La Low Goal - issue 8 - April

April

La Low Goal

Opinion The cost of membership

Ignacio Llorente Importance Of A Training Program

Hannah Parry-Jones Make Your play Unlimited

Chukka Wellness Stretching On Your Pony

Gear Guide Helmets

Jason Webb Horse Trainer

Rules Refresh Reminder to get you up to speed for the season

Looking for Contributors Could you write us an article?

Tell us about yourself, your horses, your club, etc and get featured!

This Month…

Welcome Opinion Article: 4

Big news

Goal Victor Ludurum

(must be big, he’s gone for the over the top font)

La Low goal is now available on apple news, just for you Apple users out there.

From last month onwards we will be uploading every story straight to your phones (unless you’re on Android, in which case, tough luck). Now you will be able to get you La low Goal hit in an even more convenient and simple manner, while losing none of the content. But wait, it gets better. By subscribing on Apple News you can get handy reminders as soon as we publish something new, allowing you to read our stories as they break, and be the very first one to the party. Of course, for you non Apple users, or those who still prefer the magazine e format, you can always view the magazine right here on issuu.com, or download the issuu app.

Gear Guide: Polo In other exciting news (oh, we have been busy this month, haven’t we?), prepare for a La low Goal special. We will be publishing our very first 6 month special later this month, IN PRINT. Thats right, we will be printing a limited selection of ‘best of’ issues, taking the very best articles from the last 6 months and wrapping them up in an arty bundle. Hopefully you’ll be able to get hold of them at you’re local club very soon, so keep your eyes peeled.

Helmets

Enjoy the issue.

Connor Kay (editor)

In this Issue Millfield Polo: Winners of the Sandpool Trophy

Donate now Rules Refresh: all you to know to get you up to speed for the season

Ignacio Llorente: The importance of a training schedule

Jason Webb: The acclaimed horse Chukka wellness: trainer shares his top Stretching on your horse tips

Contents: Page 5 Opinion Article

Page 7 Gear Guide Guide to Polo helmets

The cost of membership

Page 12 Rules Refresh

Page 24 Jason Webb Horse Trainer

Page 20 Millfield Polo

#

lalowgoal

Use the Hashtag #lalowgoal to be featured in next months magazine!

#LaLowGoal @performancepolo

Great photo of @harrisonazza ro by @hcruden floating along the boards There has been a lot of preparation to get ready for our upcoming summer season. We would like to thank everyone who has made this possible.

@triskelionpoloclub

The Cost Of Membership

We can all feel the excitement building.

The ponies are all back in work. We can see those plump winter tummies shrinking and the muscles starting to show beneath the new summer coats that are coming through.

We’ve dragged ourselves down the gym, spurred on by the longer evenings, occasional sunny days and the odd whiff of fresh cut grass from over the neighbours fence as they mow the lawn. We have started penciling dates in the diaries and have had endless impromptu meetings in the barn about possible teams and handicap levels for this year. There is really only one thing left too do….bite the bullet and pay the club membership!

As we sit poised over the online banking log in page, we ask ourselves,

“But why is it so much?!”

Surely the club is just milking us members so the guys at the top can give themselves a bonus.

We mutter to ourselves as we begin filling out the online payment details.

“With so many members, surely the club doesn’t need to charge that much. Where can it all go?”

Surely all they do is cut the grass once a week right?

Lets have a quick look at what they do and where our membership goes.

As we ready ourselves to press ‘confirm’ on that bank payment, our clubs and groundpersons have been busy beavering away for over a month already, in apprehension of the beginning of the UK grass season properly starting later in April.

Weeks ago the groundsmen and club managers (and possibly outside sourced agronomists) will have gone over the pitches to discuss what needed doing to get them in playing condition.

As every year, the fields will have been harrowed and swept to remove dead grass and moss.

Then top dressed with soil and sand mixture to fill in any holes and imperfections. Then probably rolled and overseeded with a mainly ryegrass seed.

They are not done there though.

The fields will have been sprayed with a herbicide to remove moss and weeds, …and then the cutting begins.

This is no small task as each pitch is 300m x 200m covering the playing and safety areas.

The grass is initially cut long (about 34mm) and usually cut using ganged cylinder mowers.

And don’t think they then sit back and just watch the grass grow. Its time to assemble the boards. Each board is 30cm high and 3.6m long and they take some time fix in position and secure as they will remain for the whole season until they are lifted and stored again in September.

The fields will probably then be in need of spraying with a fertiliser before the grounds are then ready for a further cut at a lower height of around 19-22mm before the ground staff then have to start the line marking and setting up the goal posts.

There! The pitch is ready. In all its lush green glory. A wondrous smooth sea of verdant green ready for us members to ride out onto, on our spring fresh ponies, with our newly purchased tack or well polished and repaired equipment, our crisp, fresh, white jeans and newly designed team shirts.

But the ground staff cannot bare to watch the game as they know the damage our eager early chukkas will do. They are resigned to the fact that after we leave that first tournament, flushed

with the excitement of being outside on our galloping ponies, they will be back on duty ready to make good the damage, before we return to do it all again next week.

The team walk the pitches filling divots with a mix of 70% sand to 30% seed. The droppings are removed and then back to mowing and collecting again. This busy workforce, labour away almost unnoticed until we return for chukkas and see the results of their toil.

This carries on, daily throughout the season and even when we hang up our mallets in September and head off to the end of season party the staff haven’t finished.

The pitches will be verti-drained to undo the compaction of the soil throughout the summer.

This will also help with drainage within the soil for the following year (always thinking one step ahead). The considerations for the grass quality don’t stop there as the field may be top dressed with sand, overseeded or fertilised before the ground staff can pallet up the boards and finally relax a little over the winter months.

Now you know what is involved in maintaining that green field of play, you might think..

“Oh, very well but surely thats just a few guys salary. It still doesn’t come close to justifying my membership fee”

Well maybe, just maybe, you have forgotten to factor in the full costs. Not just those well earned salaries but what about the cost of the sand and the soil for top dressing (up to 600 tons per pitch), the quality grass seed for reseeding, the fertilisers, the herbicides, the equipment required by each club,

Mowers

Scarifiers

Harrows

Aerators

Sprayers

And of course the tractor plus the maintenance/storage and upkeep of all of these.

So far we have looked at the ground care of our clubs but a quick look at the A.G.M minutes will let you know what else your club committee have been up to and, sure enough, all the figures will be there in black and white, helping to justify every penny.

So, lets press ‘Confirm’ on that online banking payment and as we ride out into the April sunshine onto those lush green summer pitches maybe look into the distance and give an appreciative wave towards the tractor diligently mowing fresh strips into the neighbouring pitch, before we tighten our grip on our mallets and line up to begin our summer of polo.

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4 Goal

Victor

Ludurum

The season is almost upon us. Soon the tournaments will begin, the chukkas will become commonplace and the Victor Ludurm series will once again see teams rack up points in order to take the overall crown. This series, hosted over a number of tournament levels from 4 to 18 goal, and at dozens of different clubs sees teams compete in isolated tournaments in order to compete for not only the individual tournament win, but also points which are totted up to calculate the overall champion at the end of the season. As of last year, a new level was added to the lower spectrum of this long established series, the 4 goal Victor Ludurum. Now in theory I absolutely support this cause. Any initiative to share competitive teams around the low goal clubs is a good idea in my eyes. If we could end up with a situation where a number of highly competitive teams traveled around the country, combined with a willing crop of teams from the host club, we could end up with some exciting, competitive polo, which would not only please the players, but also attract spectators and sponsors. As far as I am concerned this is a win, win situation, for everyone involved. However, as you may have come to expect there is a catch. People just aren’t following the series through. The team who won the inagral series last year, Coombe Place, only competed in 3 of the 6 available tournaments. Print on Demand, who finished runners up, only 2. At Cheshire, no travelling teams at all turned up, and as a result this promising scheme, just isn’t delivering. It also means that the series is even less likely to attract competitive teams in the future, as it would be possible to win just by attending a couple more tournaments than the next team. This isn’t competitive polo. This isn’t what we all were hoping we were promised. And I think I know why.

Polo entry fees are extortionate. It can be well in excess of £500 just to enter a team for a low goal, weekend tournament. This is before pro fees, umpire costs and travelling costs are added on. And Victor Ludurum tournaments are even more expensive. Part of this is due to the obligation of the club to hire professional umpires, but I don’t believe this can be put down to the astronomical entry costs the Victor Ludurum charges. When this is combined with a team’s travelling costs, pro fees, etc, you can see why people would prefer to

stay at their own clubs. If people want these teams to travel, which they really should, then they need to make it economically viable for the patrons and teams. Yes, clubs might still need to charge slightly more than regular tournaments, but if they can keep this to a minimum, I am happy to bet that more teams will enter, and overall the club will end up making more.

Finally, I think a little hype needs to injected into the series. Yes, results are published monthly, but this is very factual and, put simply, boring. We need a story line, something teams and spectators want to get involved in. We need to promote the teams, tournaments and results more, and focus on the battles between teams at all levels. If you had similar teams traveling the country, taking on the home favourites and battling it out over the course of a season, you can construct an exciting plot and storyline. Hype it up. Get people involved. Use social media, video platforms, magazines (especially if you want to write here, please), all of the above, just inject a little excitement.

One way of injecting this excitement and attracting teams is to use prize money. We have seen this work wonders in the US high goal, where teams are battling it out for a possible $1,000,000. Team uptake has increased dramatically, and more people are more interested in the game. The system where by a bonus of $500,000 is won by achieving the grand slam, also puts a huge target on the back of the team who wins the first tournament, (this year pilot) helping to construct this plot line and build the tension. If something like this was introduced in the Victor Ludurum, with each tournament offering prize money, combined with special bonuses for winning a certain number of the available tournaments, I believe we could see something similar start to take shape throughout the different handicap levels. Of course the prize money wouldn’t be as high, but as long as there is something on the line, as far as teams and spectators are concerned there is something to fight for. It will surely only result in more teams, better polo and more spectators. Victor Ludurum is a fabulous thing, especially at the higher levels and I would love to see these benefits passed onto the low goal, I hope we can make it happen.

R Re

Rules efresh

The season is almost upon us, and for many of us out there we will be in need of a little refresher after many long months out of the game. For some, perhaps this will be there first season, while for many others, just a light brush up will be needed. This month we will start at the absolute basics, the fundamentals of the game, and build up to some of the more complicated rules in a later issue.

A polo field is 300 by 160 yards in size, with boards along either side, often tapering inwards towards the goal. Markers are painted across the pitch at the centre, and at the 60, 40 and 30 yard lines where penalties of different severities are taken from. In its simplest form, the aim of the game is to score, by hitting the small white ball, more than the opposition. A feature that often confuses new players and spectators alike is the fact that we always change end after each goal is scored. This is to ensure neither team has a sun, wind or field advantage, but does often confuse casual spectators as suddenly the teams are shooting for opposing goals.

The main rule a player must be conscious of, and the one that overwhelmingly yields the most fouls is, the line of ball. This is the basis of most the rules in polo, and is there simply to avoid harm to horses and players alike by avoiding collisions. Simply but, the last player to hit the ball (or the umpire in throw in’s) creates an invisible line in the direction of the ball, extending out in front of it. This line is often thought of like a central reservation on a road, and dictates where players can ride. For example, you cannot pull out at 90 degrees to the line in front of another player, much like you wouldn’t pull out in the middle of the road. The most common foul in polo is when a player crosses this line in order to play a shot. This is dangerous as it could lead to a collision between the fouling player and the people following the ball, and therefore is a serious offence. A common misconception surrounding the line of ball, is that the player who last hit the ball has right of way.

Although this is true in many situations a player may hit a shot, such as a cut shot or backhand, which they cannot turn onto, and therefore have given up the right of way to other players. Often, in amateur matches they will return to the ball and foul when rejoining the line.

Ride offs are another key concept of the game, and give rise to a number of types of fouls themselves. A ride off, is where a player uses their horse to push another player off the line, in order to make them miss or play the ball themselves. The key thing with ride off’s is that they must be shoulder to shoulder and at the same, or a very similar speed. Off speed, or uneven ride off’s can be very dangerous as they often lead to horses falling, and thus are severely punished with a long ball placement, or sometimes a yellow flag. The ability to ride off, also gives rise to the two on one rule, which is again, fairly commonplace. Usually, much like the road analogy of the line of ball, would suggest two players can meet each other traveling in opposite directions on different sides of the line. If they both play the ball on their off-side it is completely safe, as there is no danger of a collision. However if a player is in the process of being ridden off, they automatically gain full control over the line.

This is because if the ride off is successful and the player manages to push the opponent off the line while the ball is being met, it can end up with a head on collision.

This rule overrides all others, and even if the pair are traveling against the line of the ball and weren’t the last to hit it, they force the other player to pull out of the play.

Today I have only covered a few of the more simplistic rules and regulations in polo. For a greater understanding, and the latest on this year’s rules, the HPA blue book is the place to look. The most important thing to remember when watching polo however is, that if it looks like a foul, it probably is. The rules of polo are written entirely around protecting the horse and player. They are logical, and more often than not, you can see a clear reason for their introduction.

The Armis Polo Helmet receives distinction for high design quality in the Red Dot Award: Product Design 2019 Robin Spicer from Armis Polo Design Studio has won an award in the Red Dot Award: Product Design 2019. The Armis Polo Helmet received the Red Dot, which the renowned jury only awards to products that feature an outstanding design.

Robin Spicer wins the RedDot Award for the Armis Polo Helmet

The Armis Polo helmet embraces a fresh design language to showcase the engineered technology inside but references the classic polo style, shape and materials with the registered design undertaken by lead designer Robin Spicer.

Armis is the first brand to be designed to both the British Standard PAS 015 with Kitemark as well as fitting MIPS (Multi-directional Impact Protection System) patented technology inside. This ensures every helmet is made to the same high quality as the first one and every helmet is being produced in the same way. It is fitted with an EPS Foam liner with MIPS integrated inside, MIPS mimics the brain’s own protection system by adding a low friction layer between the head and the helmet.

In a game of Polo, if you fall, the head more often hits the ground at an angle, creating rotational violence that leads to strain in the brain.

The helmet can absorb more of the strain, adding better protection than traditional helmet. This works in combination with a composite shell to reduce penetrations along with a flexible peak to reduce neck injuries. It has a machine washable headband to stay fresh and to adjust the size. Armis is 100% British design and manufactured in the UK and is worn by world #1 polo player Adolfo Cambiaso.

Design quality is the common factor for award-winning products

“I would like to congratulate the laureates sincerely on their wonderful success. The fact that their products were able to satisfy the strict criteria of the jury bears testimony to their award-winning design quality. The laureates are thus setting key trends in the design industry and are showing where future directions may lead,” said Professor Dr. Peter Zec, founder and CEO of Red Dot, in reference to the winners.

Experience and expertise get straight to the point

The Red Dot Award: Product Design is one of the world’s largest design competitions. In 2019, designers and manufacturers from 55 countries entered more than 5,500 products in the competition. The international jury comprises experienced experts from different disciplines and has been convening for more than 60 years in order to select the year’s best designs. During an adjudication process that spans several days, they try out the products, discuss them and ultimately reach a well-founded decision regarding the design quality of the entries. True to the motto “In search of good design and innovation”, their assessment focuses on criteria such as the level of innovation, functionality, formal quality, longevity and ergonomics.

Success to be celebrated at the award ceremony On 8 July 2019, Robin and The Armis Polo Team will celebrate their success during the award ceremony. The international design scene will gather in Essen’s Aalto-Theater as part of the Red Dot Gala. At the subsequent Designers’ Night party, the Red Dot laureates will receive their certificates and The Armis Polo Helmet will join the exhibition “Design on Stage” in the Red Dot Design Museum Essen, which presents all of the award-winning products. From that date, The Armis Polo Helmet will also be on show in the Red Dot Design Yearbook, online and in the Red Dot Design App.

About Armis Polo The Award-Winning company Armis Polo was formally founded in 2015 by Robin Spicer at Loughborough University in England.

However, Spicer’s love of polo began at an early age of six, originally from Northamptonshire, he was lucky enough to travel the world with the sport to represent his country.

Having fallen off countless times while playing polo and been knocked unconscious 3 times, with the most recent incident lasting for over 20 minutes, this sparked the fuel to the fire to take on the polo community. The driving aim has been to create a better performing helmet that does more than just meet a British Standard. The scenario of falling off, being knocked unconscious, then getting straight back up onto the horse and playing polo again in a couple of days is not unfamiliar in the polo world.

Concussion is dark science and only until recently the sporting world has given the right amount of attention and expose that it requires.

Armis will work closely with suppliers and manufacturers to deliver the best helmet the polo market has ever seen. The future looks bright and they look forward to keep developing new and exciting products.

About the Red Dot Design Award: In order to appraise the wide scope of design in a professional manner, the Red Dot Design Award is broken down into the three distinct disciplines: the Red Dot Award: Product Design, Red Dot Award: Brands & Communication Design and Red Dot Award: Design Concept. With more than 18,000 submissions, the Red Dot Award is one of the largest design competitions in the world. In 1955, a jury convened for the first time to assess the best designs of the day. The name and brand of the award were developed in the 1990s by Red Dot CEO, Professor Dr. Peter Zec. Since then, the sought-after Red Dot is the revered international seal of outstanding design quality. The winners are presented in yearbooks, museums and online. Further information: www.red-dot.org.

Press contact at Armis Polo: Press contact at Red Dot: Julia Hesse Manager PR & Communications, Red Dot GmbH & Co. KG Gelsenkirchener Str. 181 45309 Essen, Germany Phone: +49 201 30104–58 j.hesse@red-dot.de www.red-dot.de/presse Robin Spicer, Armis Sport Limited, Caswell Science and Technology Park, Towcester, Northants, NN12 8EQ T +44 (0) 1327317680 M +44 (0) 7949234662 W www.armispolo.com @armispolo #seriousaboutpolo

Millfiel

eld Polo

Undefeated Millfield Polo team win Sandpool Trophy at National Championships One of Millfield’s Polo Teams, Millfield White, has won the Schools End of Season Arena National Championships Tournament at Druids Lodge Polo Club in Salisbury. The team finished the season undefeated.

The tournament, which took place on Sunday 17th March, saw Millfield Polo take two teams (Millfield White and Millfield Blue) to travel south to compete against Marlborough College, Milton Abbey School, Sherborne School and Druids Lodge Combined.

Each team played two one chukka matches, before advancing onto the finals. Millfield White played against Marlborough College first and ended the chukka with an impressive 7-0 win, followed by a 7-1 win against Sherborne School.

Millfield Blue played their first chukka against Milton Abbey and were defeated 3-2. They then went on to play Druids Lodge Combined and followed up with a 6-1 win. Millfield Blue advanced on to play for 3rd and 4th place against Marlborough College and won 6-0 securing 3rd place.

Millfield White advanced on to play for 1st and 2nd place against Milton Abbey, who had been having a good day winning both their previous matches, just as Millfield White had. It was a tough chukka with the ball going backwards and forwards and both

teams scoring goals. The final bell rang with the scoreboard showing 3-3.

It was left to the managers at Druids Lodge to decide how they would decide the winner, which was based on goals scored over the course of the day.

Millfield White had scored the highest number of goals throughout the tournament with a final score of 17 goals, placing them in 1st place and taking home the Sandpool Trophy. The Millfield Blue team played incredibly well and earned a well-respected 3rd place.

Jason Webb

With a reputation built through word of mouth, UK-based Australian, Jason Webb, is a leading horse trainer specialising in starting young horses under saddle and solving all behavioural and ridden problems. Working with international riders of all disciplines and world renowned studs, as well as recreational riders desiring a safe, confident and responsive riding horse, Jason’s understanding of horse behaviour has made him one of the UK’s most sought after trainers. In addition to taking horses in for training, Jason runs clinics, camps and demonstrations that work in conjunction with his online training program, Your Horsemanship.

What is your background and how did this lead to you becoming a horse trainer?

I grew up on a sheep and cattle property in New South Wales, Australia with my three siblings. My father, Doug, bred a lot of horses for working the farm, racing at the local “bush” tracks, and for playing polocrosse. I never really intended to become a horse trainer, but when I first came to the UK in 1999 to coach

polocrosse, I ended up starting a few local horses and “fixing” a few unruly ones, and it snowballed from there! I ended up doing a lot of travelling back and forth between Australia and the UK until I got married to Penny and settled in the UK in 2004.

How would you describe your method of training horses?

Generations of horsemen in my own family were using techniques based on the natural instincts of the horse well before the term “natural horsemanship” became fashionable! They understood how to read the horse’s reactions to situations and adapt their own movements and behaviour to bring out the best in their horses. In turn, they passed their stockman’s knowledge onto my siblings and I. My methods evolved from this early education, mainly through experience; in my career, I have started over 2000 young horses, and worked with horses with just about every behavioural and ridden “problem” you can think of!

Nowdays, All of my training programs revolve around my MO:RE4 process:

In practical terms, this process is often related to the concept of ‘making the right thing easy and the wrong thing hard’, or ‘pressure-release’, but it works equally with both positive and negative reinforcement

scales of horse training. I am not forcing the horse to follow my cues, but I am giving the horse an option and when they respond correctly, they get a break, which is their “reward”.

How have you involved in polo?

Although polocrosse has always been my game of choice (I am currently in Australia competing in my third Polocrosse World Cup for the UK!), when I was growing up, we would often retrain and sell our homebred Thoroughbreds into polo when they retired from the track. When I came to the UK, I probably would have concentrated on producing horses for polo and played more, but we made our base at Penny’s family’s farm in Kent, a little far from the polo “hubs” (although someone really should set up a polo club down our way!), so I work a lot with dressage and event horses these days.

However, my assistant trainer, Hamish Gillanders, and I start a good number of polo ponies a year for

Haydon Oracle

various players and breeders, including ponies from the Beaufort breeding operation.

I also enjoy picking up an ex-racehorse or two each year to produce for polo and polocrosse and play farm chukkas at home, but this is more of a fun hobby than for business.

Last year, I imported a young Australian Stock Horse colt, Haydon Oracle, from Australia.

He has excellent polo bloodlines with his dam being full sister to one of Cambiaso’s top mares and his sire producing numerous top-performing ponies. He will be the only ASH colt standing in Europe and I am hoping that he will be popular for polo breeders in the UK; I might even get to play him a bit myself!

How do you “break in” horses for polo?

I give all young horses that come to me the same foundations, whether they are destined for Grand Prix dressage, eventing, polo, racing or for general riding. I always start with groundwork for a couple of days, working on desensitisation, flexions, lunging, long lining, introducing the tack and getting the horse used to a human being above their eye-line. The first rides in the round pen are just an extension of the groundwork, although I sometimes use a “lead pony” if I feel they may be a little tricky. From there, I take them into our large arena, and then out round the farm

and local lanes. At this stage it is all about responding to the “forward” cue in a willing manner.

Towards the end of their 4-6 weeks I will start to differentiate their schedule, according to the discipline they are destined for. So potential polo ponies will start to be neck-reined, stick and balled and led and ridden in sets. I have to say, starting polo-bred horses is such a pleasure; they are quick to learn and wellbalanced, and it makes a nice change from getting up on the huge warmbloods!

Do you have any tips for retraining ex-racehorses for polo?

My first tip is to be as fussy when buying a “cheap” ex-racehorse as you would if you were buying an expensive “made” polo pony! It will cost as much to keep and you will be investing a lot of hours into its training and development. Don’t compromise on conformation, soundness and temperament and check that they have a smooth canter. This shows they have natural balance and if they don’t take to polo, they are likely to be able to do another job.

In terms of training, it is important to teach them to relax into a slow, balanced rhythm “off the bridle”. A really useful exercise for this is what I call “working the box”. I put out four markers or bollards to make a square ‘box’, where the markers act like a pinball

www.yourhorsemanship.com Facebook @ Your Horsemanship, Jason Webb Instagram @ your.horsemanship.

For bookings please email info@yourhorsemanship.com

machine. You trot towards a marker on a light contact before turning them back towards another marker. At first, your horse is likely to speed up between the markers, so the turn makes them check their speed without you having to pull on them to slow them down.

Once you feel them keep in a slow, steady rhythm between the markers of their own accord, you can increase the size of the box and perfect the exercise in canter.

My online horse training program, Your Horsemanship, contains a lot of exercises that are relevant to retraining ex-racehorses for polo, including the desensitisation process, which is key for horses accepting the polo mallet and ball.

Stretching on Your Pony Why not mix up your stretching routine and perform a few exercises whilst mounted on your pony this season.

This month Chukka Wellness have provided us with a few simple but effective dynamic stretches to perform on your pony before riding.

It is important to warm up using a dynamic warm up to help mobilise the joints and muscles. Holding stretches when the body is not supple can be damaging.

Here are a few stretches that focus on warming up the shoulders, back and arms preparing you for swings and rotations during play.

1. Open up your arms and twist to one side feeling the stretch in your back and shoulders. Keep the exercise dynamic by twisting from side to side 2. Open up the arms, twist to one side and take one arm down to the side of the pony’s behind. Reach up to the sky with the other arm and feel a slight stretch in the lower back and side of your trunk. Keep switching between the left and right side of the pony.

3. Touch your head with both hands and twist from side to side. Start off with a small movement and build it up to a bigger twisting motion.

Chukka Wellness Fuel • Functional • Flexible

Chukka Wellness

4. Both arms above your head, reach up to touch the sky lifting yourself out of the saddle as you do so. Bend over to one side to feel a stretch along the side of your trunk. Keep switching sides keeping the exercise moving.

5. Reach down to one of the pony’s shoulders with both hands until you feel the stretch in the lower back. Slowly come up to a seated position and switch to the other side.

6. Stand up out of the saddle with your arms stretched out, twist from side to side whilst holding your stance.

7. Reach down to one foot with one hand whilst keeping the other arm extended up to the sky.

Feel a slight stretch in your shoulders, back and the side of your trunk.

8. Reach up tall with both arms above your head, stand up out of the saddle if you like and drop the heels down.

9. Grab a polo mallet for this one, reach up tall and slowly move the mallet around you – from side-to side, forwards, backwards to open up the shoulders, chest and back muscles.

Try each exercise for 40 seconds and remember to keep each movement dynamic to reduce risk of injury and help to mobilise the joints.

Remember to check out Chukka Wellness Instagram @chukkawellness Any questions or details on personalised workshops or programmes email india.parkersmith@gmail.com

Chukka Wellness now operate a mailing list, offering monthly workouts, information on partnerships with companies and updates on the world of polo. You can sign up by clicking the link below: https://linktr.ee/chukka_wellness

Chukka Wellness Fuel • Functional • Flexible

Ignacio Fernandez

Llorente

The importance of a training program  Say someone is curious to play polo, maybe they resort to some kind of aquaintance for advice, perhaps a club or finds a polo school or teacher. Every single one will have their own memory of the first time they sat atop a horse, mallet in hand, and had their very first try.

However, in the beginning it is most important to improve riding for polo. Many try and avoid it, thinking that because they have ridden in another equine discipline they have no need for it, but riding for polo is very different even from this. Almost all of the time everyone wants to hit the ball, but you have to remember that riding practice will improve parts of the swing, in the same way which a correct swing will improve riding, by facilitating it. A very common mistake is to only learn full shots, when really it should be given very little importance. The most important thing is learning to ride for polo, as it is easier to improve someone’s technique with the mallet once they are riding well.

Even once you move onto the ball, it is important to stick and ball for many hours. From the first stick and ball session many beginners

are impatient to play, but ideally this should be 2 against 2 for as long as possible. This should then be built up to 3 on 3 and finally the full 4 player teams. In these practices it is important to rotate positions, as it is unwise to always play number 1. Someday it will be your turn to defend, pass and take hit ins, so it is crucial that you have past experience of this as well.

After this, it is necessary to have at least a season playing low goal tournaments, around a 0 goal level. When you feel safe in these games and are starting to outgrow them, you can gradually go up the tournament levels. The horses during this period will be constantly changing as the player improves their riding for polo and demands more from them. It is also important during this stage to keep having regular lessons as their is still a lot of training to be done. During this learning process it is important to develop a sound understanding of everything that can happen within the game.

Skipping stages can have a negative impact since the player misses out on crucial things they should have learnt, and often will never pick

them up after moving on. Learning to play polo takes a long time, and there are many fine details the player has to understand, put into practice and then commit to muscle memory. Unfortunately though, within this sport, there are a large number of players who don’t understand what they are doing and what they need to do. I have seen it in all manner of countries, some where I didn’t speak a word, but the same thing happens to many of the players on the field, a fundamental lack of understanding.

Therefore I insist the great importance to learn methodically and have a sound understanding. Of course it is understandable that some players simply won’t have the skills to progress any further, but in so many cases there are brilliant, very intelligent people who don’t understand anything, and that is unacceptable. Commonly this stems from learning by playing with professionals, who almost always take it upon themselves to demonstrate their own abilities rather than teaching and developing the beginner. We also see professionals who are payed with the sole purpose of winning, and as a result don’t have time to teach the beginner. Having a learning program would be ideal and would ensure that the player can reach a good level of polo. Without one, the most elementary of learning can last a lifetime. But in polo, following a program rarely happens. Urgent games mean the need to learn quickly forgotten. Unfortunately teaching polo rarely pays the bills. A coach must add selling horses and playing professionally to the coaching to ensure they earn enough. We see professionals giving lessons which they are unprepared for, without an obvious plan. We see beginners in chukkas where they are ignored. Often the beginner only feels as if they are participating in the game if they please the

professionals, the more benefit to the pro they are, the more included they feel and the more praise, and less shouting, they will receive. However this isn’t learning.

It is easy to miss out stages of the learning process, but it is very likely, that in the long term it will create problems which cannot be solved. The necessity for pros to hurry beginners into tournaments just to earn a living is also an issue. These players don’t participate in the game, and learn little to nothing from it. Often they participate to bring the teams handicap down rather than to play at all. Beginners even play in the high goal, which certainly doesn’t help their learning.

Unfortunately this is the most common way into polo, to play as soon as possible, at whatever level. The player may, at best succeed to not commit a foul after a number of games, but always appears to be missing something, but does not know what. Players may not learn over years and years despite spending money on horses, professionals and tournaments. Perhaps they only listen to the pros around them, who encourage them to keep playing to drain them of ever more money. But we do also see players who quit when they realise they are not improving, and that learning any more requires being shouted at by pros and spending even more money. The current system, where you are almost just a privaliged spectator, is useless, and achieves very little. But there are players who are not actually interested in improving their game or training.

They just want to spend time, meet people who are also uninterested in improving their game, and earn the title of a polo player, although their playing could be better.

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Look out for our special 6 month printed edition hitting clubs soon

Make Your Play Unlimited

By Hannah Parry-Jones

Admittedly not everyone in the polo world can reach the likes of Facundo Pieres and Adolfo Cambiaso. Maybe we don’t all even want to be the best of the best within the sport. But, what is important and unanimously shared between all players; patron, professional or someone just doing it for fun on the odd occasion is to go out, enjoy yourself, preferably win and be safe.

Polo, in an ironic way is one of the most inclusive team sports that I believe to be out there in the world. In other equestrian sports you have health checks, age restraints and in non-equestrian sports, you would never challenge someone of the opposite sex. But not in polo, never has someone been told they are too young, too old or can’t compete against

the opposite gender, instead everyone unites and rivals against all ages, genders and sizes!

However, maybe this is why we come across some of the accidents that we see on the pitch at times. You would give your horse a minimum of eight weeks training before jumping into a chukka, so we should be jumping into the world’s fastest contact and ball sport having trained and prepared ourselves too. With summer fast approaching, we all have our horses starting fitness, and on a specialised food plan to assure they build themselves up correctly for the season, but why don’t we do the same for ourselves?

Playing polo uses muscles and nearly all parts of our body. We have all come off

the pitch a little stiff after the first chukkas of the season, or hurt ourselves after going to make that big shot. Just 15 minutes a day will sharpen and tone your fast twitch muscles and speed up your reactions. Because whatever level you play at, being able to complete your match without feeling like you’ve run a marathon is unarguable the best way forward; not to mention that winning is certainly a lot more fun! You will also be a safer player and a better rider. Fitness for Polo have some incredible programmes that really need to be followed, and will make not only your sport, but your life that much easier.

Contributors This Months Contributors: • • • • • •

Jason Webb Chukka Wellness Ignacio Llorente Millfield Polo ARMIS Hannah Parry-Jones

Editor Connor Kay

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