USPA Sun Cup Begins Thursday; Polo School League Makes Debut Saturday at Grand Champions Polo Club |
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By Arianna Delin, Sharon Robb for Grand Champions Polo Club A record eight teams will compete in the USPA Sun Cup that gets under Thursday at Grand Champions Polo Club. Several new faces, including Team USPA member Felipe Viana, Bautista Heguy, Martin Estrada and Guille Aguero will join a Who’s Who roster of players for the third tournament of the spring season. Action begins Thursday with Power Horse playing Audi at 11 a.m. FlexJet, Palm Beach Equine and Pony Express will play a round robin at 4 p.m. followed by the second game of the day between Travieso against Aspen Valley Polo Club at 6 p.m. Travieso is coming off its’ first 16-goal tournament victory in last weekend’s USPA Spring Challenge. On Friday, a full day of polo is scheduled with four games. The losers of the round robin play at 10 a.m. followed by Dutta Corp against the round robin winner at 3 p.m., the Games 1 and 2 losers at 4:30 p.m. and winners of Game 1 and 2 at 6 p.m. After a rest day, the championship final is Sunday.
The team rosters are: Aspen Valley Polo Club (14), Grant Ganzi, 1, Juancito Bollini, 2, Nic Roldan, 8, Wes Finlayson, 3. Audi (13), Marc Ganzi, 1, Leo Mandelbaum, 3, Felipe Viana, 4, Lucas Lalor, 5. Dutta Corp (14), Timmy Dutta, 1, Guille Aguero, 6, Piki Diaz Alberdi, 7, Gene Goldstein, 1. FlexJet (12) Melissa Ganzi, 0, Hector Guerrero, 5, Juan Bollini, 5, Nacho Lezica, 2. Palm Beach Equine (15), Scott Swerdlin, 0, Facundo Obregon, 6, Brandon Phillips 5, Martin Estrada, 4. Pony Express (14), Bob Daniels, 0, Justin Daniels, 0, Bautista Heguy, 8, Tomas Goti, 6. Power Horse (13), Walter Scherb, 1, Roberto Gonzalez, 5, Lucas Diaz Alberdi, 4, Carlitos Gracida, 4. Travieso (15), Teo Calle, 0, Tony Calle, 2, Julio Arellano, 8, Carlucho Arellano, 5. On Saturday, The Polo School League will make its debut with a round robin at 10 a.m. Up-and-coming junior players will compete with a pro, following the ProKidz format that Grand Champions President Melissa Ganzi developed last year, along with a special celebrity this weekend. Three teams will compete.
Pony Express features Daniels brothers, Justin, Benji and Landon playing with polo great Bautista Heguy of one of Argentina’s great polo families. Grand Champions lineup is Juanse Olivera, Riley Ganzi, Santos Bollini and pro Lucas Lalor, one of the sport’s rising stars. The Polo School will have Will Jacobs, British up-and-coming player Tom Coid, former 8-goaler Juan Bollini and celebrity Sean Yazbeck, the winner of the fifth season (2006) of Donald Trump’s reality show, The Apprentice. A year later he returned as a boardroom judge on The Apprentice. The Brit was the first non-American to be selected to appear on The Apprentice. Yazbeck was the recipient of the 2014 British Entrepreneur of the Year Award from the British Government. Yazbeck lives in Miami Beach and plays polo at Grand Champions. The USPA Sun Cup is the third of eight medium-goal tournaments that are scheduled, including the May 24-25 U.S. Polo Association’s National Youth Tournament Series (NYTS), one of several qualifying tournaments held around the country to determine 16 all-stars and four alternates to represent four zones to compete in the national championship. The first two tournament champions were Psycho Bunny (Piki Diaz Alberdi, Brandon Phillips, Andrew Seibert, Kris Kampsen) with its third consecutive Grand Champions Cup title and Travieso (Tony Calle, Carlucho Arellano, Julio Arellano, Teo Calle) winning the USPA Spring Challenge. Other tournaments are: May 7-10, USPA Eastern Challenge, May 14-17, Polo Gear Challenge Cup, May 21-25, The Memorial, May 24-25 USPA NYTS and May 28-31, Santa Rita Memorial. One of the biggest highlights of the spring season is the use of state-of-the-art technology featuring live streaming, instant replay, challenges and team review from Chukker.TV. In January, 2014, Grand Champions Polo Club became the first polo club worldwide to offer instant replay and team review much to the delight of players and patrons in hopes of improving officiating and quality of play at all levels of polo. Chukker.TV is providing unduplicated state-of-the-art technology to provide instant replay. In addition, the technical staff has live-streamed games that have been viewed around the world on its website. Chukker.TV also partnered with Roku, Inc. to bring polo to fans live in the comfort of their homes at no cost. Chukker.TV has a channel on Roku. Grand Champions, with its five well-manicured fields and turnkey facility, expects to have its finest spring season in the history of the club which opened in 2008. Everyone is welcome to enjoy the games. Admission is free. Those interested in playing should contact Grand Champions polo manager Juan Olivera at 561-601-9316 or email juan.olivera@gcpolo.com 2015 POLO ON DEMAND Grand Champions Polo Club, featuring five world-class fields, has a full schedule of tournaments from January to May. Let our polo experts create a turn-key experience including top pros to bring out the best in you and your team. Lessons are available. 2015 SPRING SCHEDULE Thursday, USPA Sun Cup, Friday, USPA Sun Cup, Saturday, The Polo School League, Sunday, USPA Sun Cup; May 7-10, USPA Eastern Challenge; May 14-17, Polo Gear Challenge Cup; May 21-25, The Memorial; May 24-25, USPA NYTS; May 28-31, Santa Rita Memorial. |
