Wins for Hedonism Wines & Print on Demand in the HPA National Club Championships at RCPC
By Victoria Elsbury-Legg
This weekend at the Royal County of Berkshire Polo Club spectators gathered in the stands to watch the finals of the HPA New Year National Club Championships. In the 10-12 final, with Hedonism Wines going head to head against Black Eagles in what proved to be a very high scoring match, playing alongside Max Charlton and Roy Prisk was Terence Lent, a sixteen year old from Sussex Polo Club who was subbing for patron Yevgeny Chichvarkin. With a final scoreboard reading of Hedonism Wines 22 – 20 Black Eagles, a total of thirteen lucky goals were put on the board for his side by Max Charlton, with an additional four from Roy Prisk and five from Terence Lent.
It was far from an easy game for Hedonism Wines, as playing alongside Black Eagles patron Jonathon Munro Ford was Chris Hyde and two goaler Phil Sellar. In the final chukka it looked as though the match might have to be decided by an extra chukka as despite a 17-15 lead for Black Eagles at the opening of the chukka, Hedonism Wines fought back strongly to finally win the game 22 – 12. MVP went to Terence Lent and Best Playing Pony of the match was Max Charlton’s bay mare Gemma, who was lead up by groom Ella Weedon.
Subsidiary 10-12 HPA National Championship winners were Four Quarters.
In the 1-3 goal final it was an all-female, home side ‘Cool Riders’ team of Saskia & Genevieve Meadows and Nell Jacobs who took to the arena the favourites at the start of the game, but in the opening chukkas they faced touch opposition from Print on Demand (Ollie &Marcus Cork and Stuart Beetles) who stretched their lead to 9-1 by half time. Despite coming back strong and scoring ten goalers in the second half, it was not enough to put the Cool Riders in the lead, and the match was won by Print on Demand 18-11. The Best Playing Pony rug went to Stuart Beetles pony Plato, with Stuart winning MVP.
In the 1-3 goal subsidiary final Red Kites beat Gaucho 15-13.