memberprofile
Ryan Thompson Age: 44
Helping bring and establish six wicket croquet in Buffalo, particularly American Rules croquet. I feel strongly about our responsibility to our founders, as well as doing what we can to promote the American version of the sport. I consider the Buffalo Croquet Club receiving the USCA’s “New Club of the Year” award in 2017 the best trophy yet.
Home base: Buffalo, N.Y. Home club: Buffalo Croquet Club Grip: Solomon Mallet: Custom-made John Hobbs mallet crafted with Bocote wood and a narrower 2-inch-wide mallet head that is 11 inches long and weighs 2 pounds, 7 ounces. Total mallet is 2 pounds, 14.5 ounces and 36 inches long with a carbon fiber shaft. Years playing croquet: 15
I also just annihilated Rich Curtis, Chris Patmore and Doug Grimsley at the Vuelta a España in our four-person fantasy cycling league. Do you play other sports? As soon as the Buffalo American Six Wicket tournament is over, I put away my mallet and start training for cyclocross season.
Favorite croquet venue: The NYCC’s Central Park lawns. It doesn’t Favorite sports teams? Go Bills! The Buffalo Bills and Buffalo matter how much dirt or how many acorns there are, playing in Sabres are obviously very important to me, but I am a huge the middle of Central Park, in the middle of our nation’s greatest sports fan in general, and we have two TVs in our living room metropolis, is unrivaled. so that we can always watch sports – whether it be boxing, Favorite tournament: The Buffalo Croquet Club American MLB, cycling, NASCAR, golf, motocross, chess, NBA, surfing, Six Wicket Invitational, of course. With the help of some tennis or skateboarding. When the pandemic first hit and dear friends and colleagues, we started this tournament in 2016, and it has been a sellout success ever since. While I won’t be able to continue as the tournament manager any longer, I do hope to remain the tournament director. Hopefully, I will see you all in August 2022. How did you get into the game: I was out one night in Manhattan with incoming NYCC President Doug Moore, and he said he needed to wake up early in the morning to play croquet. I said, “Who the #$@% plays croquet?” I was unwittingly made a member of NYCC soon thereafter, and it would be two years before I ever even played the game. Croquet highlights: I had a recent 17-game win streak going in tournament singles games, and I was quite confident that I had secured my 18th game. I hit my balls into the corners for the last turn and went to congratulate my opponent on a valiant effort … only to discover that I had actually lost by one wicket. I think it’s a play like this that has earned me the nickname “Trainwreck.”
28 | www.croquetamerica.com
Ryan Thompson, who began playing croquet with the NYCC when he was a newspaper editor in Brooklyn, routinely uses some of his media insights and connections to promote the Buffalo croquet tournaments, as seen here giving a television interview to Channel 4 News.
