I always thought polo sounded like fun, so...

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

…yesterday I had my first lesson.

And I was right, it is fun. But boy, am I sore! My legs are sore, my butt is sore, and both arms are sore–right more than left.

I had been thinking about this for awhile, so I finally signed up. Driving out there I kept wondering if I was actually going to go through with it. Then, with my usual fabulous sense of direction, I thought I was lost, really good and lost, half-hour to recover lost, so I thought: Okay, if I can’t find the place that’s some kind of a sign that I should not do this. And then I saw some white fences and a bunch of horses and realized I wasn’t lost after all.

I signed up for a package of 8 lessons, of which however many you need are private lessons and once you reach a certain level you take a group lesson and actually…play with other people, and practice things like nudging them off the line ( :eek: ) and hooking their mallets to block their shots.

The hardest thing was getting on the horse. I’ve ridden, but I’ve never ridden English style, and I got a large (but extremely well trained) horse. So the stirrup is hanging at approximately the level of my collarbone, and there’s no mounting block. I’m fairly flexible–I’m not Gumby–but that’s impossible. The instructor said, “No worries, I’ll boost you.”

This turned out to involve some movements that I just didn’t get and a certain amount of flailing. Post-boost, I’m lying across the saddle with my legs on one side and my arms on the other. I’m pretty sure I was supposed to end up some other way, like actually in the saddle. However, I said I’d done some riding…it was an inelegant position but one I’ve been in before, and from there I knew what to do. Okay. So I started off humiliating myself in the worst way (well, probably the worst way would have been if I’d gone completely over the saddle and dived headfirst into the dirt on the other side), but who doesn’t have a mounting block, especially when the stirrups are at chin level. (Hmm, I see they’ve already gone up a bit from what I said before, by this time next week my memory will tell me that stirrup was over my head.)

Anyway, as I said that was the worst part. Aside from that, I learned a lot. The mallet is heavier than a tennis racquet, or maybe it’s just the length (I think I was playing with a 52" mallet), and the mallet is always in a player’s right hand, no left-hand play allowed. The right side is the “off” side and the left is the “near” side–that makes no sense but I think I can remember it. I was not too bad at hitting the ball if I got lined up right–the ball is easier to hit if it’s about a yard from the horse’s feet–but by the end of the hour it was all I could do to swing the mallet, let alone make the ball go more than about four feet. And most of this was done at a walk, with a bit of trotting.

I am proud to report that not only did I not hit myself in the head with my mallet, I didn’t hit my mount with it, either.

And next week, it’s a group lesson. I can’t get lost again because now I know where the place is. I’m half nervous (about as much as before the first lesson) and half can’t wait.

2

Congrats! It sounds like fun! I wish I still had money to train, but I can keep my animals or I can train, so dog, cat and horsefeed it is.

Think of it this way - It’s called the “Off” side because you don’t mount on that side. “Near” side is the mounting side. And I’d bring a mounting block. I’m 5’1" and my TB is about 16.2 hh. His back is over my head. I have to have something to stand on to mount.

StG

3

Wheee! Fun! I had a polo lessons once and it was a hoot! I remember ending up with a bruise on my collarbone from resting the mallet there.

As to near and off – picture yourself leading the horse: you hold the rope or reins in your right hand and walk on the horse’s left. Thus, the left side of the horse is “near” to you and the right side is not. :slight_smile:

The leg up is an art and a science. When you get it right, it can be remarkably graceful. When you get it wrong, well… hilarity ensues. (I did once personally pitch a student straight over a horse – she was lighter than I thought).

4

I’m pretty sure it’s possible to lower the stirrup, if you need it lower in order to get your foot in for mounting… you can just shorten it again once you’re on the horse! Though a mounting block is useful, you either need it to be inside the riding area, which means it’s in the way, or you need to go through a gate of some sort, which means you have to manage to close it from on top of your horse. Easier said than done, IMHO. I love being boosted up… it feels like flying for a split second, when done right! I haven’t ridden in years (with the odd exception of overpriced easy trail rides through the years) and I miss it, but I can’t afford to keep it up.

Polo does sound like a lot of fun; I’d love to try it one day.

5

Okay, on the leg up. I thought she was lifting me up so my foot would go into the stirrup. Apparently what I was supposed to do was leap up with assistance, swing my right leg in kind of a fan kick over the horse’s back, and land in the saddle. Right? Kind of a dance movement.

I can’t think of any way to practice this movement so I don’t look like a complete klutz at the next lesson.

Also–I don’t know if this comes from riding Western style, maybe a different tradition–but it seems to me that a rider needs to be able to do everything, catch the horse, saddle the horse, and get on the horse–without anyone else’s help. So I might have been resistant to the idea that I needed help to get up there (although, obviously, I needed help). I’m thinking of taking my little office stepladder to the next class. It’s light, folds up, and will get me about a foot closer to that stirrup.

6

Gee, I have a lot of questions:

  1. If you had never been on a horse before, would the club recommend that you take riding lessons first? If so, would you take those lessons at the club itself, or at an ordinary riding stable?

  2. How are horses assigned to polo players? If you join the club and begin playing at a recreational level, will a horse be assigned to you for each match? What about really good players–do they have their own horses, or do they get assigned a different mount every time?

  3. If you like the game and decide to play regularly, how much does it cost to join a polo club? What equipment do you have to buy?

  4. Is polo mostly a warm weather activity? Since you’re starting in October, is it safe to assume you live in a warm climate?

  5. How are matches arranged? Does the club organize multiple teams for intra-club play, or is the club just one team that plays other clubs?

7

The stable where I take lessons says you don’t need any horse experience–they will teach you riding and polo at the same time. I’m a decent rider. It would take me a long longer to learn both of them. I barely got to the point of consistently hitting the ball and it was hard work, never mind strategy.

Really good players have their own horses, and several of them apiece (the horses get changed every few minutes) but the riding school has a lot of horses and they seem to be pretty well trained. Apparently some players lease horses. I know a couple of people who play with other people’s horses and the owners appreciate it because it gives their horses more polo experience.
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You need a helmet and a mallet and, obviously, boots, if playing in matches white pants (jeans or jodphurs), gloves if you want. You could probably spend a lot.

Not that warm…although it was quite warm for my lesson on Friday and I expect it to be warm or at least not snowing for every lesson I take. But there are some people who put special shoes on the horses and play winter polo on the snow. There’s even an organized one in Aspen–I don’t know if they do it every year but they’ve done it in the past.

At my level, once you get into group lessons the group splits up and plays each other in informal games. Beyond that, I don’t know. I do know that in some of the top teams in the area there is one “professional” player and the other three or four (in the case of alternates) are amateurs.

8

I seem to recall hearing that being hit by a polo mallet is a real risk, and serious injury could result. Does that sound true to you?

9

While I can’t do it myself, I have seen a 5’4" woman get on a 16+hh horse, bareback, without any assistance whatsoever. She just grabbed his mane and swung her leg and she was up! It was pretty impressive, but I really don’t know how she did it.

I would lower the stirrup, get my left leg up and place my foot in it, and then use that as leverage to swing my right leg up and over. Once sitting, just lift your leg up and forward, and adjust the straps to your stirrups to make them equal, comfortable, and appropriate for the riding you are doing (I don’t know at what length you set them at when you play polo).

It’s been a very long time, but I think I’d describe a leg up or a boost like this:

Stand facing the horse (on the left side, of course!), with your left hand holding the reins/mane and your right hand on the saddle back or seat. Bend your left leg at the knee, and the person boosting you will cup their hands under your knee and “bounce” you up. At that time, you sort of jump up, using your arms as leverage, and you sort of end up half over the horse as you described earlier, but basically holding yourself on with your arms rather than belly, and just swing your right leg over to sit into the saddle.

The only way I can think of to practice would be to find a low wall, about the height of a horse. Get a friend to boost you up onto it, and practice boosting them if you feel like it. My little sister and I used to do this all the time on a low wall near an apartment complex near our home… horse-crazy preteens, anything we could do to “practice” was worth it! hehehehe

10

Every time I see the thread title I read it as “polio”, which I never though sounded fun at all.

I guess I need to work on my reading skills

11

Yes! And when I was a kid, up to college age, I could actually do this on any horse that had enough mane to get a grip of. It was a swinging action. That was a long, long time ago.

That sounds promising, although the instructor explained to me that the girth isn’t tightened as much for polo, so I’d have to be quick. This is essentially how I get on horses these days when riding western-style, because I did almost always have to shorten the stirrups. For polo, BTW, the stirrups were not as short as I thought they’d be–just long enough so that I could rise off the saddle when standing, or about the same as I had them when riding Western.

That sounds reasonable. This horse–and I guess polo ponies in general–did not have a mane. And the saddle did not have much of anything I could get a grip on. I think that was part of my problem. What do I grab to hoist myself up?

I think I’m just going to have to work on general agility. But thanks!

12

I think the only serious injury would be if you got hit in the head, and I was wearing a helmet. Now, anywhere else it could leave quite a bruise, but I don’t consider that serious. I have seen people wearing knee pads, though–maybe that’s why. Another vulnerable spot.

13

And you call yourself an optimist?

14

It certainly is more challenging when the mane is shaved off (BTW, the term for that is “roached” for some reason). However, there is usually some stubble at least that you can dig your fingers into. Do Not Not Not use the saddle itself for leverage – if the girth is as loose as you’re describing you’ll pull the saddle right round the horse. In the end though, you have to wrap your mind around the idea you are basically being tossed into the saddle vs. pulling yourself up with your own strength. Like many things related to horseback riding, raw strength is less important than balance and leverage.

If legs up what the horses are used to, a mounting block may not be an improvement, particularly the stepladder sort you’re describing. As to “not doing it yourself” – Jockeys always get a leg up, and no one would accuse them of not having control of 2000lbs of hormone-addled Thoroughbred. :slight_smile:

15

Why isn’t the girth tightened? If it’s too loose, it could, in fact, cause the saddle to slip around the horse while you’re riding, resulting in an upside-down-rider, or, more likely, a runaway panicking horse and a rider on the ground. My 9-year-old-self can attest to that! Luckily, we were in a riding ring, so the horse was quickly brought under control. Unluckily, my riding instructor at the time was a sociopathic French Colonel (yep, literally a French cavalry officer) and he yelled at me as if I was in boot camp, causing me to cry, and my little sister ran to my defense, and we never returned to that stable… oooh, the emotional scars! hehehehe You should have seen his face when my 7-year-old sister accused him of being an evil, evil man for yelling at a kid who made a simple mistake (I wasn’t strong enough to tighten the girth properly, especially on a horse that had a habit of holding his breath…I hadn’t stopped to retighten it once we started the lesson.)

Anyways, don’t use the saddle itself as a grip to pull you up, because even if properly tightened, the saddle could slip anyways, and you’ll just hurt the horse (friction on his skin… ouch!). Even if you can’t grip the mane itself, you aren’t using it as a handle, it’s really more a point of contact with the horse. You can place your palm on the base of the neck/top of the wither, your right palm on the saddle seat, or on the horse’s back just behind the saddle, and you really just do a bit of a push-up as you get boosted.

I thought Western style typically had longer stirrups than “English” seat. We typically used hunter saddles (which based on Google seem to resemble polo quite a bit), and the rule of thumb at the time was, from the ground, put your fingertips at the very top of the stirrup strap (under the little flap), and the bottom of the stirrup should come to your armpit. It was a good, consistent length regardless of the horse/saddle used. Is it different for polo? I imagine they should be a good length for “posting” during trotting… just being able to stand up that much?

Are these horses trained with neck-reining (is that the right word? Western-style, with the rein on the neck indicating direction of turn) or English-style, where the pull of the bit turns the horse’s head?

The more I read and post to this thread, the more I want to go riding! I miss it! But I’m broke, and really really can’t afford it.

Total aside: A few months back my sister was volunteering for a local equine vet, and they were treating a young horse (3 y.o. I think) who had been injured enough for his racing career to be over. The owner got to know my sis during the treatments, and offered to give the horse to her. He had to sell him anyways, so why not give it to a future vet, who clearly loved horses, etc. My sister, living in a small apartment with a dog and cat, and being heavily funded by scholarships and the Bank of Dad had to decline, of course, but man was I ever jealous, even after all these years of not being involved in the horse world at all! She also has a prof who lets her ride his horses for free - they need the exercise, so does she, it makes her happy, why not? Unfortunately, similar opportunities don’t seem to pop up on me on the island of Montreal!