Old News

June 17, 2011

Although one would wonder with this "God-awful" weather we are still managing to play at least once a week. I will say the grass is green and fields look great though, but we most certainly have had enough rain to last the year!

With our season started and under way we are busy fitting up horses and making plans for upcoming events. Our club is very excited to host 16 year old Emily Brodigan of Tamworth NSW! We expect Emily to arrive at the beginning of July and spend close to a month with us and hopefully our club members will learn a lot from her. Calgary is always happy to host international players as it does seem to teach everyone different methods of horsemanship as well as play. We are very fortunate to have this exchange with NSW as it does help to build a nice tight team with a good horse sense. We still hope that some time down the road our group might be as  adventurous as to send an exchange player back to them as they are always asking. Exposing our juniors to these international players does help to see how different they treat this horse sport. It does expose to our juniors to the fact that the horse always comes first in such simple ways as the horse is exercised and cared for before any fun. It does point out differences that are helpful to understand why Australians excel at this sport. I will be the first to admit that living in the city does make our "horsing" job a little trickier and more time consuming as well. However it is nice to be able to compare the difference in play as well as location and lifestyle.
Perhaps just something to ponder if nothing else.

Wow, how very deep for a rainy Friday! See you on the field

June 5, 2011

The weather is certainly not making the beginning of our season an easy one! With some slight alterations we did at least manage to get our Ryan Murphy clinic done and all end up with sunburns. What are the chances of enough rain for soggy feet on the same day you get a sunburn? Only in Calgary in the spring for sure. In true form Ryan did a fantastic job with the clinic under less than perfect conditions. Everyone left with a tired horse as well as a brain full of new strategy to enjoy the game of Polocrosse. We would like to Thank both Ryan Murphy and Melissa for
doing such a great job of keeping everyone on task and well organized!

Having missed our season opener I guess we will through all our efforts into our first all clubs welcome "Jackpot" that will be hosted at our South Glenmore Park field next Saturday June 11. We will be praying to the sun Gods to give us a lovely day to enjoy some fun play for all levels. I look forward to seeing everyone and their horses again next weekend! Until then practice and play while the sun is shining as the weather is not going to be nice for the first bit of the week.

Lesley

May 26, 2011

Well with this weather not cooperating at all it is will deep regrets that we must  cancel our "Season Kick-off". I do realize that the rain will stop but it is "too little too late" and our field will be far too wet to play on. However, we will have a group of people and horses at the field unless it is still raining, and will teach some skills for those extreme optimists that do show up. Please follow our group on Facebook at Polocrosse Calgary as well for more current updates.

Happy boating!

May 16, 2011

Although we have not officially kicked off our season we have been actively recruiting and practicing at our field in South Glenmore Park. To date we have had fantastic turn-outs which started at our indoor practices, perhaps people are starting to catch on to how much fun this sport really is!

You can most certainly tell that spring is in the air with flowers in bloom, grass finally greening and the horses chasing the "birds and the bees"! This of course makes all of our practices very exciting as well as our everyday horsing lives. Spring is always a time to be VERY careful with horses as the season change does affect our horses each differently and some not at all. I know things have been very exciting both good and bad back at Zeus and I hope we are coming to the end of it as my cup runnith over!

Over this past weekend we hosted a very strange practice which started of with a "a moose on the loose", let me assure you that horses do not like Moose's (or is it Meese LOL!) By the way they do not like kites either...These two events definitely laid the ground work for a colorful and eventful practice that everyone enjoyed and played hard at aside from these two incidents. I am glad to say that the turn-outs have been great as our club even though we lost 9 players coming into this season we will still begin the season with 25.

This weekend we also hosted Wendy Agate for a 1 day riding clinic that was full to capacity at Springbank Equestrian Centre. She is strict but really got people doing what they needed to be doing in order to play Polocrosse! Everyone learned a pile and enjoyed a good hard day of listening to Wendy's bellowing voice. I must say, I myself cannot get enough of it! Everyone had such a good time that we will do it again and all are looking forward to it and those the missed it mustn't do it again next time as it truly was worth it's weight in gold!

April 28, 2011

Well it does seem sort of sad to be leaving RJ Ranch for possibly the last time; however we all know the weather is never what it's meant to be so we will be back just on a less regular basis. Thanks to Jennifer Lynne and Richard for all their help and support! We will be back though.

I guess as I am sure that everyone would guess we are on our field now and did enjoy our first outdoor practice at South Glenmore Park last night. It was fantastic to be back on the field! We had a good turnout that will only get better as we seem to be gaining players weekly.  A good time was had by all including the horses...some were definitely happen to be back at it while others just seemed to mill around glad to be out. As I am sure everyone knows the Mane Event is this weekend and therefore we will not be playing this weekend as most are at this super horse event. We will be back to business as usual on Wednesday at 6:30 at South Glenmore Park. I look forward to seeing all of you that were on the benches last night actually on your horses next week. With the weather as unpredictable as it is, please drop me a line and I will add you to our email list in case you are coming and do not get the info that it was cancelled. Please now ahead of time that after waiting so long to play outside  we will try to play regardless of weather so simply dress for it. You know the old saying "waste not want not" now that we can play lets do so!

Play safe and "Game On"!

April 17, 2011

We may as well just pack up and move to the North Pole! If it weren't for our practices I am sure we would all go mad. This week was much less dramatic than the week prior Thank goodness. We only had one minor mishap with Alex landing in the mud...however funny, you must not say anything. Things only got better from there anyway! Everyone had a fantastic time even though it snowed and snowed and snowed while we enjoyed our nice warm arena. This week we enjoyed some extra company with our new resident Aussie Grant out to "bash on us" nothing says Polocrosse like a rap across the knuckles...I think we are all going to be in trouble once he works the kinks out of his trusty new loaner stead. Thanks goes out to Les for providing both sandwiches as well as a spectacular performance on his horse Rita in the world's smallest saddle. One would actually wonder if there were even one there in the first place. Thanks again to RJ Ranch for taking good care of us as well as Lee Ann and Sheldon for providing a pile of horses and being the resident grooms! We will and can only get better at this plan, "Onward and Upward"!

April 10, 2011

All it takes are some indoor practices to create the excitement of play. Thanks to RJ Ranch's Jennifer-Lynne and Richard for their kind hospitality and taking such great care to make sure everything runs smoothly even in the worst case scenarios. This practice started off a little sketchy with horses not getting into trailers, trailers getting stuck, horses falling down in trailers and so forth but the practice went off without a hitch. We enjoyed the company of a few new players as well as some new horses. Our own keener Emma travelled all the way from Lethbridge to make practice and even brought along a tasty box of Picture Butte donuts! This practice we had no unrequested dismounts but are still waiting on our case of beer from the last one...You know who you are . It is important to remember that all of these great dismounts will be voted on for the season wind-ups prestigious "Seatbelt" award so pay attention! There will be a test!

I would like to extend a special Thank you to Allison Cully for lending her horse out for practices as well as Brittany Kuhn for lending her "Pepper" out to our newest player Rob. Of course a special Thank you must also go out to our favorite Pooh picking Lee Ann Kuhn for always taking the time to clean up after us and take photos for our website...everyone works so well together to try and make sure that all the horses have a ride and everyone has a horse to ride as best we can. It appears we are really off to a great start this season. Thank you all for your part! 

April 5, 2011

With everyone waiting daily on spring to arrive I have just about given up hope and I am simply just looking forward to summer now. We are currently practicing indoors every Saturday to start fitting up horses and making ourselves and horse ready for our upcoming season. With preparation for the season comes plenty of footwork and planning. We are starting to work on our events and get them on our calendar as they are booked. Do stay tuned in to see what we have on the books for this summer!

Aside from our regular play we are hosting 4 big days. Our season "KICK OFF" will be the first important date (May 28th) and we expect a big turnout for it. See the attached flyer for more details and expect to see it everywhere as we are looking forward to a great season and will be pushing this event. This day is a "come one come all" day so make sure and pray for good weather! Our day will involve play as well as helping to mentor people coming out to try the sport for the first time...Some people may bring their own horses or leave them at home and want to try it first on a horse that knows what it is doing more so than their own.  We will try and lend our horses to those that would like to try it out first and will certainly try to accommodate where we can; However we will be careful to make sure horses and riders match.

Watch for an update after our next practice which is this Saturday, and if your dying to come drop us a line!

March 23, 2011

Slow and steady the chill seems to be coming out of the air but not a moment too soon. We have had what seems to be the longest winter on record with the most snow in years. With so much snow we go straight from "too much snow to ride" into the "footing is too slippery" season; However we can trust our horses know that the season is changing as they are blowing out their winter woolies daily which clearly indicates it is time to start riding and preparing for the upcoming season. I thought it only fitting to point out that it does take 8 weeks to properly fit up your Polocrosse horse for play and it is easy enough to work your horse for the first but at the walk and slow trot to get their wind up.

We have already hosted our first indoor Polocrosse practice where the first case of beer was earned for a spectacular "involuntary dismount". As it is spring we mustn't forget that horses really do suffer from "Spring Fever" and they are all feeling a little fresh so expect some interesting behavior on your first ride. We have been fortunate enough to have a lovely arena to ride in provided by RJ Ranch. A special Thanks to Jennifer Lynn and Richard for taking such good care of us! We are hoping to host our second practice Saturday March 26 with our very own Shelby volunteering to run practice. Shelby has been over in Australia and done a pile of play and practice with some of the best in the world. We are expecting that she may be able to add a little something different to our practices. If you are interested or able to join in to try Polocrosse or simply just would like to come and watch, please drop us a line for the time and directions.

I also wanted to point out that our website is still currently under construction and we are trying to get it up to date...All good things take time though. The priority is our calendar and we will have that up and running by the end of the week.
has nothing posted yet.

Stay tuned and happy riding! 

January 18, 2011

A new year is upon us and it is time to start planning for the upcoming season! We are also currently upgrading the website so make sure to check in to see what's new.

In true Polocrosse form it is definitely time to have a get together and do some planning. We currently have a spectacular game of "Lacrockey" planned for this Sunday January 23 at 4:30 to be held at "The Music's". If you are interested in joining in, please bring a pair of skates (white or black..) and a helmet. Also bring a snack and something warm (or not) to drink. We will play out on the pond where there is a nice fire and a few chairs so do bring one if you need to sit. We are also trying to book the 3rd Annual "Christmas Tree Burning" at Zeus. This is a little more spontaneous due to these crazy hockey schedules. During these fun outings we will do a little brainstorming and then have a more formal meeting once we have an agenda formed.

Also on the books currently is attending the World Cup July 4-18th 2011. If anyone is considering attending whether to play in the Pony Club Event that is running at the same time or simply to go and watch "The Best" compete we would love to hear from you as I am sure there will be a group interested. Lee Ann Kuhn is in charge of organizing a group to play in the Pony Club Event so please contact me if your son or daughter would like to play.

Take care of that "Polocrosse Itch" indoor practices will start in February so stay tuned!

Lesley

November 15, 2010

Well time just keeps marching on and now it is time to play "catch up" again. I seems that the season just slowly creeps up then takes on a life of it's own and then the season is over again! This year our season was action packed and fun-filled as usual with guests from around the world as well as our own little community. I will try to do a bit of a season re-cap...Our season began with our annual Highway clean-up in early May which I must say we had a fine turn-out for. This is turning out to be our un-official season Kick-off. Quickly following that was our annual trip to Stettler which really turned out to be a bit of a bust due to the TERRIBLE weather! We will keep trying and truly did appreciate the efforts of all of those involved both with-in our club as well as those in Stettler. We did manage to dart back to Calgary for some play in the sun which did help some.

June brought the first of our 2 Jackpots to Glenmore Park where we had a lovely day of play and both the other clubs joined us. Also this month we enjoyed a great Paul Johnson clinic held down at "Reesland" the first of two clinics to be held this year! We also welcomed Terri and Bec Moore of Australia along with Ross who lived and played down with the Millarville club.

July just started rolling along with arrival of Walter Dewes who was kind enough to bring our Deb back from New Zealand. However, not soon enough to play in the "Belly-Bash"! The girls came out victorious this year, well done Isabelle Ladiges, Rachel Rees and Shaina Kuhns. The "Ol birds" will have to tighten up their game! The ball never stopped rolling this month as we headed down to Reesland for the second of our 2 Jackpots. Again we had a great turn out from the other clubs. We head right into The Stampede Parade followed immediately by the Stampede Classic tournament. This is usually the week we are all trying to live through just for the mere fact that it is so busy! Most came out unscathed. However; Christine suffered a terrible bee sting, Al lost his favorite dear horse Monty as well as takes a terrible spill which puts him out for the majority of the season. The Stampede Classic tournament overall was fantastic with a large amount of first place teams filled with Polocrosse Calgary members, well done group! This is also the first of hopefully many tournaments where we actually were able to play as full teams rather than just sections. I will say it did really confuse alot of our players as we are always just playing as sections...We then have an opportunity to catch our breath a little but are back to it just in time for the "Flower Power" tournie held at Hickville. Possibly some of the best photo's came from this tournament as they were just so darned colorful! A good time was had by all and we were even able to celebrate Krystalle's 22nd Birthday! We also welcomed Amy Johnson and her beau Dan from New Zealand but did miss Sophie Nichols due to a broken foot. Better luck next time Sophie. We really enjoyed Amy and the "Dan Brothers"!

August is crazy and frantic with the computers and phones buzzing while organizing our club to host the Canadian Nationals. Amidst this crazy planning we are again blessed with another fantastic clinic, this time put on by Australia's own Maryann Gough and USA's Ryan Murphy! The clinic was a terrific combination of horsemanship and Polocrosse and was enjoyed by all involved. This clinic was also hosted at Reesland, Thank you so much for providing such great facilities Dave, Helen, Rachel and Olivia. Dave went above and beyond this year by providing a great playing horse to Amy as well as a place to stay for 3 New Zealanders and training them to become farriers! The sore back may have had something to do with this...there's still next year Dave! Which leads us into THE NATIONALS...We were all nervous about trying to get this big tournament off the ground and despite having to change venues 6 days prior it seemed to tick along very well with only a few minor hiccups. Being a young club with lots of young players the tournament still turned out to be a hit! That is until the God forsaken rain shows up and truly rains on our parade. This tournament does go off with less excitement than the last two but finishes with a "bang" for Ziad and Blue. Both come out for the most part OK, both are Polocrosse player and horse and are tough! All in all the Nationals other than the rain were lovely especially since we did get to experience some of our very own talent. Thank you Allison and Diane for helping Jim Baker along we definitely can handle this department ourselves next year  . The most important thing is that almost every person stepped up and helped with the planning and doing of all the odd jobs to get the Nationals off the ground. A hearty pat on the back to all those volunteers in every job! Thank you all.

As luck would have it, it did continue to rain and we really did have a hard time trying to continue with play. We always played when we could and tossed in some other fun events like Mountain Trail rides, Gymkhanas and Fox-hunting. We also had one member get married as well as one member have a baby. I guess we will build our little club and community one tiny member at a time.

Until next time,
Lesley Plant

June 3, 2010

Well the weather has been a pain but we will be kicking the season off at South Glenmore Park this Saturday at 1PM (June 5, 2010)!

The wheels are also in motion with our travelling guests. They will slowly begin to trickle into Canada over the next 4 weeks. Our very own Deb Nickel will arrive today into Vancouver and arrive to Calgary on July 17 followed quickly by our Australia Exchange player Rebecca Moore and her mother Terri on June 30. With good planning Rebecca will hopefully get to play in the "Belly Brain-bash"...Arriving around the first week of July will be our guest coach Walter Dewes of New Zealand as well as Sophie Rose Nichols and her friend Amy both from New Zealand as well. We look forward to their arrival and Thank the hosting families of these guests. I ask that if you are doing something interesting over the month of July or simply have extra tickets to something, remember our out of country guests.

We also will be hosting 2 fantastic clinics at Reesland aka Dave Rees's place. We are hosting Paul Johnson author of "Paul Johnson's Polocrosse Book" from Texas for the weekend of June 18-20, I believe that we currently still have limited space in this clinic. We are also hosting a Polocrosse/Horsemanship clinic with Ryan Murphy of Pennsylvania and Maryann Gough of Australia the weekend of August 6-8. Costs for both of these clinics is $100 for the WEEKEND!!!! What a great deal.

If you are interested in either of these clinics please contact us and we will get you in touch with the organizers. If you would simply just like to come out and have a look, please check our calendar of events.

May 30, 2010

Well just as last weekend Mother Nature is being nasty! We do need the moisture to help keep feed prices down but this is seriously getting ridiculous! This was supposed to be our season "Kick Off" but due to SNOW we have had to re-schedule until next weekend June 6, 2010 at South Glenmore Park. Which I suppose would be fine since it is also our first official "Jackpot" for the season. I believe the weather is supposed to pull itself together and hopefully we will use our first Jackpot as our season kick off as well! If you play be there, if you would like to check out a great horse sport or simply just love horses come on over to the end of 90th Avenue SW (West end) between 1-3:30 Saturday June 5, 2010.

Our regular practice schedule has been greatly affected by the weather but hopefully be back on track for Wednesday and Thursday at 6:30 at South Glenmore Park unless otherwise posted on our schedule under the calendar. It is updated regularly so please visit it to check on dates and times.

Lesley

May 27, 2010

Well we are certainly trying to "Kick Off" our season but Mother Nature is definitely not helping our plight. Last weekend we travelled to Stettler for our annual play with 4H where we managed to have a bit of a clinic in the morning and play on a VERY cold afternoon. With it being such a hardy group we had to pull our kids off their horses as I am sure they would never stop playing! The 4H group then organized a "potluck" and "raffle" which  was hosted inside Nitschke's truck bay of course due to weather. I would like to Thank everyone involved in helping to get this weekend off the ground by helping to coach, ref, direct, feed both people and horses, and take in cold strays as it certainly was cold!..In fact we woke up to snow! A special Thanks goes to Kathy Hildebrand and her family for housing most of the group and their numerous shuttle trips. I would aslo like to Thank Al, Sue, and Kayla Hicks, as well as Dave Carnell for their tireless hours of coaching Saturday and umpiring on the field.

I know the weather took alot out of people but a group did manage to dart home to warmer weather??? and get a little play in our own field at South Glenmore Park in Calgary. Even with the weather taking it's toll on everyone I believe a good time was had by those involved. Thanks again for everyone's help and support.

 Lesley

March 28, 2010

The grass is coming, the birds are chirping and it's time to play Polocrosse!

It is always easy to tell when the season is upon us, people leave South to get some early play in the USA, indoor racket practice starts and indoor horse practice starts. Most have already taken place with the trip to Texas being the capper. This year we have "5" people traveling to Texas to play in one or both the Waldemar and Lonestar tournaments. This year on the roster we have Meghan McGovern, Dave Rees, Rachel Rees, Isabelle Ladiges, and Shaina Kuhn's heading South to play.

The Rees family is going to be the first in Canada to actually take horses to Texas and we all are excited to see how this works out. It is a long trip but we are always looking for a good trip south of the boarder to go in the big freightliner! I know that we are all happy and would love to be going ourselves but are really cheering on our group. "Go Calgary Go"!!!!

We mustn't forget our "long lost" Deb over in New Zealand really getting her hands dirty, almost up to her elbows in fact. We expect her and the other 5 in Texas to come back "all fired up" and ready to really play some great Polocrosse.

Currently we are working on putting a Google calendar onto the site to make it more user friendly and accessible so please do not hesitate to contact us for updates or schedules in this regard. Everything great is a work in progress to please bear with us....