Golf bag is 'oversized baggage' on most airlines. You will be charged a fee to fly it. So is a bike box, of course, but you can get a lot of mallets into one of those.
Chicago Bike Polo 2003-2008
St Louis Bike Polo 2008-now
A thread about polo travel, and a question to start it off.
This thread is intended as a home for discussion of polo travel - any and all. I'm kicking it off with a question about traveling with mallets on an airline: has anyone done this? Some of us have shipped our bikes to Madison, but I still need to get mallets there, and I'm thinking they won't be allowed as carry-on, and I'm worried that if I check them they will get bent or broken. Anyone have any experience with this? Any ideas?
pretend its your walking cane
i just had to fly back with mallets that i made with montana and i just found a big screen tv box and cut it down to less than a foot high and then taped the box together and it worked fine got charged $15 for a checked baggage cause "the airlines are "passing" on the discount to those that dont check baggage anymore" or some bullshit. but i would have had to check my bag anyways cause of my ny noose lock.
pre-9/11 i used to fly with lacrosse sticks semi-regularly. they'd just let me walk on with them. you can always ask, they might give you a bag and make you check it.
My girlfriend brought my mallet to me in paris from wisconsin. She put a clear garbage bag around it and secured it with painters tape. The airline excepted it to be checked. She declared it as sporting equipment.
Why not ship them in the same box as your bike?
{}------- lexington -------{}
I said it above, but i already shipped the bike. gotta carry a couple mallets on.
seperate the parts
put them in a cardboard box, check it. they'll be fine.
Cut your mallets in half and carry them on in a small bag
then have montaner weld them back in MAD
I heard he does it to bikes...
Doug D
Brooklyn, New York
http://www.hardcourtbikepolo.com/
I'm getting visions of a screw together polo mallet, in a small velvet lined case, like the ones professional pool players use...
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urbanbicyclist.org
nathan in MKE built a mallet out of a retractable hiking pole (basically a telescoping ski pole) it's really heavy but would make a great travel mallet
-hero squad * milwaukee, wi-
Question #2
Airline Sponsorship
I hear Paris has this in the works? We have a friend who works for Midwest Airlines and could probably sometimes get a few employee stand by tickets but that is kind of obnoxious. They are cheap(like under $100), but its stand by and your bike may make it to the destination before/after you.
-sidenote story: my bike beat me back to mke from NYC when i went to the BFF in 2007 so i had to get it from the luggage desk place. I walk in and ask if there is a bike there and she pulls it out from behind the desk for me and
She says "do you play bike polo?"
me:what the hell i dont know you..."umm yeha i do howd you know?"
girl: "I saw you playing at a tournament in chicago."
me:"ohh cool yeah i play thanks for watching my bike"
Weirdest moment in bike polo ever. i was recognized at an airport for playing bike polo in another city.WEIRD. I didnt catch her name or why she was at the tourny
ANYWAY- if anyone has any ideas on how to go about this or has any info they have found out let me know. Lucky's Advert. guy gave me some suggestions that were good I just want to see if anyone has experinec asking a big corporate airline for a sponsorship or somehtign similar
--Midwest (im assuming others too) offer group rates so maybe if we all book for the same day or something we can get that . Anyway im looking into it if anyone wants to help or suggest
www.mkebikepolo.com
Traveling within Canada on Porter Airlines the mallets got checked as sports equipment in clear plastic; no problem, in fact, so did the bikes - all that was done was deflate the tires (which is silly, but hey, they fly 'em for free). That said; they thought at least 1/3 of us were on crack (http://bikepolo.ca/comment/reply/640/6107) or if I recall the comment correctly - should be.
Porter really treated us well.
they deflate the tires because the cargo hold on airliners aren't pressurized. so if you didn;t deflate your tires they would explode.
-hero squad * milwaukee, wi-
"all that was done was deflate the tires" ? Didn't you also have to put them into boxes?
-max
Nope - on the way back they wanted one (with wheel covers) wrapped in a plastic bag - which they supplied.
The web site asked that the 'pedals be removed and handlebars turned in' but in reality we didn't have to.
warning: this is only really relevant for Toronto, or those who want to visit Toronto via Chicago/NYC, or fly between select Canadian cities.
Big +1 on Porter Airlines. Biked to the Toronto Island airport (right beside the CMWC polo courts, for those who were there). They offered me a big plastic bag for my bike "so that it wouldn't get scratched" which i accepted on my outbound flight, but declined on the return as a waste of plastic (for a polo bike, anyway). I left my polo mallets tied to it. At Newark i had to wait about 5 minutes for the bike to come out to the baggage claim area, but on the return flight it was already waiting for me after passing through customs. From airplane seat to home, including customs, in 20 minutes. Not to mention the free coffee/snacks in the first-class style lounge and the free booze and food on board.
Hopefully these perks will last. Porter has a great niche carved out for itself, since it flies only turboprop planes out of an airport that is turboprop-only to cut down on noise. I can imagine that they will eventually either hike prices or cut down on the perks, hopefully they'll keep allowing unboxed bikes for free. Most of their customers are commuters and business types so i don't think that cargo will ever be a big issue for them.
Isn't the cargo hold where they put caged animals like dogs? What happens to them, Joe?
they also explode if not deflated
-hero squad * milwaukee, wi-
i keep hearing this but I've flown with my tires at max pressure at least a dozen times, still no flats... I think it's a myth fed to us by bike-hatters.
yeah, james flew to toronto with his tyres fully inflated. i think you may be right...
TOP CENTER 4-EVA
could be, i was told this to be the reason. whenever i shipped bikes for the shop i worked at i deflated the tires.
-hero squad * milwaukee, wi-
yeah i was told this too but i'm hearing more and more from people who don't deflate and who haven't encountered problems.
TOP CENTER 4-EVA
we had problems flying with inflated tires!
we had problems flying with inflated tires!
What were they? I've taken well over 50 flights with inflated tires and never had a problem.
KC->NYC fully inflated 700X23 both popped after getting on the bikes
After getting on the bikes? They weren't flat when you got them off the plane? The pressure change in the cargo bay is minimal unless you already had your tires maxed (ie over the pressure rating already) there should not have been an issue. Dogs ride in the cargo bay. I don't think I've heard of any of them deflating.
Is it possible the baggage guys deflated them? That happens as well.
This site details various airlines' fees for checking a bike: http://www.ibike.org/encouragement/travel/bagregs.htm .
Never deflated my tires, and I fly with my bike almost every month. Never had a problem. Took my mallet with me most times too, tied to the top tube so no risk of damage. I leave my plastic wheel covers on too to reduce the risk of bent spokes during transport.
Yorgo
LONDON: http://bricklanebikepolo.wordpress.com/
PARIS: http://panambikepolo.blogspot.com/
hockey goalie bag, purchased used for $49 CDN at Goalie Heaven in Toronto. there was no choice of team logo :/
Also good for traveling on high speed trains in europe, most of which ask you to have a "housse".
is the bike in the goalie bag under the airlines' measurements for over-sized bags? in other words, with that particular setup, did you (would you) have to pay an over-sized luggage fee?
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carve. smash. eat shit.
Kev, given the choice, would you've chosen the Leafs?
huh i dunno. maybe the CHIEFS... choosing the leafs seems like choosing bad luck.
hey Kev,
so without any padding the bike/wheels don't suffer? wont it get kinda squashed on an airplane?
so I guess this method evades the oversize restrictions that most airlines have, I think each
length must be under 60inches.
I just travelled Paris-Zurich-NYC-Chicago (Swiss air) and checked a polo mallet with no bag or anything, just slapped
the baggage sticker right on there and it then had a personal attendant take it to the plane.
somehow it got lost at zurich but that was coz the connection was super tight.
I filled in a lost polo mallet form at JFK and it was fedex-ed to me in chicago pronto!
i didn't measure it, but neither did the people at the US Airways check-in counter.
wheels were fine, tho i recommend padding the wheel's axles/nuts with cardboard so they don't poke through. or just remove the skewers if its quick release.
as for getting squashed, i think that boxes are a lot more tempting to stack on top of than an oddly shaped bag.
yep, i agree. if your wheels aren't strong enough to fly in an airplane they probably won't hold up on the court. big fat tires help protect rims too.
usually the restrictions are 62 linear inches (width + height) of the bag, and 50 pounds.
bikes fly free in canada now on westjet and air canada. used to be $40. all "hockey equipment" flies for free as well, plus you get two free pieces.
i use the plastic spacers at the forks and the rear axle to keep them from being catastrophically bent.
i went with bags because they are so much easier to deal with after you land, and they tend to not to pile a bunch of stuff on them. i used to wrap the bike in plastic but now hockey goalie bags seem to be a great off-the-shelf solution.
i've flown about 45,000 km now with the bike and i've never had a problem, excepting the bullshit US$175 for the bike one time on united last year rolling to chicago.
fuck united.
yeah that's like the theory of the surfer who never packed his board. Just checked his boards bare and all fragile-looking
Yorgo
LONDON: http://bricklanebikepolo.wordpress.com/
PARIS: http://panambikepolo.blogspot.com/
I've flown with mallets. Airline wrapped them in plastic, taped them and put both a priority and fragile sticker(!) on them for me. I put them in the belly as checked baggage. I only had one other bag with me, so there was no extra luggage charge.
so what airlines would you recommend trying to wrap up a bike and get it through?
Airtran. $15 charge which is the typical checked baggage fee. I also carryon my mallet, but took the head off.
for a mallet, remove the head, paint it red and white, and wear dark sunglasses?
wow! and it only took you 59 seconds, how many cups of coffee did you drink to move that fast? it usually takes me about five or six minutes to put together my bike. mad props!
Pieter Blokker gearing up for polo at Coachella
that is fucking hilarious. i don't even remember going to coachella!
I can assemble my bike faster than I can put on flip flops too....but gimme a break, how much flip flop weather do you guys think we get in Canada?
are the hockey bags most people have 40 or 42?
I heard that Pieter got mallets allowed as carry-on baggage by declaring them Object d'Art. Sounds far fetched, but I wouldn't put it past him. Peter Dalkner and I packed our mallets in with our bikes when we shipped them to Vegas, but it sounds like it's too late for that. If there's enough jerks who forgot to stick their mallets in with their bikes, maybe you could buy a thrift store golf bag and send them all together?