Your picture is ridiculous and huge.
Thank you for that. It makes me want to get a visor with an inch of visibility for polo.
_______
Marco!
I am the Duck.
Machine Politics vs Beaver Boys, May 2011. Photo by Bruce Carver
What will happen to the joust?
I read very briefly someone saying that the joust won't be around for ever. It was felt that the typical charge of polo was too dangerous and eventually we would find some more sophisticated way to start the game.
How do people feel about this? I love the joust. While occasionally dangerous if you do something dubious, it is usually pretty safe at this point and a fun way to start the game.
Thoughts? Any clubs starting the game in a different way?
October 26, 2009 - 8:37pm
#2
with pleasure!
October 26, 2009 - 8:36pm
#4
If people want to get rid of the joust, they're pussies and should go play some safe sport like circle rules football and what not.
October 27, 2009 - 1:33am
#5
HAHA! thanks a lot Mumford for putting us two steps back, circle rules football really?
November 3, 2009 - 5:26pm
#6
HAHA! thanks a lot Mumford for putting us two steps back, circle rules football really?
fuck off! not my fault polo got cut from good morning america
October 26, 2009 - 10:09pm
#7
cory youre drunk!
October 26, 2009 - 11:21pm
#9
Well seeing as the joust has been in bike polo since the beginning (yeah I mean the Irish grass version for the 19th century) I don't see it going anywhere in hardcourt. What club is actually going to stop jousting? We're not, you guys aren't, so where is this opposition to awesomeness coming from?
OGT-COMOPOLO
October 27, 2009 - 12:15am
#10
Talk to Capt. Jake about jousting.
BOOM!
October 27, 2009 - 1:54am
#11
I've had collisions at the joust before (no broken bones, thankfully), but I've also had collisions with the goal, the boards, the ground. Should we rid all of these things from the game? Floating around in some sort of fluffly cloud substance as far away from danger as possible? In all seriousness, though, riding like madmen, one handed, swinging around mallets is not necessarily the safest thing. Everyone that plays knows this going in.
OGT-COMOPOLO
October 27, 2009 - 8:20am
#12
biking will no longer be allowed since it is too dangerous.
PETE_of_C0M0P0L0
www.comopolo.com
October 27, 2009 - 2:05am
#13
if your still ham handedly sprinting full bore at the ball with no plan but to hit it as hard as you can at the start and don't want to get better than ride way faster out of the saddle, cut your bars shorter, and don't ever use a brake. You're gonna figure it out soon, if you win the sprint then use it to open a play, if not, attack on D. Mistakes happen often after an overzealous joust.
October 27, 2009 - 3:10am
#14
OK...but you have no opposition to the joust being the official way to start a game, no? I agree with the original post in that it is relatively safe a large majority of the time (of course the more experienced the players, the safer I'd imagine). My point was mainly that accidents are going to happen in all stages of play in polo, and that I don't understand pigeon holing the joust as more dangerous than any other part of the game.
OGT-COMOPOLO
October 27, 2009 - 5:35am
#15
For Hell's sakes lads, life is a wee bit dangerous now and again. I vote to keep polo gnarly. We shall joust til' the end of time. caw rah caw caw
October 27, 2009 - 7:30am
#16
The joust is totally the best way to start the game! When else do we get the excuse to yell all kinds of awesome stuff at each other during the game?
But seriously, it's true about experienced players not having issues with the joust. This week we played mostly newbie games, and I had some of the most terrifying jousts of my life over the course of four hours or so. I think my favorite was a game where the two jousters got scared of each other and both left the ball behind for me to scoop up. The worst is definitely left-handed on right-handed jousts. It just doesn't work as well when the bikes go to the same side of the ball.
(I've missed you guys.)
October 27, 2009 - 7:33am
#17
I think it's long been understood, no left vs right jousts.
October 27, 2009 - 7:35am
#18
Maybe that's just Krista and I, then. Because it's not a game of polo until we've crashed into each other somehow.
October 27, 2009 - 7:37am
#19
There's another thread about this
October 27, 2009 - 11:49am
#20
SF has a lefty who almost always jousts. I've learned to aim directly at him, and focus more on the impending collision than the ball. Oddly enough since taking that strategy we have _not_ collided on the joust. It becomes more of an odd tangle/cutoff/chicken situation in a fun way.
October 27, 2009 - 11:55am
#21
I'm pretty sure that's what happens with a majority of the lefties on our court- I'm just not used to taking the joust at all, since I'm never the strongest player on my team. I like these newby games, they point out my weaknesses quite nicely.
March 2, 2010 - 5:23am
#22
I've seen lefties cross their arm over the their right side to joust. Kind of silly, but it's safer, and it's been the rule for left-handed jousters at some tournaments I've been to.
November 3, 2009 - 3:38pm
#24
who's going to remove the stand after the joust? Why not just say that you can only shuffle on the joust? People will still strike the ball even if it's on a stand. You really should just keep a person in goal on the joust until one team has possession.
March 2, 2010 - 5:41am
#26
In Geneva, until few months, players began on the middle of the court and the sprinter jouster need to pass behind his goal to go take the ball after. It makes the Joust a lil' bit safer, cause like this there's more chances to have a bigger distance between the two joust-players. It was also good for the other players who can easily take goal and every position they want more slower than in a frontal joust way.
But after "l'équipe" won some tournament and goes back to geneva with new way of plays, we forgott this centerjoust way of play. In big court this is realy more expensive in energy, and if the jousters arrives in the same time at the ball, they have much more speed than for frontal joust, so maybe more risky.
But try it sometimes is good i think, lot of fun when fixie riders fall down in the first turn behind thier goal, after 4 seconds of play.
March 4, 2010 - 2:33pm
#27
when we do 2 on 2 we do an intial joust to gain possession, then we play like half court bball rules, with the team that let the goal in taking possessiona dn bringing it half court. that is just because it keeps the game moving faster. i would never want to play this way with full teams thats for sure.
more rules makes a shittier game.
March 4, 2010 - 3:48pm
#28
What? Can you rephrase your post? I'm not sure what you mean.
Bringing it half court?
March 6, 2010 - 9:08pm
#29
sorry, i thought when i said bball rules it explained better, but i guess not. my bad.
if team a scores, then team b takes possession of the ball behind the goal and brings it to half court before team a can attempt to gain control of the ball, when the ball crosses half court normal play then continues.
it keeps play faster pace, and setting up the joust each time just takes too much time, especially when we're not really keeping score and just playing around.
March 7, 2010 - 1:09am
#30
um, that's how the game is played. there is only 1 joust in the beginning of the match and after each goal, the team scored on takes the ball out. the only time there would be more than one joust in a match is in a tournament if ties aren't permitted, the ball would be reset, a 2nd joust would happen, and the first team to score wins.
this thread is dumb because the joust isn't going anywhere. it is the beginning of a match in every single tournament.
March 7, 2010 - 11:08pm
#31
and this is key: overtime should be called as time winds down, and the ball should be reset for another joust. letting the game just keep going leads to millions of arguments about what just happened. a second joust allows people to know what the deal is and eliminates disputes. it even lets the fans know what is going on.
March 7, 2010 - 9:38pm
#32
hrm. we play a joust every time there is a goal. i guess thinking back to when i first started there was only one... rochester has some pretty lax rules that i had to re-adjust to when i started playing here.
March 8, 2010 - 12:10am
#33
Wow. Talk about slowing the pace of the game! All those of you who think nets slow down the game try playing in Rochester where they restart after EVERY goal.
As a side note (or, more to the point I guess), we had a little local tourney here this weekend and we began with a hockey "face off" start. It was neato.
March 9, 2010 - 12:55pm
#37
Mason has been doing hockey starts a few times a Sunday for a long long time in Portland, its fun but not all the time.
March 12, 2010 - 1:44pm
#38
oops.
Who's new
- mixtieme - portland oregon
- polophil - Hamburg
- axlissel - lima, Peru, Miami FL
- Deguerrilla - Landover MD
- AndrewMBP - Miami
- thecatman - fresno, ca
- kona29ermtb - eugene or
- Jamie Edwards - Sydney
- malletheadz - Florida
- KCJ - Jacksonville FL
Recently added polo bikes
mandatory helmets for the team charger/foreward. problem solved. the joust is too fun and is probably one of the most exciting parts of the game. sure it's sometimes dangerous, but so is riding a bike in general. at first in baltimore we did a hockey style face off. but the joust replaced it because it's more fun and kicks ass.
keep the joust alive!