Pictures from this past weekend in L.A.

Back from L.A.

Your boys and girl are back from Los Angeles' SoCal Winter Polo Picnic. Team Austin, Miguel, Casey and I, didn't play that well against the extreme competition on this side of the country, but we had fun and learned a thing or two.

There were teams from East Van, Seattle, Portland, SF, LA, Pheonix, some from D.C., some from N.Y., and I'm sure from some other places I can't remember right now. We met lots cool and great people. The L.A. crew is super friendly and welcoming, they also play some hella good polo out there. Pheonix brought some 11-12 year olds who f-n rocked, and would put shame to a lot of us here, sorry Austin, these kids are good! LA fought East Van in the Final for a freakin awesome two-game final, but couldn't keep East Van from killing it in the second game! Well done Los Angeles and East Van.





Miguel took a lot of really great pictures this weekend, so be on the look out for those!
Thanks Casey, Miguel, and Annie, I had a good time with y'all!

Pics from our trip so far!

the Lexington Crew

First day of COMO

First Day of the Midwest Championships was amazing. So much fun was had. Annie, Jasmine, and Mo, aka team "Tough shits" did real well, with a record of 1-3. Casey teamed up with two peeps from COMO, team "Old skoal", and they had a record of 1-2-1. Miguel, Charlie, and I, aka team "Hymen, I'm home," had a record of 3-1 today, and are currently seeded in 5th place out of the 40 some odd teams playing. The competition is extreme, the first games are as intense as the last games in our tourney!!! The play is fast, the shots are on, the games are FUN! More after tomorrow!

NOLA NEXT MONTHA

Don't forget, next month on the 21 and 22, there will be a tourney in Nola! If you want to go, better start getting a team together!

Confusion Resolved?

Ok, so I apologize for not making everything crystal clear about the tournament. I will try to here...

Registration for the tournament will be from 11 a.m. to 12 p.m. Saturday Morning
the fee will be $15 per team - that's $5 a person and it covers both days. This will buy us some food and drinks as we need them throughout the two days.

Saturday's play will be round robin style, with pick up mixed in here and there... if you choose to miss a game or two on Saturday it won't knock you out of the tournament. It will only lower your seeding for Sunday's Double Elimination round. I am going to rank each team based on the amount of wins or losses they have for a Double Elimination bracket for Sunday's play.

Sunday will begin at 12 p.m. again, there is no new registration or fee,
The double elimination round will begin with the top seeds playing the lower seeds
each time a team loses they will be put in the losers bracket, unless they are already there
and the winners will continue in the winners bracket
I will hopefully have this drawn up very big for everyone to see as we go along...
And so it is possible for the winner of the loser's bracket to play the winner of the winner's bracket and come out on top and win the tournament.

It's double elimination, so 2 losses and your out, otherwise you keep playing.

So that's everything, if you plan on doing the race or going to some other events, let me know you do intend to play in the tournament and I will put your team down and you can pay the registration fee when you get there. I assume there will be time to leave and come back on Saturday if you'd like to go to some of the other events.
You don't have to play Saturday if you don't want, but again, you will just be seeded at the bottom for Sunday and will start off playing the best team from Saturday. And you'll miss out on all the fun! Just let me know in advance that you are playing if you won't be there to register before noon on Saturday. call me, text me, whatever - 512.423.5008 give me a team name and the members, thanks y'all!

Tournament Week

The Tournament is THIS SATURDAY AND SUNDAY. Registration starts around 11 a.m. and games will begin at Noon. Please come early and register your team and pay the 15 $ so I can get the bracket all together before we need to start playing. Sunday play will begin at noon again, and I'll have the brackets ready for that. The tournament will be round robin style on Saturday and we will use the results from Saturday to seed the teams for Sunday's double elimination. So that means on Sunday two losses and you're out! This two day tournament should give everyone a good amount of play, we want y'all to play as much as possible. We have teams traveling in from several different places and want them to get in as much play as possible with our Austin club.

We'll have some food and some drinks available. We'll also hopefully have some seating available so we don't have to stand the whole time.... ummm what else.... oh and if you guys have the time or the energy get some team uniforms together... a unifying shirt or something so you look like a team. It will make things easier for the spectators who don't understand the chaos. And tell your friends and family to come watch... it should be a lot of fun. We will also do some side games and activities to get the spectators involved and keep things fun and not too serious. Have fun!!!

Bicycle Film Festival and Bike Polo

I hope you all have been paying attention to the Bicycle Film Festival website to see what was going on next week! There is some crazy cool stuff happening, an art show, concerts, afterparties, and of course tons of bike films... including 3 about bike polo, that's right 3 about bike polo.

The first one is on Friday and it's called "Paris Vision," bike polo in Paris. I probably won't be able to make that one because of work, but some of y'all better go and tell me about it, or I'll be very upset.

The second one is on Saturday, entitled "One Less Horse," horse polo vs. bike polo, sounds awesome, that's going to be on Saturday night and we might try to organize a group ride and watch.

The third is also on Saturday night and it's called "Polo Manual," better believe I'll be at that one...

Oh yeah and if you can't make it Saturday, these last two will also be showing on Sunday night after our Bike Polo Tournament, which may be easier for us all to catch. What better way to end a tournament than with some polo shorts, film shorts that is...

OH and if you haven't looked at ticket prices, then let me tell you what they are, unbelievable!!! A festival pass is only 27$, that will get you into all the screenings, but not the Wednesday concert, that'll cost you 15$. Or you could be a goober and pay 10$ for each individual program, which has several films in each. Friday has 2 programs, Saturday has 4 programs, and Sunday is a repeat of 2 programs... that would be 80$ if you didn't have a Festival pass... hmmm.... I say shell out 27$ and see it all, if you can of course.

Thursday Polo

Sunday was so much fun at METZ PARK that we've decided to meet there again this Thursday, and chances are we will meet there until the Austin BFF Bike Polo Tournament is over, which if you haven't been paying attention will be on August 8 and 9th.

Word is that our buddy Keith is bringing the Thursday night social ride out to Metz this week, so we will have an extra large crowd, hopefully playing with us and of course watching. So bring your A game, I know Keith is!

Unfortunately to some, and fortunate to me, I start work again this week, so I won't be able to make the Thursday session or any more for that matter, but that doesn't mean it won't happen, just means it probably won't happen on time, ha! So expect someone to be there no later than 6. Have fun and be safe!

Thursday and Sunday the 16 and 19 Polo

Dan, Chris, and Miguel
representing Austin in Denver this weekend
for the Rocky Mountain Bike Polo Open
Jordan and myself are going to support, so dont expect to see us this week at polo,
Have fun and be safe!

edit: polo will go on as usual, someone will come by and get the stuff, and if not then YOU can come by and get it...

METZ PARK

So, our buddy Keith scouted out a good spot for our Tourny, which is getting closer. Metz park is located on Pedernales and Canterbury sts. on the Eastside. Go have a look if you're in the area... I did. This is what I saw:


Comment and let me know what you think. Keith pointed out there are no Light poles for me to run into... but there are a bunch of other poles... and a tree... could be fun. We would have to build some boards to go around the edges for the tourny but that wouldn't be too difficult... I hope.

ATL this weekend!!!

Just in case you forgot about this tourny, Jordan, Dan, and Myself are taking the trip to represent ATX in ATL. It's going to be a long 15 hour drive, but in the end it should be worth it all. Some of our pals from NOLA, Baton Rouge, and P-cola will be there, so we will at least know some of the faces.

Polo this Sunday may be like last Sunday, unless you guys take it upon yourselves to do it, don't be lazy! It might be a good time to scout some mallet materials, or just have a social club outing.

All I know is I'm stoked!

Is it too early...

Is it too early to mention this...?

BFF POLO TOURNY

This is what I've got so far, more info to come!
bikepolo.ca

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The Bicycle Film Festival will be here August 5-9, which is a Wednesday - Sunday!! That's 3 more days than last year... I didn't go last year, but this year I will try for sure.

There is a lot going on in those 5 days, and with all that, we are excited to announce that we are going to host a bike polo tournament with the help of the BFF!!! It's official, expect to hear a lot more about this in the next coming weeks. Some of us met with Jeanette from the BFF crew and she has a lot of good things going already and we had some ideas of our own to make it a really awesome event. We want as many teams from Austin as we can get and hopefully we can attract some players and teams from other cities to join us.

I'm really excited about this and I know some of the other ATXBPSC are as well! If you want to be a part of it, let me know and start thinking of who you want to play with in the tourny, so you can start practicing together as a team, if you want!



Also as a side note: if you want a mallet of your own to practice with on the days we don't play, let one of us know and we will try to find some mallet material to help you out, or find some yourself and we can show you how we made our mallets or you can go here or here and find out yourself, I'm all about self-sufficiency... also Jimmi said he might be able to help get some ski poles soon, talk to him!