Sunday Funday – 8 hours of watching polo online

The US Open Polo Championship at the International Polo Club in Palm Beach started Saturday the 28th of March 2015. I was watching the polo match on my iPhone in bed as it was about midnight here in Bahrain when the match started. I am so happy that it has become more common to film and live-stream polo matches and drone filming is awesome as well. I mean I wish I was actually there, but since I can’t be this is as good as it gets.

The first match was between Coca-Cola and Las Monjitas and it was a nail-biter to say the least, those guys were ping-ponging the goals and right as we thought they would be going in to overtime Coca-Cola’s Julio Arellano scored a goal as the hooter went off announcing the last 30 seconds of play, so the match ended with a win for Coca-Cola 9 and Las Monjitas 8. For polo rules and jargon go to my post What is Polo?

Goal progression for Coca-Cola: 1-1, 3-4, 5-5, 5-6, 7-6, 9-8

The whole US Open is shown on Chukker.tv and this is the schedule:

Yesterday I watched the US Open Polo Championships online for 8 hours straight. I tried to multitask a little and write this blogpost at the same time, but it was impossible as all three matches were just incredible and demanded my full attention and concentration as to what was going on over there in Florida; the lead kept changing, so many penalty shots, a few injuries, two of the matches went in to overtime, it was just intense to say the least. I was tired at the end of it cant’t even imagine how the players felt and Chukker-tv’s commentator Toby Wayman must have been quite tired at the end of it all.

During the second match I did manage to multitask, although in a different way, using my brain for polo and my body for exercise. I was power walking on the treadmill while the match was playing on my iPad, little did I know that this would be the longest match ever, so i spent 2 hours and 20 minutes on that treadmill. Great way of getting some cardio done though as I hardly noticed the minutes go by, I was just focused on what was going on in the match and tweeting at the same time. Yes I am on twitter, you can follow me by clicking on the little birdie at the top right side of this page, also on Instagram and Facebook, just search PoloPeoplePlaces ! You can also put your email in the follow box, so you get an e-mail when there is a new blogpost.

The first polo match of the Sunday polo-marathon was a bit of a family feud between the Ganzi’s, I wonder what dinner at their place was like last night. Marc Ganzi is the patron of the Audi team and his wife Melissa Ganzi has her own team FlexJet. Yesterday Melissa was not feeling well, so her son Grant Ganzi had the honor of taking her place and he must have made her very proud, with some excellent horsemanship and team play out there on the field. Grant and his teammates Nic Roldan, Miguel Astrada and Magoo Laprida in their battle against Audi’s Marc Ganzi, Gonzalito Pieres, Rodrigo Andrade and Fred Mannix gave us spectators a true spectacle to watch. FlexJet had the lead for the first half of the match, but at the end of the fourth chukker they were tied at 8. Two more chukkers of ping-pong of who had the lead with a final score by Gonzalito Pieres took the triumph for team Audi.

Goal progression for Audi: 2-1, 4-5, 6-7, 8-8, 9-8, 11-10

Audi won the last tournament, the Piaget Gold Cup, which is the second part of the American Triple Crown.

The second match of the day was a bit different, but also very exciting, between Orchard Hill and Valiente. There were many fouls, it felt like the whistle was blown every 40 seconds, also some injuries and falls resulted in stopping the match quite often. Number 1 polo player in the world Adolfo Cambiaso left the field already in the first chukker due to an injured jockey muscle after a collision with Ezequiel Martinez. Earlier in the season he told Chukker.tv commentator Toby Wayman that he was experiencing some pain in his jockey muscle, let’s hope he can recover quickly and continue the tournament. Sapo Caset replaced Cambiaso and the game went on. Facundo Pieres, playing for Orchard Hill, showed us exactly how good he is in the second half of the match, with an impressive amount of goals scored, 12 in total by Facundo including the golden goal in overtime which made Orchard Hill the winners of this lengthy match.

Goal progression for Orchard Hill: 1-2, 3-4, 6-4, 9-9, 13-10, 14-14, 15-14

Facundo and his team mates already have one of the three Triple Crown trophies at home from the CV Whitney cup, which is the first tournament of the American Triple Crown.

 

The last match of the day was also the featured match played at the Engel and Völkers field at IPC where the lavish Veuve Clicquot Champagne Brunch is hosted. The Alegría against Lechuza Caracas match was just as exciting as the two previous matches and ended in overtime as well, with the golden goal scored by another Pieres, this time Nico Pieres, who secured the victory for his team Lechuza Caracas. Alegria had the lead up until the fifth chukker when Nico Pieres scored 3 goals and Victor Vargas one and they finally had the lead with one goal. By the end of the sixth chukker it was a tie leading them to overtime, where Nico Pieres was awarded penalty shots twice, he missed the first one, but when that second one came around shortly after he showed us what his 8-goal skills can do and it was the end of the match with Lechuza caracas 12 – Alegria 11

Goal Progression for Lechuza Caracas: 2-3, 3-3, 5-6, 6-7, 10-9, 11-11, 12-11

With so many great players in this tournament we can only expect all matches to be as exciting as these first four have been. I am already looking forward to Wednesday afternoon when the next match will be played between Valiente and Las Monjitas starting at 4 pm Palm Beach time (which means about 11 pm Bahrain time, so another late night for me).

And what I am most looking forward to is the Final! I already have my ticket for the Veuve Clicquot Brunch and will be going with one of my best friends who I haven’t seen in a while, so it will be a great day as I have already rambled excitedly about in my post Florida Bound

It’s hard for me to choose who is my favorite as there as so many good players out there, but I am hoping to see some Pieres power on the field in the final, which is quite probable as there are a few of them out there and three of them have already taken the first two trophies, so let’s see if they will return to the podium or maybe it’s baby brother Nico’s turn to win the final.

Here is a full list of the teams and their handicaps, this information is from the IPC website

Alegría Assist Card 26 goals

Julian Mannix- 4 goals

Hilario Ulloa- 9 goals

Mariano Aguerre – 9 goals

Sterling Giannico – 4 goals

 

Audi 25 goals

Marc Ganzi – 1

Gonzalito Pieres – 9

Rodrigo Andrade – 9

Freddie Mannix – 6

 

Coca-Cola 26 goals

Gillian Johnston – 2

David “Pelon” Stirling – 10

Julio Arellano – 8

Stuart “Sugar” Erskine – 6

 

FlexJet 25 goals

Melissa Ganzi – A /Grant Ganzi – 1

Nic Roldan – 8

Miguel Novillo Astrada – 9

Magoo Laprida – 8

 

Las Monjitas 26 goals

Camilo Bautista – A

Facundo Sola – 8T

Sebastian Merlos – 9

Eduardo Novillo Astrada – 9

 

Lechuza Caracas – 26 goals

Victor Vargas – 1

Nico Pieres – 8

Juan Martin Nero – 10

Agustin Garcia Grossi – 7

 

Orchard Hill – 26 goals

Steve Van Andel – A

Facundo Pieres – 10

Polito Pieres – 9

Ezequiel Martinez Ferrario – 7

 

Valiente 26 goals

Bob Jornayvaz – 2

Alejo Taranco – 6

Guillermo Terrera – 8

Adolfo Cambiaso – 10 / Sapo Caset – 10