La Low Goal
May issue
by low goal for low goal
Contents Features Equestrian Relief
The groundbreaking fundraising effort
13
USPA COVID-19 Relief
The USPA’s financial support for US Polo
Home School
How to get your polo fix in quarantine
Equine Influenza Latest guidelines
Polo King Game
We ask developer Rupert Duff all about the development process
27
Equestrian Relief 21 First Chukka
Oliver Conway - My Life in horses
Mounting techniques YNBACA Sugar Erskine
Trailer vs Lorry - How to transport your horse
History - John Watson
The weird world of Segway Polo
Coronavirus and the future
An unnecessarily sarcastic month review
Rated - Product reviews
Head to head: Polo vs Polocrosse
37
Do you like squares?
You better hope so. Because La Low Goal has a new look…and its square.
Aside from the squares, we’ve brought in a whole host of new features including a brand new “First Chukka" section at the start of the magazine, bring you all the latest news, top ten lists, opinions and player introductions in bite size pieces.
Elsewhere in the magazine Coronavirus, as you would expect, dominates the headlines as we discuss everything from the Equine Relief scheme, seeing equine stars from all disciplines including polo, complete challenges to raise money for the NHS, to the USPA's relief scheme to support US polo, and of course what exactly people players have been amusing themselves with during lockdown.
We all yearn to be back on a polo field, and hopefully in the not to far distant future this will become a reality. Until then however, we hope that this issue can brighten your day just a little bit, and help get you through what is a very tough time for all of us.
Enjoy the issue Connor Kay (editor)
F
First
Top 6
Mounting techniques 01
02
03
Over the head
Nico Pieres Style
This unorthodox mounting method sees the horse lift the rider onto its back using hits head, allowing the rider to slide down from behind the ears onto the horses back. Issues may arise if the horse decides he doesn’t fancy working today. Also you end up facing backwards.
Often displayed by 10 goal superstar Nico Pieres the standing vault is simple yet crowd pleasing. However it can be hard to master, especially wearing stiff polo boots and on larger ponies.
A very novel and exciting mounting technique which sees the rider run up and leap over the horses bum into the saddle. Pros: great fun to watch, great fun to do. Cons: those kicky back legs are a worry.
05
06
04
Ladder
Rise and Shine
Some of the methods on this list require either some skill (on the part of either the horse or rider) or at least a fair bit of physical exertion. The ladder is not one of these methods. Simply climb the ladder and clamber aboard.
Wow onlookers as you rise from the ground on the back of your steed as if by magic. That is unless they have seen someone mount a camel. Its basically just like mounting a camel.
Leapfrog
Vaulting Release your inner trick rider and leap onto your already galloping horse. Pros: speedy and looks cool. Cons: also fearsome to master
You’ll never be as cool as…
Sugar Erskine What could have been
A patent registered in 2004 saw a design for a rope ladder attached to the pommel of the saddle, allowing riders to clamber up the side off their horse, before folding the ladder and continuing with their ride.
Sure, you might think you look pretty trendy in your bespoke helmet, and perhaps stand out quite well with a ... unusual, colour combination. But I can guarantee you don’t have a patch on Sugar Erskine. Sporting his traditional bright red snakeskin boots and knee pads, he certainly does pull off a bold look. It doesn’t end there though, Sugar has been know to dye both his saddles and hair bright red, and even shave the logo of his team, Coca Cola, into the hair on the back of his head. That’s the kind of team loyalty La Low Goal is on about. For this season, Sugar added to his look with the addition of a brand new helmet, complete with a Mohawk, in his tradition Coca Cola red. Sugar is certainly never difficult to spot, even from the far side of a polo field, which, in our books, makes him most definitely cool. And that is not to mention the fact that Sugar recovered to high goal form in just over a single year after suffering a serious fall which doctors declared he would never recover from in 2016, cementing his status as too cool for us normal folk.
History John Watson Wrote the first official polo rules Pioneered the backhand Invented the Ride Off Won the first
international
match
Image: www.polowicklow.com
Won two
Westchester
cups
John Watson is regarded as one of the fathers if the modern game of polo. After picking the game up in India, he helped introduce it to England and Ireland and went on to become one of the most successful players of a generation. His adoption of team play and apparent invention of both the backhand and ride off (somehow it took the best part of 2500 years for some bright spark to consider hitting the ball backwards) helped his Freebooters team to much success as well as leading England to two wins of the inaugural Westchester cups in 1876 and 1886. Furthermore his tactical play proved so influential that he convinced the Americans to overturn their ban on the backhand shot entirely and he is credited with penning the very first written polo rules, setting the stage for the emergence of the modern game.
The weird world of…
Segway Polo
Image: https://www.facebook.com/ispasegwaypolo by Peter Meuter
Established in 2003 with a showcase during the half time interval of an American Football match, Segway polo has grown in popularity and now boasts a host of international team, clubs and tournaments as well as a internationally recognised organising body. Much like equine polo a small ball, in this case made from a foam material, is hit with mallets, very much similar to hand sticks. However, unlike conventional polo, Segway polo introduces goal zones where offensive players are not permitted to enter to stop them dribbling the ball through the goal. Furthermore, there are no rules regarding rights of way, instead players are simply not permitted crash, stating “collisions shall be avoided”, which certainly
goes some way to simplifying the rules for spectators. The goals also have crossbars and, somewhat unsurprisingly the size of the field has been reduced to 55 meters in length (at the mandated top speed of 12.5mph it would take a Segway polo player over 8 minutes to complete and end to end run of a traditional polo field, not exactly riveting). The international tournament, the Woz cup, named after Apple Co-founder and long time Segway polo player Steve Wozniak, has been held in 5 countries, including Barbados, Sweden, the US, New Zealand and Germany and has seen over 35 teams from across the globe battle it out for supremacy.
News Bites COVID-19 causes U turn for Equine Influenza vaccinations
2020 Argentine triple crown teams announced
Team Polo finish second in the Equestrian Relief charity competition
FU TU RE This Month In numbers
0
games played In case you hadn’t noticed (and you would have to be remarkably unobservant) theres a bit of a situation currently going on with coronavirus. At least it makes it easy to count.
2700 Bored Polo Players Yes that is just the official HPA members number. And no, we didn’t put that much research into this section
30 Days
The amount of time we spent trying, and failing to think of a statistic to go here
Many of us are currently sat at home awaiting the day the government allows us outside and we can finally begin the polo season. However with the global ramifications of the pandemic starting to come to light, polo among many other sports and hobbies, could be facing a much longer road to recovery than expected. Despite a number of government grants and schemes many businesses, especially smaller ones, are anticipating struggling in the coming months due to a lack of income while a large proportion of the world is on lockdown. This combined with a drop in the global market is likely to see disposable incomes drop substantially. As expected the first thing to fall by the wayside when tougher times set in is going to be sports and hobbies. How are patrons going to justify costly hire expenses and paying pros when they are beginning to struggle. The downturn could see a sharp drop in patrons and low goal players as they simply cannot afford or justify the expense anymore.
Without the patrons the fragile polo ecosystem risks collapsing
Without the patrons the fragile polo ecosystem risks collapsing. Struggling pros may be forced out the game, and with fewer players and less money being thrown around horse prices could plummet, affecting horse trainers and dealers. Of course, these are worse case scenarios. As previously stated schemes such as the furloughing of grooms could help players cut costs, and the HPA’s pledge to notify players a month prior to the start of the season means many players can safely turn the vast majority of their ponies away until they are needed making more savings. Despite this we can expect a decrease in patrons and sponsors, and polo needs to be ready to adapt to best deal with this. Some have suggested running shorter more marketable tournaments, similar to the system seen at Polo in the Park. A high intensity format where players play up to three days on the bounce could cut costs in terms of travel and hiring of fields and umpires when spectators are unlikely to attend. Sponsors and spectators are likely to be much more interested in this kind of short and sweet format. Alternatively we could be looking at moving away from the traditional patron and pro model, seeing more teams, especially in the low goal, opting to split entry costs 4 ways. Perhaps patrons and player will be incentivised to scale back their investment rather than entirely ending it, reducing the number of horses and playing lower level polo. We have already seen in countries outside the big polo three, Argentina, America and the U.K, that it is possible to sustain a polo community almost solely based on low goal polo, although many would agree that it would be a shame to see the U.K. scene decline in this way. In truth nobody really knows what is on the horizon. Like everyone else across all of the affected countries we have to take things as they come and adapt to find the best possible outcome for everyone involved. Despite the situation people seemed to have remained optimistic for the 2020 season and beyond, and hopefully this will help carry the polo community through these testing times.
Who you should be following @poloimages
Polo Images over on instagram has been posing a series of incredible digital watercolour renders of everything from dogs to polo action shots. If you fancy a watercolour done of one of your own photo just get in touch with a photo (with permission from the photographer)
I started playing polo 5 years ago and have loved every second of it
Oliver ConwayJohnson My Life in Horses Horses
I am Oliver Conway Johnson. I play at cheshire polo club and have been playing there for 4 years. I started playing polo with Glynn Henderson 5 years ago and I have loved every second of it. I am currently a 1 goal handicap on grass and 2 In the arena. The main team I play for is AW Jenkinson with Cristian Chavez and Katie Jenkinson. In the first year of playing polo I started of by playing on a 13.2 mare called Cindy. Before I had trained her to play polo she had been a showjumper and a hunter. She was very quick at learning and enjoyed polo more than anything else. She was a very good little pony because she was very quick and very nimble. I played her in all the pony club stuff and won it twice on her. Taboo was my second polo pony I had. I brought her 4 years ago from Mikey Henderson. She was an amazing pony for me and got me so much polo, starting my polo life off. She is a big horse and hits the ride offs hard and is very powerful. She isn’t the fastest pony out there but she is very good at playing at the back and very nimble for her body size. My brother now plays her and thinks she is amazing. Striker and Freda are 2 ex high goal Ponies. Freda is now 20 and is in little work but was played last season by me and my brother. I brought them both off Steven Massy who we are good family friends with. He gave up polo 3 years ago and sold me the ponies because he had no use for them. Striker was also from Steven and is 18 years old now. She is still in work and loves playing polo and gets really excited before the match. They have both taught me so much about polo because they where one of the first fast proper polo ponies I had. They have both played in pony club and in Junior HPA. They are good ponies because you can play a -2 goal where you at 4 ,playing at the back and controlling the game, but then they also play great in the 4 goal, 6 goal and 8 goal. Rabbit is a 10 year old bright bay. She is now 10. I brought her in May 2017 after trying her at Cirencester in a tournament with Mikey Henderson and Ollie Cork. Rabbit was owned by the Cork family who are based at Cowdray park polo club. Rabbit is one of the top horses in my string and has been a major part of my polo career. She has played all year round in the arena and on grass. She has won both pony club championships 3 years in a row with me. She has always been part of winning junior HPA rocksavage in 2019 with cheshire polo club. She has also played with me at Chester racecourse 3 times and won the £10,000 price tournament with me the second time I played there. She is a very good pony for me because of how agile she is and how fast she is, especially for a 14.3 pony. I think without her I would not be where I am now because of how much experience and polo she’s has brought me.
Oliver’s Horses
Cindy
Taboo
Freda
Striker
Rabbit
Rated And quite possibly slated its nice A very sleek and but very It Looks elegant design expensive Kieran
Looks like a turtle on your head Dave
Its alright in black Andrew
Connor
A boL aN bRve Nw idea
Good Jean
I think it looks crap Guy
Clare
First polo helmet with MIPS
I prefer the traditional style, but have nothing against it Sam
Website
nice to have something new designed for polo Archie
Honestly I don’t mind it Brenda
Polo Game
Good because it fits my weird shaped head Oliver
7
10
G a m in g
Polo Game is a mobile game released on both iOs and the Google store, licensed by both the AAP and FIP. Choose your favourite teams and players from the Argentine high goal and tackle, the Tortugas, Hurlingham and Argentine Open tournaments. Graphically, the game is actually quite impressive, especially when turned all the way up. However where the game falls down is its complete lack of rules or hitting options. You’ve got one hit option which randomly chooses forehand and backhand and doesn’t allow you to change any kind of angle, and all the AI players just swarm the ball and ram each other head on.
4
10
Vs Trailer
Lorry
You can have the best horses in the world, top of the line equipment, and skills which would put even Cambiaso to shame, but if you can’t actually get to a polo field it's all going to add up to absolutely nothing. Transportation is a big deal, and making the wrong choice when it comes to your vehicle could limit your polo capacity for years to come. Unfortunately however there is no right and wrong answers when it comes to choosing a way to get your horses from A to B, it is very much dependent on your own personal needs and requirements. Obviously trailers limit the number of horses you can take to polo. Most only have space for two horses, but is it possible to get 3 horse trailers if you’ve got a car with enough towing capacity. Most people apart from those playing the very low goal will often choose to take more than two ponies to game, wether it be because they need a spare, they are worried about injuries or they don't think their ponies are up to double chukkaing. However if your ponies are fit and healthy and you only need 2, a trailer is certainly a much more convenient way to travel. Assuming you already have a vehicle which can tow a trailer, it is the much cheaper option and will not require the space or insurance that owning a lorry might. However, if you are planning on carrying more than two or three ponies a lorry is a much better prospect. 7.5 tonne lorries, which anyone who took their licence before 1997 can drive, can easily carry up to 5 ponies, and 3 with living. Living is another area where the trucks really begin to hold their own. Although it is possible to get trailers with living area they are often quite cramped and many people
wouldn’t like to spend more than the odd night kipping in it. If your planning to spend a month on the road following the Pony Club Polo circus, the lorry is certainly the more luxurious way to go. Then you start getting into the bigger lorries. These will require you to take your C1 licence, but allow you to drive any rigid lories up to 26 tonnes. Many people will be put off by driving a vehicle of this size, as things can get a little tight, especially on the narrow roads to some polo clubs. But if you can stomach it, bigger lorries allow you to travel as many ponies as you could ever dream for, with or without living. Furthermore there is bonus space for water, tack and food for the horses, as you are likely no where near the weight limit. Really, it is all down to you. If you only need to take 2 ponies and don’t fancy commanding the road from high up above, take the trailer. For some however, manovering a trailer will be even more difficult than a small van or lorry, in which case it makes more sense to take one of those. Wether you need 3, 4, 8, or more ponies moving there will be a lorry for you, wether you want living or not, brand sparkly or on its last legs.The main takeaway is to make sure you have your requirements clearly sorted out, allowing you to find a vehicle which fits them as well as possible.
Head to hea
Polo Number of players
04
Players
2700
Number of Members
HPA Members
Lets face it, if you’ve got this far you’ve likely got a good idea of what is involved in polo. If you’re here looking for recipes or celebrity news, turn back now because it isn’t getting any better. But, just in case you need a quick refresher: two teams hit a small white ball into goals on apposing sides of a very large field with big long sticks. Also you ride horses.
02
What you actually do Number of horses required
Horses (although most people have more)
Hard and made from high impact plastic
Ball
275m x 145m
Verdict
Field
Its a strong win for Po I’m not even going to years back and wasn
ad
Recommended
Polo crosse
06
Tiger King
Netflix's wild new documentary featuring big cats, bigger personalities and… potential murder plots is just what we need take our mind of the world currently.
Players (although three only play at one time, honestly its quite confusing)
Polo Pod
Two teams of three players aim to throw a rubber ball between the opposing teams goalposts from outside the 10 metre semi circle surrounding the goal to score. The hold/pass/catch/bounce the ball using nets similar to lacrosse rackets and can only go into some of the three zones on the field depending on their position. Only the number 1 player who is limited to the attacking two thirds can score a goal. You also ride horses.
01
Horse Soft and made from foam and rubber
146.5m x 55m
olo. But you new that before you started reading this feature. o pretend we’re not biased. I tried Polocrosse once a couple of n’t very good at it. And it made my wrist ache. Hence, it loses.
Season 2 of polo’s singular podcast breaks cover with a brand new co-host in Jack Richardson and a new line up of polo stars to be interviewed.
National Theatre Every Thursday at 7PM the National Theatre streams a new product on youtube. Head over to get the full thrill of live theatre from your own living room.
Sugar Waffles
Maybe we are not the most qualified to give advice, but when we are bored during quarantine, we drown our boredom with sugar waffles and Nutella. Probably a bad habit.
An unnecessarily sarcastic
Month Review So it’s been just a couple of weeks since Boris ordered us all inside, and since then you’ve all gone absolutely crazy. Absolutely lost your minds. First of all some bright spark decided to ditch all the polo balls in favour of toilet rolls, something which seems particularly daft when you consider that: a) toilet rolls do not substitute well at all and tend to bounce randomly due to being cylindrical rather than spherical. And b) there was a nation wide shortage of the things, at the exact same time.
Soon some of you cottoned on that polo balls were probably best suited to, you know, playing polo and started entering handstick challenges (mostly the Australian one, we’re not bitter, just pointing it out). We then found out that some people can literally go forever and it just became a contest of who could be arsed doing it the longest (over 1000 is simply greedy and not fair when I can barely manage double figures).
Social media also blew up with a variety of challenges, from the “game face challenge” to the “until tomorrow” movement, where people just shared photos of themselves looking as ugly as physically possible before sheepishly deleting them because apparently that’s how we all get our kicks now.
Absolutely lost your minds
La Low Goal Shop Available at lalowgoal.co.uk
Eques Relief
strian f
Relief is "Equestrian a fundraising effort by the equestrian community to aid the NHS COVID-19 Urgent Appeal
The event saw 7 teams comprised of the biggest equestrian stars in their respective disciplines go head to head in 5 different challenges, broadcast in the Equestrian Relief highlights program each night at 7pm on Facebook. Over a week the teams, Team Showjumping, North and South, Racing, Dressage, Presenters and Polo,
tackled the 5 challenges, a 5km run, the Plank, a Bake off, a Horse Painting and a dark horse round which saw competitors display their “hidden talents”. Each competitor had to complete two of the challenges and were graded with a points based system, with the team with the most points being crowned the champion.
On The Gallops The first challenge saw equestrian stars take on a 5 kilometre run against the clock. Ros Canter of team eventing took the win with a time of 19 minutes, 29 seconds, beating out AP McCoy for Team Racing by 23 seconds, with Jack Richardson of team polo taking 3rd place with a time of 20.01 minutes. The scores shook out with team eventing leading the way in the teams competition with a combined time of 40.48 minutes, ahead of Showjumping South, Polo, Presenters, Racing, Showjumping North and finally Dressage.
Plankety Plank In Plankety Plank competitors held the plank position for as long as possible. Oliver Townsend took the win with an impressive 13 minutes, beating out Emma Spencer for the presenters and Malcolm Borwick who impressed holding the plank in full polo equipment for 7.31 minutes. Once again team eventing came out of the
challenge ahead, extending their lead at the top of the table, while the presenters came home 2nd and polo retained their consistent position of 3rd, team captain Mark Tomlinson adding 4.13 minutes to Malcom Borwick’s time to give a combined total of 11 minutes 44 seconds.
Bake Off Easter Cake Challange The third day of challenges saw competitors baking an “Easter Showstopper” . Judged on presentation and creativity the challenge saw an array of colourful and delicious looking cakes being whisked up. For the third day running however, it was team eventing who took the top spot in both the individual and team leaderboards, helped by Ros Canter’s impressive rainbow cake complete with an icing horse and cross country jump. Team Dressage came in second, followed by Showjumping south, Team Polo, Showjumping north, the Jockeys and finally the Presenters bring up the back of the field.
Horse Drawn Challange Day 4 saw the penultimate event of the competition once again challenge the equestrian stars creativity, daring them to paint or draw their best personal achievement, with the caveat that it must incorporate their horse. As a bonus their masterpieces where auctioned off to raise yet more money for the NHS during the coronavirus outbreak. Oli Bell for team racing finally managed to deprive team eventing of the top spot, although Zara Tindall’s efforts did manage to bag 2nd place overall and salvage a joint 3rd place result for the team, giving them a strong chance going into the final day of competition. Hazel Jackson and Mark Tomlinson struggled as team polo floundered in 6th position just one position from the bottom of the leaderboard.
Dark horse round The dark horse round saw competitors showing off their “hidden talents”, with entires ranging from impressions, to bouncy hopper jumping, to reciting poetry and, weirdly, dreaming. Ben Hobday took the top spot for team eventing with an impression of Netflix’s Tiger King, complete with a Carol Baskin who he proceeded to shoot, and a shetland covered in tiger stripes and with NHS clipped into its coat, completing a dog agility style course. A strong
Final result Team Eventing took the win after 5 days of competition after winning an impressive 4 of the 5 challenges. Team Polo Jumped to second after a strong final day, beating out Team Hickstead, Presenters, Dressage, Racing and finally Showjumping North who trailed on 22 points, the only team unable to break the 30 point barrier and outscored by the individual winner, Ros Canter who achieved 28 points just beating Old Bell with 27 and Polo’s Jack Richardson with 25.
showing for team polo bagged them 2nd and 3rd positions individually and 2nd in the teams competition with a HNS inspired rap and music video performed by the both of them. Elsewhere a number of competitors took to the medium of dance with…mixed results and Luke Harvey rounded out the bottom of the table by pulling a sheet off himself while lying naked in the garden.
Aftermath
Ofte loo eart it is afte whic the risk Infrastructure is already on its knees, people are unwise to a second shock after weathering the former, and regularly they are just as strong as the main event. On a similar note, the current Coronavirus pandemic is not what poses the greatest risk to most sports, polo included. A sport cannot get sick or die out due to infection. Instead it will suffer at the hands of Coronavirus’s aftershock, the economic damage. This economic fallout is already, and will continue, to wreak havoc worldwide. The loss in disposable income is likely to push many players and patrons out the game, and threatens to drown clubs, as they are forced to keep up with maintenance costs, without the stream of income tournaments, lessons and membership provides. Without support many worry about the possibility that when we are all allowed back into the wild, many of the clubs, especially the smaller ones, will have already gone.
ten, when oking at rthquakes s the ershock ch poses greater k. Help is at hand however, but only if you’re American. The USPA has announced three new financial initiatives aimed at keeping clubs and players on their feet during these tough times.
proved their validity and situation a grant will be directly paid to the USPA member club to allow for the continuation of the minimum maintenance costs incurred while the club is unable to run properly.
The first initiative outlined in the USPA COVID-19 relief package is the Equine Welfare Program, a scheme aimed at helping struggling horse owners who have fought to make ends meet without their usual income. The applicant, who must be a USPA member, returns an application form to the USPA outlining their situation. After review by the USPA an agreement I set up to provide the member with adequate finance to sufficiently feed the horses in their possession. Hopefully the scheme will ensure that despite the testing situation, horse welfare is not an area where costs are cut in order to keep people afloat.
Finally, the Tournament Stimulus Package, provides clubs with a helping hand while exiting the current situation and slowly returning to normal. For every USPA member club, the USPA has pledged $2,500 prize money for the first two tournaments after the end of lockdown. These prizes are granted for both grass and arena tournaments and will hopefully incentivise a quick restarting of the season as soon as the becomes possible. Furthermore, the USPA has pledged to also supply trophies for these tournaments, either directly or through yet another $500 grant. Finally, the USPA are providing one USPA certified umpire for each of these two first tournaments, available for up to 10 consecutive days per tournament completely free of charge to the club. These measures,
Similarly, the Distressed Club Relief Program sets out financial support for clubs who are in immediate danger of going bust. Once they have
it is hoped, will allow USPA clubs to rise from the ashes of the Coronavirus pandemic, keeping the momentum of US polo, without allowing it to slowly fall into decline as members struggle to prioritise polo when things finally start to return to any kind of normality.
will the HPA follow suit?
So the big question, will the HPA follow suit? As of yet there is no indication of anything similar from the HPA, although that doesn’t mean it isn’t coming. However we do have to bear in mind that the USPA is the much larger organisation, profiting even more off of other ventures such as clothing lines as well as boasting more clubs and members.
This puts it in a financially stronger place, allowing it to pledge these grants without risk of going bankrupt themselves. I am not a accountant for the HPA so of course do not know, but I struggle to believe the HPA has the same level of resource available to. Maybe I’m miles off, but the way they were almost begging for memberships to be paid at the outset of the COVID-19 situation did, to me at least, suggest the the HPA is not in the same kind of financial security as the USPA. I guess only time will tell. But don’t hold your breath.
La Low Goal Hand-stick Challange results (so far)
Home Scho What you’ve been up to while sat at
We may not be able to go outside or actually play but that isn't stopping many of you trying to get y fix through other means. Wether it be by polo p online lessons and courses or wooden horses, y have been trying everything to release the bor
Polo Puppets @polocommentaries over on Instagram has been posting a series of posts, creating a short story following the endeavours of “got-the-gear" Fred and “Keen Man” Ed as they set out in polo, aided by their coach Mr T. Head over to instagram to follow the story.
Th Po Po
The Polo Pod re “The Pandemic host Jack Richa including the D their favourite p Instagram. Sinc featuring both W respectively.
ool home
y any polo, your polo puppets, you guys redom.
ARMIS ZOOM Using the Zoom App ARMIS have been broadcasting sessions by both Jason Warren and Phil Baker focusing on fitness for polo and Technique and Tactics. While Jason Warren guides viewers through a polo specific workout, Phil's sessions cover the breadth of polo from rules and tactics, using the whiteboard and magnetic players, to swing technique and buying advice, with live questions helping to consolidate everyones understanding.
he olo od
eturns for its second season, premiering with c Pod�. Season 2 sees the introduction of cohardson as well as a host of new features Dream Team feature where interviewees outline picks for teammates, available to view on ce then 2 more episodes have been released, Will and James Harper, and Hazel Jackson
MHF Polo Alec Banner-Eve at MHF Polo has been uploading regular youtube videos to their new youtube channel, covering everything from the trigger grip, to swing exercises to physiotherapy advice. Just head over to youtube to get some ideas to keep yourself in form while you’re stuck at home.
Toilet
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Hands Chall
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t Paper Challange
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Fitness Camp A number of dierent programs have been oering online fitness programs during lockdown. Jason Warren has been running Tola Zoom Camps, 35 minute HIIT training sessions running every Monday, Wednesday and Friday to keep you active during quarantine.
India at Chukka Wellness has also set up the Chukka Wellness membership resource, a virtual fitness resource boasting live workout sessions, Q&A sessions, on demand exercise routines and discussion boards. Both these resources can help keep polo players fit and motivated during the lock down and ensure they are ready to jump back on when polo resumes.
Equine Influenza Just under a month on from the HPA and Royal College of Veterinary Students U-turn on the Equine Influenza vaccinations, where they advised all vets to stop administering Equine Influenza boosters with imitate eect, both bodies have decided to allow the administration of vaccines providing the Government regulations on social distancing are respected. Vets will also be expected to fill out a risk assessment prior to every visit to minimise the risk for everyone involved. As set last year after the equine influenza outbreak, all playing horses will be required to have had a booster given within the last 6 months, however horses which were given annual boosters last year in March or April will be allowed to stretch their annual boosters to the end of April this year without having to restart their vaccinations. Any horses not correctly vaccinated will need a course of three vaccinations, the second 21-92 days after the first, and the third 150-215 days after the second. Horses will be permitted to play 76 days after the second vaccination, meaning the shortest time between restarting the vaccines and playing is 28 days, or approximately one month.
Polo Game After its introduction to the App Store in April we caught up with the developer of Polo King Game, Rupert Du, to talk through the game.
King e
came across SpriteKit (a framework for creating 2D games) and realised I could make the game. I asked my 8 year old nephew to come up with a name and “Polo King” was the result.
How long did the game take to develop from scratch?
A long time! It's been over 2 years, but I’ve had phases of spending more or less time on it, work gets in the way a bit! I’ve spent a lot of time learning how to do things as I went along, but that’s just part of the fun.
Have there been any setbacks in the development of the game?
Why did you first choose to develop the Polo King Game? I used to play polo myself and have also always enjoyed video games like FIFA. I studied computer science at uni and although I didn’t continue coding for work, I still enjoyed doing a little for fun (geeky I know!). I always had an idea of making a polo game but it wasn’t until I started playing around with Apple’s developer tools that I
Not so much setbacks, but lots of challenges! Apart from the limitations of my coding ability (my code architecture is a little bit ramshackle, if it were a physical structure there would be a lot of duct tape) the biggest polo specific challenge has been creating the computer controlled players “AI”. Translating how you play the game positioning, making decisions - into code has been really hard. I’ve used lots of different sources for inspiration here, but I found old polo instruction books really useful as they have some quite structured ways of thinking about the game which translate more easily into an algorithm.
4. What reception have you had to the game from players? The reception has been pretty good! I’ve had some great help from people who agreed to test the early beta versions of the game and provided feedback. I used an instagram account - Polo King - to advertise the game, and a fun extra has been that my testers come from all over the world, I communicated with one in Portuguese using google translate, which was amusing! I think the game can be hard to get the hang of initially, especially if you don’t play other video games, so this is something I’m trying to address with more intuitive controls and maybe even some instructions.
5. Could you see a system where players play against each other online in the future?
Sure, I’m planning to create an online multiplayer version of the Polo King - just needs for me to learn how to do it and probably a bit of a restructure of the code! The whole eSports world has grown rapidly in the last few years, and I guess the main reason polo hasn’t followed is its lack of scale, but as the cost of developing this sort of thing comes down we might expect more niche sports to be included.
6. Could you see Polo King being used to teach new players rules or tactics in the future? I think this is a really interesting possibility, it would certainly be a less dangerous (and cheaper) way for beginners to learn about the right of way rules! I aimed to implement the right of way rule accurately in the game, but to keep the game moving it allows a few fouls to slip through. However, generally the game should reward the same good plays as in real life, like playing anti-clockwise, maybe going left to create space, clearing to the boards etc, so hopefully it can help players develop good decision making.
7. What projects are you moving onto now Polo King is available on the App Store?
The Polo King is far from finished! There is a Career mode coming soon, which lets you create a player profile and play seasons, winning games to improve your handicap and qualify for higher rated tournaments, earning coins to buy better horses and make it to 10 goals. The online multiplayer version is also something I want to try, and I’m always working on improvements to the computer players AI - so lots of things still to work on!
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