Imperia Tourney 2

Spring Break were in Konstanz last weekend for Imperia Tourney 2 (Dave subbed in for Ryan). We arrived on Thursday and chilled out with our host (the legendary Katie) for the evening before playing some friendly matches and throw-ins with Bambule on Friday.

Friday night was the first evening out which set the pace for the trip (Adam was out until the wee hours every night)! Despite this there was some quality polo being played all weekend and it was great to get to spend some time hanging around with the European polo community (both old players and new).

Saturday meant group stages and we managed all wins except against L’Equipe (2-0), the evening group seemed a little tougher than ours and everyone was keen to see how well the Paris Blue Socks (Hugo, Greg and Woods) and Eddisons (Eddie, Mo and Will) gelled together. There were also some impressive new players from Leipzig, Hamburg (Robert especially) and Grenoble (mini Wills), definitely ones to watch.

Our first game on Sunday was a bike killer with my fork shearing off beneath the crown, oh dear. Still it was another fun day and Dave and Adam really held things down (I was on Erin’s bike and held the back) until the afternoon when we were up against L’Equipe again (5-0 loss). After a quick 5 minute break we had to take on Tough Shit (playing with Andy instead of Jamie) and they were first to score with us chasing the goal difference all the way to the final whistle. Tough Shit went on to fight valiantly against Paris Blue Socks but lost by a slim margin. Eddisons beat Blue Socks to take on L’Equipe and had an impressive first game before losing beer point in a tense second game (it could have gone either way).

Some other worthwhile mentions would be for Bambule for their awesome (quick) passing plays on the break and Iron Ponies who seem to have a sixth sense when it comes to player positioning. It was disappointing to see so many teams employing a strictly defensive strategy (3 goalies?) as well as so many blocking plays (knife fights?) but the final games still seemed to rely on quick, accurate passing which was a slight relief (although the blocking plays and defensive strategies still held up well all weekend).

Thanks for putting on such an awesome event Konstanz, we had an eventful few days with you and wouldn’t change any of it! See you next year…

Some videos are below, the first is a sort of compilation/stalking Adam kind of thing, the second is the two finals in their entirety (brought to you by Karlsruhe Bike Polo, although we missed the last goal of the second game and the resulting French fireworks, oops):