 What is polo?
The horse polo can be described as a mixture of football and field hockey, the main difference being that the players play on horseback. The riders score goals by hitting the ball into opponent’s goal using mallets. The team consists of three players when playing arena polo and four players when playing outside on a full-sized grass field. The match consists of four periods called chukkas, and each of these last for 7 and a half minutes.
LessonsThe lessons are for all levels, from beginner to more advanced, and the horses are chosen according to everyone’s abilities. The price of one hour lesson is £26. The lessons usually take place every Wednesday afternoon, but this may change depending on how many groups there will be.
All the lessons are taught by Maywood Polo. During winter (October to end of March) we ride in the arena at Woodham’s farm and during summer (April to end of September) at the West Stoke Farm on an outside field. For more information go to www.maywoodpolo.com
What to wear for lessons?To begin you need a helmet, since we don’t provide one, and boots with small heel. If you don’t own boots, you can use shoes with a heel and chaps. For trousers you can use anything you feel comfortable in, most of us are wearing jeans. For more advanced level, we recommend to also get knee pads.
TeamWe will hopefully send at least one team to compete against other Southern Universities in the University League (SUPA). Trials for the team are taking place at the beginning of November and are open to everyone, but you should at least be able to handle a horse in canter and be willing/able to commit to weekly training.
For those who won’t make it to the team(s), there might be a possibility to have friendly games against other Universities later in the year.
SocialsWe will be organizing social events throughout the year. There will be more information about them later on, but they should include pub crawls, visits to polo related events and other fun stuff too.
We are also looking into organizing regular hacking, either with polo ponies or regular riding school horses, for those who will not want to play polo regularly but still want to ride.
How to join us?If you are interested in joining our club, please contact any of the committee members. For more information you can also visit our website at www.portsmouthpolo.com.
The membership fee is £20 for the year, and this gives you the insurance needed to be able to ride and the student friendly price of £26 per lesson (normally one hour polo lesson costs £55 or more).
|
|  |
RSS
