Daily Telegraph -- The message from Facundo Pieres, one of the greatest polo players in the world, was as cryptic as a code in a James Bond film.
“Turtles,” it read. “What dreams are made of.”
But the 28-year-old described as “the emperor of polo” was not making an obscure reference to aquatic creatures.
Instead he was talking about the polo field in the well-heeled town of Tortugas – turtles, in English – which hosts one of the most hotly-anticipated events in the early polo calendar. And this week, that dream is coming true, when the Argentine rider takes part in the Tortugas Abierto – part of the Triple Crown, and the first major match of the season.
It is a season which, in the eye of many, well merits its mythical reputation.
“Argentina’s polo season is far and away the best in the world,” said Roderick Vere Nicholl, publisher of Hurlingham Media, a specialist polo magazine and website. “It’s got more players, a higher standard, and is all professional.
“It’s the Mecca for anyone interested in the sport.”
The high goal polo season – with teams having a total handicap of 22 goals or more – spans the best part of a year, taking professional players on a huge global circuit from Florida – January to April – to England and Europe for the British spring and summer, and then on to Argentina in September.
The season in the Latin nation began on September 21 with the Jockey Club Open, which was won by La Dolfina – a team which, alongside the Ellerstina team, has dominated the game for two decades.
And as the Argentinian season kicks off, it is easy to see why there is nowhere in the world that can rival it.
Of only seven players in the world who currently play with the top handicap of ten goals, all but one – Uruguayan David Stirling – are from Argentina. James Beim, the current captain of England’s polo team – who took over from Luke Tomlinson in July after their defeat to Argentina in the Coronation Cup, has a handicap of seven.
Entire families are dedicated to the sport, producing generations of champions – Facundo Pieres and his brothers Nicolas and Gonzalo will play together for the Tortugas Abierto, as part of the Ellerstina Team.
They will take on La Dolfina, the team of the legendary Adolfo Cambiaso – who at the age of 16 became the youngest ever to achieve a ten-goal handicap – and whose brothers Marcial and Salvador are also polo professionals.
Cambiaso is widely considered to be the greatest polo player who has ever lived, and has turned La Dolfina into an all-encompassing lifestyle brand with clothing, holidays and even a polo estate for anyone wanting to really live the dream.
Argentina’s players – known as “hired assassins” for their lethal role in European teams – are so formidable that a home-grown player rule has been introduced in the UK, meaning that the British riders are guaranteed a look-in among their South American colleagues.
Polo matches in Argentina are broadcast live on television, and the professionals greeted with the ardour normally reserved for footballers or film stars. Nacho Figueras, the US-based Ralph Lauren model and polo professional, has 16,000 followers on Twitter. Both he and Adolfo Cambiaso are married to models, and run lucrative sidelines in clothing design and paid appearances.
The three most prestigious games are played at Tortugas, at Hurlingham on November 2 – a suburb to the north of Buenos Aires – and finally the Argentine Open at Palermo, in the most stylish district of the capital. Not for nothing is Palermo known as the cathedral of polo, with 45,000 people flocking to watch the drama on the emerald turf, in the midst of the skyscrapers right in the centre of the city.
Six times as many people will attend the Palermo tournament as attended the British Open in 2012. Photos from the week-long spectacular, which culminates this year on December 6 and 7 with the Argentine Open and the World Polo Tour Championship Cup, plaster the pages of the gossip magazines.
[video=youtube;edErmqLGGY8]http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=edErmqLGGY8[/video]
But if the skill and glamour were not enough, it is also the history which so appeals to afficionados of the sport.
Within ten years of the first polo game being played in Britain, in 1869, it was being organised in Argentina – then progressing to the US and Australia.
In 1892 the River Plate Polo Club was founded, which acted as an association bringing together all the teams to play tournaments. Two decades later, following a series of meetings at Hurlingham, the Argentine Association of Polo was born.
Initially the game was dominated by Britons – of 248 players in the first handicap list, 139 were British. But by 1930, the sport had taken off, and of 974 players, less than a third had British surnames.
Soon it was rooted in the Argentine psyche.
“The history of civilisation is linked to the horse, and men throughout the ages benefited from its strength and speed; its valour in battle; its resistance to fatigue; its noble obedience right until death,” states the Argentine Polo Association, with considerable understatement.
And the Argentines became the best polo players in the world.
“Often in rural areas children are in school from 7am to 12pm, so they’ve half a day every day of their lives that they can dedicate to polo – from the age of 12 or 13,” said Luke Tomlinson, the former England captain.
“They have more access to horses than anyone else in the world, and they receive advice from ex-10 goalers because invariably they have a cousin or an uncle who was very good.
“Most important, though, for any player, is being able to play full-time from as soon as they are old enough to want to be good. That can be any age from seven onwards. If as a kid they get that dream, it is the best time to start in order to keep that flame alive.”
And as the players line up at Tortugas this week – the scheduled matches for the weekend were postponed due to rain – that fire will be burning brightly.
With the glamour, the history, and the breathtaking talent, it’s an exciting time for all sports fans.
James Bond himself would be proud.
