First find a suitable area. |
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From stake to stake, the distance is 40 ft. The first 3 feet in front of the stake can be utilized when pitching the horseshoe. So...in terms of court size, to be comfortable, you'll need a fairly flat area about 65 ft long by 15 or more feet wide. |
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| Above, I've cut limbs or maybe it was a small tree, to form the sides of my first pit. Once done, I measured to find the center and then I put something (a pair of scissors) to mark it. |
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Under "stuff needed" I forgot to mention: 1 Dirt mover. |
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| Then I took about 7 inches of a cardboard cement tube form (sometimes called "sauna tubes") and made up some quickrete and inserted the stake at an angle. |
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The stake angles forward and is about 14-15 inches above the surface. |
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SECURE THE PIT SIDES: To stabilize the sides of the pit, I made little sharp stakes. Enlarge photo and you'll see an example. Then I hammered them into the ground in front of the little logs and then I screwed the stakes to the logs. Works great! |
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| I then covered it with landscaping cloth I got cheap at Roses. I've got some gravel to hold-it down on the edges while I add sand. |
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| Getting closer. I added about 5 inches of sand. |
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| I cut a 40 ft piece of rope to help with the horseshoe court layout. Made it easy. |
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| Now to work on my game.... Rules & Regs below. |
Rules & Regulations for Horseshoes
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Teams: Form two teams. Each team gets 2 horseshoes. Flip a coin or rock/paper/scissors to see which team pitches first. The Pitch: The first pitcher throws both horse shoes, one at a time. The distance from one stake to the next is 40 feet but there is a 3 ft space in front of the stake open to the player. So... If the player is an adult male, he must throw from behind the first foul line (37 feet from the targeted stake). If the player is female, younger, or elderly they may throw from anywhere behind the second foul line (27 feet from the targeted stake). The next team then pitches from the same end, aiming for the same stake. The scores are tabulated and the horseshoes are retrieved. The next pitcher from each team then pitches from the opposite end—back towards the initial side. Pitching is alternated like this from one end to the other until the game is complete. Scoring:
Game Over: In a point-limit game, the game ends when at the end of an inning (an inning occurs every time all players have pitched) a team has at least 40 points. A shoe-limit game is over when 40 shoes have been pitched. The team with the most points wins. In the event of a tie, extra innings are played until a winning team emerges. For more info, see the National Horseshoe Pitchers Association of America’s official rules.
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