As the snow polo season draws to a close with St. Moritz, Aspen, Megève, Tianjin and many other snow polo tournaments around the world already finalised, one of the oldest and most prestigious snow polo events has yet to begin – The Cortina Winter Polo Audi Gold Cup will take place from February 17 to 23 February in Fiames, district of Cortina d’Ampezzo.

Back in 1989 four friends – Italo Focacci, Fabrizio Bogiankino, Corrado

Cortina Winter Polo Cup in Italy

Pantanella all from Rome – and Renato Manaigo of Cortina, decided it was time to bring polo to the Dolomites. They first chose Lake Landro, between Cortina and Dobbiaco but later decided to move the tournament to Lake Misurina. The tournament became an annual occasion, went from strength to strength and is now considered one of the most important events in the snow polo season calendar.

Traditionally, the tournament is played on the frozen surface of Lake Misurina, but this year, due to the ice not reaching its required thickness the games have had to be moved to Fiames about a 20 kilometre drive away. Not ideal, but in the end a much better solution than cancelling the tournament all together as was the consequence of the lake of St. Moritz  not reaching its required level of thickness in 2012.

This year 5 teams employing more than 100 horses between them will take part in the tournament and Cortina Cup veterans like Luca d’Orazio (participated continuously for the last 11 years and 5-time winner), Dario Musso and Rommy Giannni will saddle up once again, so it’s shaping up to be a pretty exciting event.

The full list of teams and players:

Audi Polo Team:
1 cap. Davide Nanni         hp. 1 ITA
2 Paolo Santambrogio     hp. 3 ITA
3 David Bernal                 hp. 7 ARG
4 Fabrizio Bulgarini          hp. 3 ITA

HOTEL DE LA POSTE POLO TEAM:
1 cap. Gif Turati               hp. 1 ITA
2 Diego White                  hp. 8 ARG
3 Oscar Carona               hp. 3 ITA
4 Franco Piazza              hp. 3 ITA

JOHN TAYLOR-MONTECARLO POLO TEAM:
1 cap. Rommy Gianni     hp. 2 ITA
2 Luca E. D’Orazio         hp. 2 ITA
3 Dario Musso                 hp. 7 ARG
4 Juan Cruz Greguoli      hp. 5 ARG

U.S. POLO ASSN. POLO TEAM:
1 cap. Richard Fagan     hp. 2 IRL
2 Marcus Hancock          hp. 3 UK
3 Marcus Arraya              hp. 7 ARG
4 Santiago Torreguitar    hp. 4 ESP

RUINART POLO TEAM: 
1 cap. Davide Dondena  hp. 1 ITA
2 Horacio Etcheverry      hp. 7 ARG
3 Luis Neuforge              hp. 4 GER
4 Teodoro Neuforge       hp. 2 GER

More than 12,000 polo aficionados braved the cold and showed up for the 29th edition of World Cup Polo on Snow in St. Moritz last week. The Polo Blog was there and managed to snap a couple of pictures of the hard-fought matches between the four teams Cartier, Ralph Lauren, BMW and Oppenheim.

With all teams sporting a combined handicap of 18 and with the likes of Nacho Figueras, Chris Hyde and Eduardo Novillo Astrada, who, with a 9-goal handicap is currently regarded as one of the best players in the world the tournament was always going to be something special.

Sunday’s final on the frozen lake in St. Moritz stood between BMW and Cartier and it was Cartier that got off to the better start being up 5-1 after just 2 chukkas. It looked like it was going to be a comfortable win for Cartier, but BMW managed to fight back bringing the score to 5-4 and pressing hard in the final minutes for the equaliser. Goal line clearences and shots from BMW that were licking the wrong sides of the posts meant Cartier could celebrate their win after the final whistle and take home the coveted trophy.

In the match for third place  Ralph Lauren managed a narrow win of 4-3 against Oppenheim which allowed them to bring home The Deutsche Bank Trophy.

A great year for Polo on Snow at St. Moritz and at The Polo Blog we are already looking forward to the 30th anniversary next year.

St. Moritz Polo World Cup on Snow starts next week and as a warm-up Polo+10 in Germany has looked at the history of snow polo and put together a chronological list of polo snow events.

Even though polo has been played for thousands of years, the first ever recorded snow polo match only took place a little more than 25 years ago. It all started in St. Moritz where a small group of crazy polo enthusiasts got

Fin del Mundo Snow Polo Cup in Ushuaia in Argentina

the idea to play on the frozen lake. Today, over a quarter of a century later, the St. Moritz Polo World Cup on Snow is not only one of the most prestigious polo tournaments in the world, but snow polo has become one of the most popular kinds of polo there is.

Each year new snow polo events are announced in different parts of the world. Four years after the first polo match in St. Moritz in 1985 Cortina Winter Polo in Italy followed suit. Then Polo Masters, Megève in France, and in 2000 the World Snow Polo Championship in Aspen USA. Since then, the trend really accelerated with a new polo snow polo tournament being announced nearly every year in different parts of the world like China Snow Polo World Cup in Tianjin/China – the first snow polo event in Asia.

For the full chronological list of snow polo tournaments since the first in 1985 see the list on Polo+10 by clicking here.

Being avid polo lovers we always try to combine trips abroad with different polo matches around the world, and when a trip earlier this year took us to the beautiful island of Sicily, we were not expecting to experience anything remotely related to Polo. But then, as we were unsuccessfully searching the internet for any matches that might take place, we found that Sicily had its very own Polo stadium capable of seating 20,000 spectators – unusual for an island where polo is virtually non-existent and few matches are ever played, and particularly unusual for a city of only 27,000 citizens.

Work on the stadium commenced in 1985 and has yet to finish – It is a victim of Giarre’s many failed building projects where priority number one was to secure access to available funds from the regional government without putting too much into how and why the projects should be completed. More than 20 unfinished projects including a half-built swimming pool, nearly Olympic size and an amphitheatre are among the buildings never finished in Giarre. The stories have been covered in depth by international media including BBC, Bloomberg BusinessWeek, and The Independent – all good sources for a more in depth read on the story behind Sicily’s unfinished building projects.

We managed to snap a couple of pictures of the Polo stadium in Giarre, despite the fact that the locals there are not too interested in the media coverage.

The polo stadium in Giarre

Last year a group of citizens in Giarre staged a mock polo tournament in protest against the large number of unfinished projects – it was the first time anyone had ever played a polo match at the stadium. See the video below for the highlights

If you – like us – are already looking forward to next summer’s polo events (in the northern hemisphere, that is!) you’ll be pleased to know that, as of next year there will be an additional candidate when planning your polo holiday abroad. From the country that recently gave us “The Killing”, “The Bridge”,  and “Borgen”, the first ever Polo Open in Copenhagen is due to take place on the 21st and 22nd of June at ‘Fælledparken’ in the Northern part of Copenhagen.

So far Mat Lodder (4-goaler) and Ryan Pemble (5-goaler) have been confirmed to take part; both prominent polo players with a long list of international polo silverware between them, including prestigious Gold Cup and Queens Cup wins. With two skilled players like that already part of the line-up, Copenhagen Polo Open promises to be a thrilling event quite capable in rivalling the recent crime TV series export.

Surprised that the horse-loving nation of Denmark has not hosted any Polo Opens before? So were we! A country not without equestrian pedigree ought to have their own annual polo open, so it’s about time something was arranged. This is definitely a contender for our summer holiday plans next year!

Tickets have yet to go on sale, but should become available towards the end of the year. The best way to stay updated is by going to the official Facebook page where all new announcements will be posted by the organisers.

Fancy watching a polo match in the idyllic Swiss Alps?

In about 6 weeks, the Hublot Polo Gold Cup in Gstaad kicks off. It’s a 12-14 handicap game and the teams have recently been confirmed and can be viewed here. Loads of Argentinians in the line-up as always!

The semi-finals are played on Saturday the 18th of August and the final on the Sunday, so it makes great for a long weekend getaway with beautiful polo, played in one of the most scenic polo playing fields in the world. And if you get a chance to do a bit of shopping, the centre of Gstaad has developed into the most popular and shortest shopping street in Switzerland offering plenty of opportunities to part with your money. And before you ask, Yes! There is a ‘La Martina’ shop with great polo gear, along with a wealth of other fashionable and chic outlets.

La Martina shop in Gstaad

Back in 2010 we were lucky enough to pay Gstaad a visit and managed to film a short video of the action on the field:

Alas, with an already jam-packed polo schedule there will be no trip to Gstaad for us this year, but we are happy to help anyone who would like to go. Feel free to comment and to use us as your tour guide if you so desire. We are at your service!