How to get started in Polo by Hurlingham Polo Assoc

The Hurlingham Polo Association provides an overview of the beautiful game of polo.

The first game of polo is believed to have originated in Persia in the first millennium BC or earlier, and by the 16th century it was established in India. In the 1850s, British tea planters discovered the game in Manipur (Munipoor) on the Burmese border with India and formed the first polo club at Silchar, west of Manipur. Other clubs followed and, today, the oldest in the world is the Calcutta Club, founded in 1862.

Hockey on horseback
The start of polo in England goes back to 1869, when the first game - known then as “hockey on horseback” – was played on Hounslow Heath between the 10th Hussars and the 9th Lancers. The first official match in Argentina took place on 3rd September 1875, where the game had been taken by English and Irish engineers and ranchers. In 1876 Lt Col Thomas St Quintin, 10th Hussars, introduced the game to Australia. In the same year, polo was introduced to the USA by James Gordon Bennett Jr who had seen the game at Hurlingham whilst on a visit to England.

The Hurlingham Polo Association
Hurlingham became the headquarters of polo and in 1875 the Hurlingham Polo Committee drew up the first English rules and remained in control of the game for about thirty years. In 1925, this Committee was redesignated as the Hurlingham Polo Association.

Handicaps were introduced by the USA in 1888 and by England and India in 1910. There are now about seventy clubs and associations in the UK and Ireland, including the Rhine Army Polo Association, and most Commonwealth countries and many overseas clubs are affiliated to the HPA.

If you want to learn more about polo then visit the HPA’s website here you can find out, through the interactive map, where your nearest club is and what polo is going on. You can also find a list of HPA accredited instructors; all equipment for a taster session will normally be provided, and those listed meet the HPA’s minimum standards, including insurance. So if you fancy trying your hand at polo then it’s good to know that the only special requirement is enthusiasm!

Polo equipment for beginners
Polo players need mallets (also known as sticks), helmets, boots and kneepads. For your first lessons you should be offered a mallet and your current riding hat and boots will suffice. But if you graduate to play club chukkas you will need to buy a polo helmet and brown boots. When you play matches white jeans are de rigueur and safety goggles are advisable. Some players also use faceguards.

Polo ponies need specialist tack much stronger than in normal equitation. This would include a saddle without knee rolls, buffalo type stirrup leathers, an over girth, a reinforced standing martingale and a breast girth. They need boots and/or bandages to protect their legs and tape to tie up their tails. Pelhams or gags are used as bits: very few ponies respond quickly enough to a snaffle.

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