Just because we can, LA is welcoming all neighboring clubs to come visit us for Labor Day weekend.
It’s a holiday, why not play polo together?
Come out for the weekend, or just for a day. We’ll play our regular Friday night games from 6-11p.m. as well as our Sunday afternoon games from 3- 9 p.m. If there’s enough interest, we’ll play Saturday afternoon as well (and maybe even a bit Monday, if people stick around).
Let us know when you’ll be in town, and if you’ll need a place to stay.

Location

See map: Google Maps

Craig Raines from the planning department of L.A. Parks & Rec has posted up a note on Midnight Ridazz expressing his interest to develop bike-specific park space. As soon as I saw it, I shot off an email to Craig inquiring about the possibility of establishing polo courts. You can email or call Craig to let him know you’d like sanctioned polo courts in L.A. too - due ett!!!! Just remember to be courteous as you are representing the L.A. Bike Polo community. : )

Craig A Raines
Landscape Architect Assoc III
Advance Planning/Planning and Construction
Department of Recreation and Parks
City of Los Angeles
221 N Figueroa ste 100
Los Angeles, Ca 90012
213-202-2652
craig.raines@lacity.org

Here is the message I sent to Craig:
Hi Craig,

I saw your posting on midnightridazz.com this morning regarding the skate park. I would like to discuss with you the option of establishing a sanctioned bike polo hard court in Los Angeles. Bike polo has been played in Los Angeles for two-plus years, and in numerous other cities across North America and internationally for the past 10 years (in its current incarnation). The sport itself is more than a century old, having originated as a method of practice for traditional horse polo players.

We have played on hockey rinks, tennis courts, basketball courts, in parking lots, and any flat, level hard surface we can get access to. Unfortunately, none of those facilities are “polo courts” - because there are none. The polo community in Los Angeles has grown to hold multiple weekly games year-round in all areas of the city, from the West side to East L.A. and the Valley.

If this is a feasible project, the bike polo community is willing to provide any input and support to establish a polo court. Please let me know how we can help each other achieve this goal.

Sincerely,
Krista Carlson
(I listed my phone number here)

Ahead of us now is an endless summer of warm polo-filled days. Let’s kick off the fun with the Long Beach Friendlies. A daylong tournament on May 8 consisting of pick-up and single elimination games, the LB Friendlies will be held as part of the Long Beach Bike Festival this weekend.

Later this year, L.A. is set to host the first Southwest Regional Championships. Dates TBA.

In June there are a variety of reasons to pack up your polo bike and out of state. PDX II (June 18-20) is a good one; so is ESPI5 & Women’s Army II (June 25-27). The North American Hardcourt Bike Polo Championships are a mere month after, from July 16-18 in Madison, Wisconsin, and if nothing can come between you and epic polo, then you won’t be missing the World Hardcourt Bike Polo Championships in Berlin from August 13-14.

In September we can look forward to winding the warm days at the East Van Crown. There’s quite a few honorary Canadians that are due for a (first) homecoming.  Holy shit, what an epic summer of polo!

2010 began with a bit of politics- Krista was chosen as our club’s representative to North American Hardcourt in the first week of January. In the middle of the month, she and five other club reps in our newly formed Southwest region elected Joel from San Francisco, Mike T. from Phoenix, and our very own Alex Dash as the regional representatives. So far, the governing body is responsible for overseeing the selection of a host city for the North American Hardcourt Bike Polo Championships, with other duties to be assigned if necessary. We are not, after all, a community very inclined towards formality and rigidity.

Once all the dust settled on those decisions, it was time to hunker down and really work on throwing an epic tournament. 33 teams came from Vancouver, Victoria, Seattle, Portland, New York, Austin, Denver, Phoenix, Washington D.C., San Francisco, and Florida. Here are the official results of the tourney, as posted by Joker on leagueofbikepolo.com:

1st East Van
Alex, Pieter and Chris

2nd LA - Notice to Appear
Joker, Pistolero and Tim

3rd - Sleepless in Portland
Kenichi, Drew (Seattle) and Leon

MVP - Mini Mike

The most memorable game of the tourney, however, was probably when Natural Born PlayAZ (AJ, MiniMike, and Davey) beat the defending world champions Seabass, Julian, and Dustin for 4th place. For pictures and more information, check out the post on LoBP.com: http://www.leagueofbikepolo.com/so-cal-winter-polo-picnic-ii-polo-prizes-food-beer

With hardly a moment to breathe, we trucked out to Phoenix in mid-February for the Desert Polo Invite II. There we met San Diego, Denver, and Albuquerque for the first time, and played a whole bunch of polo in the pouring rain. Most of us camped in Justin’s backyard in that same pouring rain as well. It was yet another fun tournament with the young kids from Phoenix stealing the show. The results:

1st: (LA) Hoodfellas- Joker, Pistolero, Brian
2nd: (PHX) Grass Assault- Mini Mike, Jacob, AJ
3rd: (PHX) 13 year olds- Mailman-J, Mike T, Jim
4th (LA) Juan in a Million
5th (DEN) Mile High Club

MVP- AJ

After a few weeks without any major events, we went to Inland Empire’s first tournament three weeks ago. This friendly tournament hosted by the Claremont Colleges felt more like a chill kickback as we played polo surrounded by college students playing volleyball and frisbee. The biggest upset of the weekend was having to move the tournament off campus at the beginning of the second day, but once we relocated it was right back to the chill day of fun of hanging out with San Diego and Claremont. The tournament results:
1. L.A. Confidential from 818-Alex (Joker), David (Pistolero), and Chris (Torelli)
2. Akron House from Claremont- Ace (Eric), Jasper, Bennett
3. Snap! Crackle! Pop! from Downtown & 818- Derek, Sarah, and Guy
4. SissyGirlCryParty from 818- Matt (Stillline), Brian, and Krista

These past few weeks we’ve also taken to visiting Long Beach during their regular Wednesday night games. On our first visit, we brought 7 players to a court devoid of local players, so we played our own games on their sweet court all night long. Our next visit, two nights ago, was much more successful. We found out that Long Beach has a few local players with quite a bit of skill and an absolute TON of spectators. It makes for a great polo experience.

Be on the look out for another L.A. tournament this summer- the rumors say that our region wants its own championship…

L.A. polo players have come a long way in the last 12 months. And we have much to look forward to in 2010, as we gear up to host the Socal Winter Polo Picnic - Round II.

This time last year, those of us who were involved in L.A.’s first true tournament were still trying pick our jaws up off the floor after the likes of skilled polo players from Seattle, East Van and New York demonstrated the next level of polobility for us to aspire to. A year ago, even L.A.’s most veteran player, the Joker himself, was still just a babe in the world of bike polo.

And while bike polo has thrived for many moons in other cities before L.A. was endowed with the fine game, the amazing growth of bike polo in L.A. has been paralleled by it’s growth in all corners of the world.

Photo by Alex Thompson

Yep kiddies, it’s that time - time for another two-day polo melee in the 818! Remember East Van taking out Spazzlocos (Martin, Chris and Mark Capriotti)? And the 18-on18 battle royale that culminated the whole event? Ah, yes, there will be another 818  Bike Polo Battle Royale.

There will be grub by Bike N’ Bake.
There will be grog.
There will be bikefuckingpolo.

Nothing beats Sunday’s games, but some of us are aching for some extra time in the 818 Polo Thunderdome! See you on the court!

Stay tuned…

Looks like tournament was a lot of fun, it looks to be the largest bike polo get together I’ve seen in that town. I really wish I could of been there, good job Alex. Check out Dave with his one-foot-kick move, ha!