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Episode 122 - The Sport So Exclusive It Made Its Own Rules · Sorta Sophisticated

• 0:01
  Speaker A: Welcome to Sorta Sophisticated with Pete and Amanda. So what'd you do last weekend?
• 0:07
  Speaker B: What did I do last weekend?
• 0:09
  Speaker A: This weekend. Last weekend? Yeah, just last weekend.
• 0:11
  Speaker B: I could.
• 0:12
  Speaker A: It wasn't even that long ago.
• 0:13
  Speaker B: I got a puppy, so everything is a blur.
• 0:15
  Speaker A: Oh, my God, how exciting. That's right.
• 0:16
  Speaker B: I know. You told me it was a good idea.
• 0:18
  Speaker A: Give me the name. I forgot.
• 0:19
  Speaker B: I regret. Finnegan.
• 0:21
  Speaker A: Finnegan. Finny.
• 0:22
  Speaker B: Yep. Finnegan.
• 0:23
  Speaker A: Finney's in orange. It's a good place to eat.
• 0:25
  Speaker B: Oh, it is a good one.
• 0:26
  Speaker A: Yeah. Okay. Peter, what did you do last weekend? Oh, Amanda, thank you for asking. I really appreciate that. Yeah. Wedding, Santa Barbara.
• 0:34
  Speaker B: How was that?
• 0:35
  Speaker A: It was glorious. Drive was brutal. Three hours up, three hours down. Yes. But that's beautiful wedding, beautiful bride. Pretty good looking groom too, not gonna lie. So of course I'm up there. And this is what happens when I go. You ever been to the Santa Barbara Polo Grounds?
• 0:51
  Speaker B: Yes.
• 0:53
  Speaker A: You've heard. You've heard.
• 0:55
  Speaker B: You feel it in your chest.
• 0:56
  Speaker A: You feel the right. Okay, this. Boom. So I'm up there and that's what happens. And I'm like, oh, my God. I'm there with Luke and Paul and I'm like, we gotta go check this shit out. Like, let's see what's going on. It is. It's a spectacle. I mean, we didn't go in and everything, but we got close enough to be able to like, see what was going. Cause they were running, they had a match or whatever.
• 1:14
  Speaker B: Yes.
• 1:14
  Speaker A: First of all, remarkable. Like you said, literally feel it in your bones. And then, of course, naturally it turns to all things podcast and I go, I don't know shit. Anything about polo. Because my sons are asking me, what about this, dad? What about that? I'm like, I don't know shit. Zero. Zilcha. Okay, so this is gonna be. We're doing it on polo. This is gonna be one of those episodes where we're learning together. Because I don't know anything.
• 1:33
  Speaker B: I'm here for it.
• 1:34
  Speaker A: So I go start. I don't know shit.
• 1:36
  Speaker B: I know they ride on horses.
• 1:37
  Speaker A: I know Ralph Lauren.
• 1:38
  Speaker B: Oh, there you go.
• 1:39
  Speaker A: That's what I know. Yeah. The ball, right there's a mallet.
• 1:42
  Speaker B: Mallet.
• 1:42
  Speaker A: It's swinging others heads. That's all they do. What was I gonna say? Oh. So I start looking it up and I think this was divine intervention. It is the 150th anniversary of polo in the United States. Yes. Right now. Yes.
• 1:55
  Speaker B: That's very serendipitous.
• 1:57
  Speaker A: No, I could. I was like, because you know how I try to connect. Anniversary. I know.
• 2:00
  Speaker B: It just happens.
• 2:01
  Speaker A: And I'm like, seriously, 150 years.
• 2:03
  Speaker B: I feel like you're lying to me.
• 2:04
  Speaker A: I'm not.
• 2:04
  Speaker B: Okay.
• 2:05
  Speaker A: No.
• 2:05
  Speaker B: That's amazing.
• 2:06
  Speaker A: This is not me.
• 2:07
  Speaker B: It was meant to be.
• 2:09
  Speaker A: So anyway, it was a total gold mine. This is what we're doing. So here's the official title of the episode. The sport's so exclusive, it made its own rules.
• 2:16
  Speaker B: Really?
• 2:16
  Speaker A: It's a little.
• 2:17
  Speaker B: Little snooty.
• 2:18
  Speaker A: It's a little snooty. I'm not going to lie. Okay, here's our promise. Today we're going to learn why polo is called the sport of kings, where it actually comes from. Okay. Spoiler. It started as cavalry training 2,000 years ago. Second, we'll explain how you actually play the sport. So you know what's going on, because I was totally lost until somebody explained it to me. And why some players, they burn through horses. They don't use one horse per mat. I'm going to explain this. Yes. And finally, we're going to talk about why some sports get coded as Rich Richie sports. Right. And others, cost of entry. Yeah. Well, that's one of them. Yeah. There's a whole psychology behind.
• 2:48
  Speaker B: There is.
• 2:49
  Speaker A: Oh, yeah.
• 2:49
  Speaker B: Oh, okay.
• 2:50
  Speaker A: So this is big. This is big. The sort of sophisticated, the podcast where culture, curiosity, and chaos collide. I'm Pete. That's Amanda. Hi, Amanda.
• 2:57
  Speaker B: Hello. I'm very excited for this.
• 2:59
  Speaker A: Are you?
• 2:59
  Speaker B: Yeah. I actually don't know much about polo.
• 3:02
  Speaker A: Don't know much about.
• 3:03
  Speaker B: I mean, I've been to the Santa Barbara one, and I've also been to the one in Indian Wells.
• 3:07
  Speaker A: Hasn't there one in Del Mar? I want to say. Maybe I want to say there is.
• 3:10
  Speaker B: I didn't go south, but yeah.
• 3:11
  Speaker A: I think it's across the street from the racetrack.
• 3:12
  Speaker B: But then you always hear about it, especially because of the Royals. Right?
• 3:16
  Speaker A: Yeah. Let's go. The Royals. So the season's also coming to a close. I didn't realize. Yeah. So we're right at the tail end. So we're at the end of the 150th anniversary of this whole thing.
• 3:24
  Speaker B: But anyway, still counts.
• 3:25
  Speaker A: All things.
• 3:26
  Speaker B: Check.
• 3:27
  Speaker A: Yep.
• 3:27
  Speaker B: Okay. Do we have a word of the week?
• 3:28
  Speaker A: We do. It is Encomium.
• 3:32
  Speaker B: Encomium.
• 3:34
  Speaker A: Encomium. Yes, Encomium. I'm saying that.
• 3:36
  Speaker B: What would imperium mean?
• 3:37
  Speaker A: Imperium. I don't know what that fucking. Never heard of that. Imperium Imperial.
• 3:41
  Speaker B: No, like an Imperium. Like a. Nope.
• 3:43
  Speaker A: No idea. You got me on that. You're more sophisticated than I am. Imperium. No, encomium. It's a. It's a eulogy or a big speech.
• 3:52
  Speaker B: Oh, okay. I mean, imperium is supreme power, absolute authority or command. Okay, so the. Em.
• 3:57
  Speaker A: Close.
• 3:58
  Speaker B: Maybe.
• 3:58
  Speaker A: Em. Okay.
• 3:59
  Speaker B: I don't know. I was just trying to.
• 4:00
  Speaker A: This is. This is a formal, glowing tribute. A speech or a piece of writing praising someone or something usually considered pretty over the top.
• 4:08
  Speaker B: Okay.
• 4:09
  Speaker A: It comes from the Greek encomium, en meaning in, and komos, meaning celebration. In celebration. That's what it meant, like to praise a hero back in the day.
• 4:18
  Speaker B: Okay. Yeah.
• 4:18
  Speaker A: Yeah. So anyway.
• 4:19
  Speaker B: It's gonna be hard. How do you know? But maybe not, because. Let's say we're gonna go on the royalty, history side.
• 4:24
  Speaker A: This is easy.
• 4:25
  Speaker B: We gotta stick it in there in history.
• 4:26
  Speaker A: I was. I. This is easy. I was at the wedding, okay, last weekend. And the father of the bride wrote a encomium about his daughter.
• 4:34
  Speaker B: Right.
• 4:34
  Speaker A: That's it. Okay.
• 4:35
  Speaker B: Okay.
• 4:36
  Speaker A: No, no, no. I'm not saying that. That's. I'm giving you an example. That's how we're going to use it. Okay.
• 4:39
  Speaker B: I was really excited to be done with it, but here we are.
• 4:41
  Speaker A: No, we're not done yet. You have to put it in. Okay. That's what she said. All right. If you like what you're listening to, hit, subscribe and follow us. New episodes come out weekly. Are we still doing these things weekly?
• 4:50
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 4:51
  Speaker A: What if we did it more than weekly? What if we started doing them twice a week?
• 4:54
  Speaker B: I think you would go crazy.
• 4:55
  Speaker A: I think I probably would. Okay, whatever. Find them on your favorite podcast platforms or YouTube. We're on YouTube. It's fun. And we. We record and stuff. So take us up on YouTube. Please follow, subscribe all the things. All right. Okay. Polo starts off in the United States 150 years ago. Like I said, 1876. Officially this past July, in Newport, Rhode Island. Of all places, Westchester Polo Club. But really, it started way earlier than that. Like I said, over in Persia. Nowadays, like Iran, I think. Yeah. Like 2,000 years ago. Fun fact. You want to know who scored the first official goal in all of polo?
• 5:26
  Speaker B: Who?
• 5:26
  Speaker A: Jesus.
• 5:27
  Speaker B: What?
• 5:28
  Speaker A: Yeah, it was 2,000 years ago. It was Jesus. He was 33 years old. He gets out.
• 5:31
  Speaker B: You're so dumb. Yeah.
• 5:33
  Speaker A: He ties the robe up his. Okay. Sorry. Seriously. All we know is that it was founded or created about 2,000 years ago. Around.
• 5:41
  Speaker B: Ish.
• 5:41
  Speaker A: Around the same time as you, but somewhere in Persia. So it Wasn't a sport created for fun. It wasn't even a sport to begin with at all. It was actually for training. Horse training.
• 5:48
  Speaker B: Okay.
• 5:48
  Speaker A: Yes.
• 5:49
  Speaker B: Training for what, though?
• 5:50
  Speaker A: Cavalry training. They're horse for army. Yes, absolutely. So think about it. It's not like we had AI guided missiles back then or anything going on. So you need riders who literally could, I guess, control a horse with one hand while doing very violent acts with the other hand, like slicing off someone's head or bludgeoning. Right, Bludgeoning people, smashing skulls, doing some shit while, mind you, their horses going what, like 30 or 40 miles an hour? Sliding, fucking around. So polo became a drill, a practice drill of sorts.
• 6:18
  Speaker B: Okay.
• 6:19
  Speaker A: So Persian kings and their militaries, especially the generals and captains and all those kind of people, like the higher ups in the military, would play it because it kept the cavalry sharp, which, by the way, is the whole reason it's named Sport of the Kings. That was my spoiler at the beginning. It's not a cute nickname, invented. No, it was made up because actually kings and noblemen played it for actual war.
• 6:42
  Speaker B: And then when we say Calvary, though, is that inclusive of the humans and the horse humans or is it a calvary? Because it's.
• 6:48
  Speaker A: Calvary always has to include horse. Horse has to include horse. Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah, got it. I don't know the. I don't know the nuances of human versus horse. It has to. I'm assuming it's all come together. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So anyway, it just sort of went from kings and noblemen to sort of wealthy people or ruling class people. We'll get into why, but like, it sort of felt found its way there.
• 7:07
  Speaker B: And like, only the people that could afford have horses.
• 7:09
  Speaker A: And that's where we're going to. Yeah, that's part of where we're going to go. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 7:12
  Speaker B: Okay. So all the way from the beginning, it was already a rich people thing.
• 7:15
  Speaker A: All the way from day one. Yes, totally.
• 7:17
  Speaker B: Yes.
• 7:17
  Speaker A: They weren't fucking around, Amanda. Like, this was. This was serious shit.
• 7:20
  Speaker B: Right? But it was also army people.
• 7:21
  Speaker A: Yeah, but. But rich army people. Like, not rich. Not higher ups in the army. That's all I know.
• 7:25
  Speaker B: Okay, okay. So it's not like. I think it's just foot soldiers.
• 7:28
  Speaker A: No, like the foot soldiers. No, they were the front line. It was like, oh, they would not
• 7:31
  Speaker B: be a part of it.
• 7:32
  Speaker A: They were digging trenches. No, these were the smart guys. Okay. They weren't messing around. So it spreads from Persia to Central Asia into something called the Mughal or Mughal Courts of India. Sorry if I botched that. Then into Tibet, then into China during the Tang Dynasty. So a lot of different empires, a lot of different names, but same basic idea. Super smart, elite horsemen, small hardball mallets, the whole thing. Right? You get it. Okay. So everybody's playing, having a good time, practicing with their horses. All over the world and everything. Going to war, killing everybody. Everybody's happy. And it starts expanding little by little. Then fast forward to the 1800s.
• 8:05
  Speaker B: Does it expand because they're conquering?
• 8:07
  Speaker A: Yes. Guess who conquered.
• 8:08
  Speaker B: Well, of course. It's the Brits.
• 8:10
  Speaker A: It's the Brits. You got it. In the 1800s, the Brits, they show up one day in India. They're like, hey, what the hell's going on here? Specifically, this little northeastern region of India. If we want to get sophisticated, Manipur.
• 8:21
  Speaker B: Okay.
• 8:21
  Speaker A: I don't know. Okay. They saw the game being played there for the first time, and they were like, wait, what? We need this. Let's go. Instantly obsessed. Because they're Brits and that's the same thing they did with cricket.
• 8:31
  Speaker B: Oh, yeah, right.
• 8:32
  Speaker A: Yes, absolutely.
• 8:33
  Speaker B: Yeah, yeah.
• 8:33
  Speaker A: And the British military always wants to look the best, be the best at everything. So they stole it and they brought it back.
• 8:38
  Speaker B: Shocking.
• 8:39
  Speaker A: What are you going to do? Right? And then, of course, when Britain gets a hold of something, what do they do? They make it better. They really do. You can hate on them all you want to, but that's what they did with polo.
• 8:46
  Speaker B: Well, in all fairness, my word association. Polo, yes. Is royals. So I guess, yes.
• 8:52
  Speaker A: There you go. Right.
• 8:53
  Speaker B: I didn't even know it came from India.
• 8:54
  Speaker A: Fine. I won't even say better. I'll say, well, came from Persia through India. Yeah. I will say they organize. British people organize shit. Maybe it means that. I don't say make it better. They organize. Right? They wrote down all the rules. They standardized the sides of the field they play on, decided the size of mallet. You were allowed to use all the things. Because up till that point, everybody's just hammering away different size horses, different size mallets. It's all left up. Playing with all these different hands.
• 9:17
  Speaker B: You say, maybe they just. They used capitalism.
• 9:20
  Speaker A: I don't care.
• 9:21
  Speaker B: Because when you modernize it now, you have to buy a certain. Right. This. You have to. This. It can't just be the pickup game anymore.
• 9:25
  Speaker A: Okay, good on them. But if they made it where everybody could understand it and sort of officially turned it into a sport with a rule book, good on them. They branded it.
• 9:36
  Speaker B: They branded it. Okay.
• 9:37
  Speaker A: Yes. I'm Fine with that shit. Let's go. Okay. That's what they do. So.
• 9:42
  Speaker B: So when did it come to America? Obviously, it came to America over 50 years ago. That was a stupid question.
• 9:46
  Speaker A: 1976 shows up, New York. Some publisher named James Gordon Bennett, who apparently had quite a bit of fuck you money, if I may say so, sees a polo match being played now in England and decides, okay, America needs this shit. So it's just popping all over. So he jumps on a steamship home with a book of rules in his pocket, along with some mallets, some balls, whatever else you use to play polo, I don't even know yet. Gets to New York, calls a buddy in Texas and buys an entire rail car full of horses and gets them shipped to New York immediately.
• 10:15
  Speaker B: Wow.
• 10:15
  Speaker A: That's how rich he was. A rail car full of horses.
• 10:18
  Speaker B: So that's crazy, right? That's a lot.
• 10:20
  Speaker A: This is right place, right time shit. I mean, because this is just gonna go bonkers from here. It wasn't just this one guy. What? Bennett Junior's hobby, that made this work. So. 1876. I gotta get nerdy on you for a second. It was considered something called The Gilded Age. 1876. Okay. Time when, like, you had all these new American industrial fortunes. You remember the Vanderbilts, the Belmonts, the Astors. All of these massively wealthy families that were looking for ways to showcase, of course, how sophisticated and aristocratic.
• 10:48
  Speaker B: So it was a way to show off their wealth.
• 10:50
  Speaker A: So this right, right place, something that for the wealthy, polo fit the bill. That is it. It's expensive, it's foreign. Had pedigree. It was all right. It was British. Let's go. So they try a few matches in New York in the springtime. By summer, they go all in. They all go to their summer cottages because they all are rich, af'd in Newport, Rhode island, where they all live. And it goes nuts from there.
• 11:14
  Speaker B: Oh, interesting. But how did everybody learn how to play this thing?
• 11:18
  Speaker A: Rulebook, man.
• 11:19
  Speaker B: So the same rule book, same rulebook. They got all over.
• 11:21
  Speaker A: They had all that. That was it. He brought. He stole. Well, he didn't steal the rules, but he stole. Oh, okay, okay, okay. Here, the rules. Here we go. Okay, I'll make this super simple, the sort of version. I'll give you the sort of super simple version. Say that three times fast. Okay, wait. Quick setup here. So four players per team. Okay.
• 11:37
  Speaker B: Okay.
• 11:37
  Speaker A: Grass field.
• 11:38
  Speaker B: Oh, it feels like there's so many more than.
• 11:39
  Speaker A: No, it's only four. I know, right? Okay. Grass field, that's 300 yards long. 160 yards wide. Peter, what the does that mean for context? That's five or six times a soccer field.
• 11:50
  Speaker B: Dang.
• 11:50
  Speaker A: Right? That is nine times a standard American football field. So if you took a football field and put 1, 2, 3, and then 1, 2, 3, 1, 2, 3. And made a big cube or whatever. Not. Not. That's okay.
• 12:01
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 12:01
  Speaker A: That is absolutely massive. Okay. And they have goals at each end.
• 12:04
  Speaker B: Yep.
• 12:04
  Speaker A: And you score goals same way you just got to score a goal from your horse. That's sort of how it works. And fun fact, if you're a professional, like I said, we're not talking about one horse per rider either. Serious players bring six or eight horses to use each match. Each match.
• 12:18
  Speaker B: Is it because each summing in the horses has a specialty?
• 12:21
  Speaker A: No, not a specialty. No. We'll get there. It's gonna have to do with how tired they get.
• 12:25
  Speaker B: Okay, so it's more like physical reasons.
• 12:26
  Speaker A: Yes.
• 12:27
  Speaker B: Okay.
• 12:27
  Speaker A: Yeah, yeah.
• 12:27
  Speaker B: Not skill.
• 12:28
  Speaker A: Okay. Yeah. So each match is broken into periods called. Oh, my God, chukkas. Just say that with me. Chukkas. Usually six or seven minutes each. Four to six per game. And. Yes. I just did. Six, seven. Everybody's paying attention at home. Okay, fun fact. Here's the part that blows everyone's mind. So almost every chukka, the player switches the horse. Okay. Sometimes more than once inside of a chukka.
• 12:50
  Speaker B: But, like, does everybody do it at the same time?
• 12:52
  Speaker A: No, no, no, no, no.
• 12:53
  Speaker B: So you gotta be quick. Like it's a pit stop.
• 12:54
  Speaker A: Yes.
• 12:55
  Speaker B: You're on, you're off, you're on it. Oh, my gosh. I have so many questions.
• 12:57
  Speaker A: Okay, wait, hit me. What?
• 12:58
  Speaker B: Okay.
• 12:59
  Speaker A: Yes.
• 12:59
  Speaker B: So wait, why aren't there a standard chukkas? Like standard times or seven?
• 13:04
  Speaker A: Because I wanted to say six or six. Six, seven. Four to six. No. Okay, you're right. Okay.
• 13:08
  Speaker B: There's a lot because there's a half times, there's quarters, there's everything else.
• 13:11
  Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 13:12
  Speaker B: But these are. Seems very, like, iffy.
• 13:14
  Speaker A: But you said not to be sophisticated, so am I gonna be sophisticated or not?
• 13:17
  Speaker B: Well, this is, like, just important.
• 13:19
  Speaker A: I'll give you. I'll give it to you quick. Okay, so why aren't they standard chocolates? Okay, because of the horses. First of all, horses cost as much as a car. They're expensive. Like Lamborghini.
• 13:26
  Speaker B: Right?
• 13:26
  Speaker A: They're very expensive. So the rules literally scale to how much horsepower. Seriously. Literally horsepower that any level of play can afford. So club guys don't even have enough horses to have. Whatever it is. Six chukkas okay, so their matches are shorter. They're usually like four. Right. And then the guys that are better, they're called high goal guys. I'll explain that in a second. Yeah, they show up with a whole entourage of horses because they can afford them. So their matches are longer and they're usually more six chuckles or eight Chukkas long. So depending on how many horses you bring is sort of how long run. Okay, okay, that makes sense.
• 13:59
  Speaker B: So like, is this more like the minors and the majors?
• 14:01
  Speaker A: Yeah. So it's basically the same thing I thought about as a handicap in golf, but minors and major, same thing. So like each player has a handicap. Okay, so there's a scale from what they call negative two, totally amateur up to 10, which would be like, I don't know, Tiger woods or something.
• 14:17
  Speaker B: Okay.
• 14:17
  Speaker A: Golf, I don't know. Right. That shows you how much I know about golf. Tall based on skill. So here in the United States is decided by the USPA handicap committee. I guess there's one in each country that has polo. Don't tell. I don't know what's what. But it's like gymnastics or ice skating. It's like subjective.
• 14:31
  Speaker B: Okay, right.
• 14:31
  Speaker A: They give. They give out these things. So.
• 14:33
  Speaker B: Oh, based off of.
• 14:35
  Speaker A: Right. So they watch these players. Yeah, they watch these players and every six months they update these players handicaps. So I don't know how they do it in golf. And I should know that, but I don't. So anyway, so they add all four players handicap on a team and that number puts you into a bracket. So in low tournaments, like club level, you have lower handicap, whereas in what you call high goal tournaments, which is the pros, you have a higher handicap. So imagine if there were, you know, four players that were all eight or nines, you know, then what is that? 36 is their handicap versus amateurs playing that are negative twos and zeros. They'd have a handicap of, I don't know, one. So you can't. Those teams can't play each other. Does that make sense?
• 15:13
  Speaker B: Yes.
• 15:13
  Speaker A: So that's how they distribute minors in major leagues. Exactly. So but the problem, and this is back to I think some of the. We were talking about how it's an elite sport and it costs money, it's hard to buy all these horses, it's hard to be that good. Right. And get that higher handicap. And so generally the more money you put in, the better chance you have at getting better.
• 15:36
  Speaker B: Got it.
• 15:36
  Speaker A: If that makes sense.
• 15:38
  Speaker B: So with everything though.
• 15:39
  Speaker A: Yes, it's wealthy correlated. If that Makes sense. Yeah. So anyway, then what they do is before a match, they compare the two teams combined handicap. So let's say one team has a 10 and the other team has a 12.
• 15:51
  Speaker B: Okay.
• 15:51
  Speaker A: And they're going to play. They're. Let's say they're both in the club level. Because you have to be in a. It starts by level. So it's club level, it's mid goal, it's high goal. Right. Okay. So you're in the club level. One's got a 10, one's got a 12. So depending on your handicap, you have to give up that many goals to start the game. So if you have a 12 handicap and somebody has a 10 handicap, you are already losing the game, two to nothing. Yeah, that's how the game starts. Well, sorry, the match. I shouldn't say the game. I don't want to. I don't want to piss off polo aficionados. Right. That's how the match starts. So I thought that was interesting, that that's how they level all this, by handicap. Keeping in mind handicaps pretty subjective.
• 16:23
  Speaker B: Yeah. I feel like, as an Angels fan, we should have this also in baseball.
• 16:26
  Speaker A: Not anymore. No, what he's talking about, they're going to win the World Series.
• 16:29
  Speaker B: I mean, we haven't yet.
• 16:30
  Speaker A: I'm calling it here. It hasn't been five years or less. The Angel.
• 16:34
  Speaker B: I mean, I will not be upset about this.
• 16:35
  Speaker A: No, it's happening. Dude, what's his name, Crawdroger 2.0. Trusting he's gonna put.
• 16:39
  Speaker B: He hasn't taken over yet.
• 16:40
  Speaker A: It's gonna happen.
• 16:41
  Speaker B: It has to happen first.
• 16:42
  Speaker A: So now, wait, I gotta go back to your other question. You had another question? Oh, it was something about, like, swapping out horses really fast or else. I think it was something like that. Yeah. Okay. It's like in soccer, you just, you know, you run off the field on and off the field in soccer. Right. Well, I mean, now they don't. Now they, like, put up the thing. But before, he used to run.
• 16:55
  Speaker B: Tag and tag out.
• 16:55
  Speaker A: Yeah, tag and tag out. So. Same, same. So the problem is a horse can't talk. So we could be like, hey, I need to come out. A horse can't do that. Right. So they're looking for physical signs of distress.
• 17:05
  Speaker B: Somebody call them in and the horse.
• 17:06
  Speaker A: Yeah. And that's the riders. The riders know if their horse needs to switch before the end of a chukka. But the whole reason the chukka is that six or seven minutes. Okay, get jokes over. That's generally how long A horse can really last. So the ref is watching this and he's like, how are the horses doing? So even if you want to make a change after three or four minutes, you're allowed to.
• 17:29
  Speaker B: Got it.
• 17:30
  Speaker A: But after six or seven, the refs are like, we done? We know that's sort of the limit of the horse.
• 17:34
  Speaker B: Got it.
• 17:35
  Speaker A: Does that make sense?
• 17:35
  Speaker B: And can you resub a horse in?
• 17:37
  Speaker A: Oh, don't know. Too sophisticated, I would argue. Absolutely not. I don't know. We could look that up if you want to look it up. Because I would think that once you're gassed, you're gassed, like, they don't come back. They've just worked too hard for that day already would be my guess.
• 17:50
  Speaker B: So they have these six to seven minutes time periods.
• 17:53
  Speaker A: Yeah, whatever. We can call them all the things.
• 17:54
  Speaker B: So at some point in time there's a halftime. Do all the horses come in? Do they get their Gatorade break? Do they. Yes, they get dehydrate. I don't know.
• 18:01
  Speaker A: They get their orange slices and they get their Gatorade. Yeah, they probably. They get to chill out a little bit and then they go right back.
• 18:06
  Speaker B: But is it like a longer halftime?
• 18:07
  Speaker A: No, because I don't. I don't know. Here's the famous halftime ritual. I don't know if there's like Michael Jackson is singing or anything like that. Don't get me wrong.
• 18:14
  Speaker B: Oh, well, I figure not.
• 18:15
  Speaker A: But the divotsdom. You've. Have you ever watched. Have you ever watched the crown?
• 18:19
  Speaker B: Oh, yeah, yeah, the crown. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 18:21
  Speaker A: Like whatever. They do the divot stomp at halftime. So literally all the spectators walk out on the field, stomp up all the torn up dirt, like shove it all back in place. It's a whole social ritual, especially United States. It's actually become more famous than like the sport itself. Like, you want to go just for the divots up. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, yeah, yeah. People in polo matches, like wearing their Gucci shoes or whatever. It is fascinating. I mean, they really don't do that. But I will say, you know, like the Kentucky Derby, how you wear the hat and you do the mint julip. So divot stomp. The idea is you dress really nice to a polo match, right? You wear shitty shoes because you're gonna do the divot stomp. But the idea is that's what is that? The social cues or whatever. I don't know what I'm saying. But you get the idea. You have to dress up. That's like part of the Fun of going to a polo match. And then everybody comes off the field in their super nice outfits or whatever, and they're gross shoes. Now then after that, all the polo players just march their next favorite of their eight horses that they each have out into the. I should say arena. I shouldn't say field. It's arena, where they play on sword.
• 19:26
  Speaker B: Sophisticated.
• 19:27
  Speaker A: Sorry. Out to the arena, and they all, like, get started again.
• 19:31
  Speaker B: There you go.
• 19:31
  Speaker A: That's halftime.
• 19:32
  Speaker B: I mean, if you think about it, though, there's a lot of money.
• 19:36
  Speaker A: There is. There's a ton of money.
• 19:37
  Speaker B: And these horses. Are they called horses?
• 19:39
  Speaker A: Yes, they're horses. Well, okay. They call them polo ponies. They don't call them horses.
• 19:44
  Speaker B: Ponies. Why? Ponies.
• 19:45
  Speaker A: Polo ponies.
• 19:46
  Speaker B: They're not little.
• 19:47
  Speaker A: Yes. No. I don't know. That's what they call them. That's. That's their job. What do you want me to say?
• 19:51
  Speaker B: Okay, well, there's a lot of money in these holo. Ponies.
• 19:53
  Speaker A: Yes, there are.
• 19:54
  Speaker B: Ooh, question.
• 19:55
  Speaker A: What?
• 19:55
  Speaker B: Are they more expensive than Lamborghini? Yes. No. Kentucky Derby horses.
• 20:01
  Speaker A: Ooh, don't know. No, I can. No, I can't imagine. They are.
• 20:04
  Speaker B: Okay.
• 20:04
  Speaker A: Okay, that's a good one. That should have been a fun. Do me a favor.
• 20:07
  Speaker B: Fun fact. It.
• 20:07
  Speaker A: Yeah, you. Fun fact. And you add that in at the end, when I'm done with fun facts, you'd be like, okay. And finally. And you saw that one in. Okay, I think. But I do think it's amazing that. Remember how I said high goal?
• 20:17
  Speaker B: Yeah, yeah.
• 20:19
  Speaker A: Pro athletes are called high goal athletes. Okay. They have eight horses each. Think of the. How much money you have to. Have to bring eight effing horses at. Like you said, who cares if they're as expensive or not? Yeah. Let's call it. Let's call it a hundred. $150,000 horse each. Right? That's a million dollars worth of horses. That your equipment is a million dollars. Right.
• 20:41
  Speaker B: Well, if you play soccer and your
• 20:43
  Speaker A: Shin guards are $1.50.
• 20:44
  Speaker B: It's true. But not even that. Think about it. It's not just the cost of a pony, but it's the boarding or the.
• 20:52
  Speaker A: It's the guy who's got to pick up the food.
• 20:53
  Speaker B: All of it.
• 20:54
  Speaker A: Right. It's the guy who's got to, you know, took them off, and so there's a lot of things that have to happen here. Right? We're. Right. Okay. I have. I have a fun fact. I'm going to fun fact you early. Okay, tell me, do you know that one of the rules is that all polo players have to play right handed.
• 21:09
  Speaker B: Did you know that kind of makes sense, though.
• 21:11
  Speaker A: Yeah. Because like, in baseball you don't have to play. You could do left or right. Right, you could.
• 21:15
  Speaker B: Right. But I would assume there's a flow of the arena.
• 21:18
  Speaker A: Flow of the arena. Is that what you. That's what your assumption is?
• 21:20
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 21:21
  Speaker A: How about so they don't kill each other?
• 21:22
  Speaker B: Well, yeah, right.
• 21:24
  Speaker A: Well, think about it. No, it's like safety, right? Horses are moving, what, like 30, 40 miles an hour? Mallets are flying everywhere, like 100 miles an hour. So mixing left and right handers, like, you could literally kill somebody. No bullshit. So back in the day, I looked all this up back in the day, people would die. Not only get injured, people were dying because they were getting hit in the heads with mallets. So they were like, we're done.
• 21:45
  Speaker B: That makes sense. That's what I'm saying. The flow of the game, because.
• 21:47
  Speaker A: Oh, okay, that's what you meant.
• 21:49
  Speaker B: Someone coming left handed. Right it.
• 21:51
  Speaker A: Yeah. Could fuck you up.
• 21:52
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 21:53
  Speaker A: Like, pretty badly. Yeah. So apparently they banned it in America the 1930s. That was it. That's when they figured all this out. Right. So they played it for 50 years, didn't ban it. People died. Then in World War II, they needed more players because the men had to go to war. So they were like, oh, shit. So lefties got to come back in and play. So they went backwards and righties and lefties got to play again. It wasn't until 1974 that they were like, done and done. It doesn't matter.
• 22:16
  Speaker B: Bad idea, right?
• 22:17
  Speaker A: Bad idea Bandit forever. Righties only.
• 22:19
  Speaker B: Oh, man.
• 22:20
  Speaker A: You know what my mom used to say?
• 22:21
  Speaker B: What?
• 22:22
  Speaker A: The world wasn't made for left handed people. That was her, like, little, little thing. When Emma. I think I told you this before. It might have been on her podcast. When Emma was little, Emma started with lefty.
• 22:31
  Speaker B: Yes.
• 22:31
  Speaker A: And my mom changed her to righty every time she had because my mom would babysit. My mom died, like after she was like 3 years old, but that was it. It stuck. And so Emma actually right now is ambidextrous. So she plays basketball left handed. She cooks left handed, but she writes right handed. It is so uber weird to watch my daughter, who was naturally a lefty, get forced into righty. It's really weird. Anyway, I think she'd be a great polo player. I think we found.
• 22:57
  Speaker B: That's funny.
• 22:57
  Speaker A: I think I'm gonna buy that's gonna be her. I think I'm Gonna buy Emma a polo pony. What do you think?
• 23:01
  Speaker B: Okay, I think you should. But realistic, like, how good do you have to be to not immediately die doing this?
• 23:07
  Speaker A: Exceptionally good. Exceptionally good.
• 23:09
  Speaker B: Because I feel like I would just die riding the horse. If I were gonna be totally honest.
• 23:13
  Speaker A: I would die trying to pick up the mallet and just because they're heavy, aren't they? Yes, they're heavy. Af, right? Yes. So high goal guys, the elite level guys, they have to maintain. Think about this, like full control.
• 23:23
  Speaker B: Yes.
• 23:24
  Speaker A: Of the horse. Like going at a fucking dead sprint. No hands, basically. Because they're swinging the mallet. Yes, maybe. Right.
• 23:30
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 23:31
  Speaker A: And tracking the, the, what do you call the ball? The Golden Snitch. Whatever you got with the Harry Potter Golden Snitch. Same idea.
• 23:36
  Speaker B: I'm sure the volleyball has a name, right?
• 23:37
  Speaker A: I don't know. Okay, look it up. Anyway, so besides horse racing, it is one of the only sports where the athlete and the animal are functionally one unit. One unit. So I mean, you have to. You have to be absolutely incredible. These are elite level athletes, for sure.
• 23:50
  Speaker B: I mean, absolutely. That question was asked with a little bit of snarkiness because I can't even fathom doing that.
• 23:57
  Speaker A: I can't even ride like gallop on a horse. Let's just, let's start without being lucky. Oh my God, I need to work on this shit.
• 24:02
  Speaker B: I also think that's why this is a sport for the rich. Because if you think about it, you need to be able to have.
• 24:07
  Speaker A: So other words, not for us.
• 24:08
  Speaker B: I don't think so. Because you need the time to have the commitment to have the horse and the trainers and like all the overhead. Right. Think about. It's like sailing or fencing. I mean, even golf and tennis are basically wealthy sports, which I think we all can maybe understand why for the here and there. Whereas like football, American football, soccer, basketball, they're like working class. Cause I feel like it's more like a pickup sport. I mean, kind of like how shin guards cost A$50. Right. So other than that.
• 24:39
  Speaker A: Other than the horses.
• 24:41
  Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. Other than the obvious reasons, I should say.
• 24:43
  Speaker A: Okay, so. Right. So the horses are one main reason. But these, anything you just talked about, sailing, polo, like fencing, all these fencing me. But whatever you need land or space. That's like one of the major considerations that you don't think about. Right. So think of the grounds. We just pull it. Right? The arena, the grounds. Right. Sailing. But you need the ocean. I understand it's free, but like to be able to figure all that shit out is super expensive. And then of course, on top of that, you have the horses.
• 25:08
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 25:09
  Speaker A: And you need daytime, right? You, like, you can't. This isn't indoors. Like, basketball's indoors. Like, you can confine it. If this is daytime hours. Like people that are available in the daytime to practice eight hours a day are usually rich and retired or.
• 25:23
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 25:23
  Speaker A: Or have family money. Like, they don't need a 9 to 5. You get the idea. So they also have something you would call institutional gatekeeping.
• 25:30
  Speaker B: It's a very sophisticated term.
• 25:31
  Speaker A: Yes, it is. No, I didn't come up.
• 25:33
  Speaker B: Here we go.
• 25:33
  Speaker A: I fucking looked this up, right? Country clubs.
• 25:35
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 25:36
  Speaker A: Right. Private academies, the membership structures. All tennis and golf fit into those.
• 25:40
  Speaker B: Right.
• 25:40
  Speaker A: Fencing. Right. Anything. Compare horse riding, competitive equestrian, horse riding, all that kind of shit. So they screen how much money you make by the price of entry. They do it on purpose. Right. And then the last one that a lot of people don't want to admit, scarcity, it creates prestige. Absolutely right. So once it starts being associated, that sport starts being associated with being wealthy, then staying associated is like part of the. Part of the prestige, part of the draw. That's what people want. So football and basketball, what, require a ball, a patch of pavement, a field, not a huge field, whatever. Right. All super excessive. Like, think about basketball. It just pickup games everywhere. Inner cities, all over. Like, working class. Stickball, baseball. Grew up in New York, like off of cricket, like on the streets of New York, like that. Like, they're totally different requirements. So with polo, you need all those things. You need land, you need horses, you need daytime cost of entry. So that's how I think we. America decides that, you know, sailing, polo, fencing, you know, tennis, golf, those all go one way and then other sports go the other way. Yeah. Yeah. Kind of interesting. I didn't know all that at first. I was like, yeah, you're right. I don't. I don't fucking get why. But when you start looking shit up, it all starts to make sense.
• 26:57
  Speaker B: You assume so much. Right. But when it's one thing I didn't think about was the scarcity aspect, right. Of these all being clubs and very exclusive.
• 27:07
  Speaker A: Yeah. You know, it's all done on purpose, man. What are you gonna do?
• 27:11
  Speaker B: All right.
• 27:11
  Speaker A: The sport of kings goes all the way back to kings. They kept it that way. All right. They kept it that way on purpose. Polo. So did we do it justice? Do you feel like you learned something about polo? Was I super sophisticated? Was I okay?
• 27:24
  Speaker B: It wasn't sophisticated. Cause I'm Sure. There's a lot more rules and there's a lot more technicalities of the game and things like that, but I think for just an average person.
• 27:32
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 27:32
  Speaker B: To be able to participate in a conversation about polo, this was sufficient.
• 27:37
  Speaker A: Can I throw in the best fun fact ever?
• 27:39
  Speaker B: Yes.
• 27:39
  Speaker A: Because I had to look it up. Please. It's not even a fun fact. I just want.
• 27:42
  Speaker B: Can I tell you my fun fact first?
• 27:43
  Speaker A: Yes.
• 27:44
  Speaker B: Okay.
• 27:44
  Speaker A: Oh, yeah, yeah.
• 27:45
  Speaker B: So racehorses by far more.
• 27:47
  Speaker A: Way more money.
• 27:48
  Speaker B: Yes. Way, way, way more.
• 27:49
  Speaker A: Yeah, yeah.
• 27:50
  Speaker B: I figured a typical racehorse is about 70. Well, sorry, the record breaking one was sold for 70 million. Top yearlings will fetch millions, whereas polo horses 25,000 to 100,000. Sometimes exceptions up to 250,000, but rarely. Rarely. Barely.
• 28:06
  Speaker A: It's not even in the same stratosphere.
• 28:08
  Speaker B: It's true. But if you take the thought of it's a $100,000 horse and I need eight of them, that is $800,000.
• 28:15
  Speaker A: But the tour de France, you remember we did Tour de France. Yeah. So a million dollars per rider because they have six or seven bikes that they each bring with them. Yeah. So very close to the same, that Tour de France, but polo, very similar people.
• 28:27
  Speaker B: Also. Is Tour de France also considered an elite sport?
• 28:31
  Speaker A: Oh, it has to be elitist. Yes, I would say it has to be.
• 28:35
  Speaker B: Okay.
• 28:35
  Speaker A: Yeah. Very few people race in the. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Good call. My fun fact was a lot stupider than that. Mine was just they totally poo all the time while they are out there running around and they just keep.
• 28:45
  Speaker B: Wow.
• 28:46
  Speaker A: Yeah, they just poo it right out.
• 28:47
  Speaker B: I mean, that makes sense, right? You're not holding it on the run, man.
• 28:50
  Speaker A: Full sprint on the run. Let's go. Poo it out.
• 28:52
  Speaker B: Oh, my gosh.
• 28:52
  Speaker A: Anyway. All right. Can I officially start Fun facts?
• 28:54
  Speaker B: Yes.
• 28:54
  Speaker A: Okay, here we go. Number one. You want to guess how many horses they use in a single high level match? Not per person, all together. All you have to do is some quick math.
• 29:04
  Speaker B: Right. So if there's eight horses, there's eight players, about 64.
• 29:07
  Speaker A: Yes. Okay, fine. That's 60 horses. Yeah. Both team combined. Once you factor in all, they're called strings of horses. I don't know if I ever said that. So you bring your string of horse. That's eight horses that you bring. Yeah. Okay, that's insane. Think back to how expensive this is. Vets, trailers, trainers, groomers, stables. Fuck me. Okay, anyway, that's insane. And think about this. 60 horses in one place at one time.
• 29:31
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 29:32
  Speaker A: How many? How often you see that? I mean, maybe in the wild you see that, but I don't know. Where else are you gonna see that shit?
• 29:36
  Speaker B: Rodeo.
• 29:37
  Speaker A: Okay, Rodeo. Maybe. Rodeo. Maybe polo grounds. That's sort of it. Where else are you gonna see 60 of anything in one place at one time?
• 29:43
  Speaker B: It's true.
• 29:43
  Speaker A: I don't know. Anyway, okay, maybe ducks in a pond. Okay, number two, we didn't really talk about the ball, did we? Never talked about the ball. The Golden Snitch. The little ball. So the ball itself has a surprisingly little humble history here.
• 29:53
  Speaker B: Oh, it does.
• 29:53
  Speaker A: It was traditionally carved from willow root or bamboo root, roughly the size of a baseball. But now modern balls are hard and plastic because they're cheaper to manufacture. En masse, of course. Same size and everything, but just way more economical. Oh, my God. Economical. We didn't use iconium. Oh, no, we didn't use iconium. Oh, my God. We gotta figure out how to use
• 30:12
  Speaker B: it before we get.
• 30:13
  Speaker A: Look it up, make sure, you know. Okay. I just think it's crazy that for 100 years in America they were smacking around this little chunk of tree root at 100 miles an hour before they turned it into a plastic ball. And whatever, the 70s or whatever it was. Okay. Anyway, that's wild. Number three. Okay. This was considered the literal royal sport. Like kings on horseback or sport of kings, like we were saying for a long time. Like, do you know Prince Philip, who was married to Queen Elizabeth ii? Prince Philip, yes. So back to the crown. Yes. He was a serious competitive polo player for decades on a real team. And then King Charles, right now her son and king. King, yes. Played competitively for years and years after him. So when they say sport of kings, that's not even ancient history. That's even right now, British royal family still playing it. I don't know if Prince William's playing Prince Harry.
• 30:59
  Speaker B: I don't think they don't talk anymore. Do you think they have an Encodium?
• 31:01
  Speaker A: I don't. What do you mean they have an Encodium? Do you mean they talk about each other like in an Encodium? What? Maybe. I don't know. All right, we'll give 50%. We'll get it in there.
• 31:13
  Speaker B: Okay.
• 31:13
  Speaker A: Anyway. Okay. And finally. Want to know where the word chukka came from?
• 31:17
  Speaker B: Yes.
• 31:17
  Speaker A: Chukka. I thought that was a weird word.
• 31:18
  Speaker B: Chukka would. You're American.
• 31:20
  Speaker A: Yeah. No. Okay, fine. It's an. It's a Manipuri word, so remember, it came from Manipur, India. I've said that's where, like, the Brits Found it. Yeah. Okay. Every time the commenter says chaka, they're using a 19th century British import of a word that predates the empire entirely. I think that's kind of cool. So it goes all the way back to India. Britain took it from India. We took it from Brett.
• 31:41
  Speaker B: I have an ultra fun fact.
• 31:42
  Speaker A: What?
• 31:43
  Speaker B: Because you said chukka. You said it's all episode. Right. But the only chukka I knew before this was the chukka boot.
• 31:48
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 31:48
  Speaker B: You know what chugga boot is?
• 31:49
  Speaker A: I have no idea.
• 31:49
  Speaker B: It's the ankle boots that men wear.
• 31:51
  Speaker A: Oh, okay.
• 31:52
  Speaker B: Right.
• 31:52
  Speaker A: That's where it comes from.
• 31:53
  Speaker B: Because of the polo matches, British army units in India wore similar ankle high boots while playing the sport.
• 31:59
  Speaker A: Really?
• 31:59
  Speaker B: That's why it's called a chucka boot. So everybody, you have been talking polo without knowing that you knew.
• 32:07
  Speaker A: Who would have known? There you go.
• 32:08
  Speaker B: All right, well, on that note, I think we should end this podcast because that was a pretty good one.
• 32:12
  Speaker A: I thought so. I like doing sports ones. Maybe I'm a guy.
• 32:15
  Speaker B: I mean, it was a good one. I love it. It was interesting things. I didn't know.
• 32:19
  Speaker A: We're going to a podcast.
• 32:20
  Speaker B: Let's go.
• 32:20
  Speaker A: I think. I think you and I have to
• 32:21
  Speaker B: go here for it.
• 32:22
  Speaker A: I want to hear. I want to feel it in my bones. Right, like that.
• 32:25
  Speaker B: I mean, that. That itself. That's what I remember out of everything, of being at the bowl. Just the thundering of hooves. For sure.
• 32:31
  Speaker A: I think so.
• 32:32
  Speaker B: So if people can't go to a match, what else can they do to learn a little bit more?
• 32:35
  Speaker A: No, you're going to a match. You're going to a match. You're going right now. Because remember when I said the season's almost over?
• 32:39
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 32:39
  Speaker A: Yeah. So Santa Barbara runs through October 11th, so you have two more chances and that's it. If you're on the east coast, Newport just closed for the season. Newport, Rhode island, where it all started. So done and done already. You could go to the USPA's website, uspolo.org and just find a club because they play club games way more than you think. I'm just telling you in Santa Barbara that those aren't club games. Those are like mid level. Yeah. Those are like official games in Santa Barbara. Yeah. And then, Chad, if you just want to learn anything else, just DM us on Instagram or something like that. We'll give you the fun facts. We'll give you the episode summary. I'll tell you more about polo. I'll tell you where to find matches. Because now I know I'm hooked in. It's in my veins. It's in my blood.
• 33:17
  Speaker B: Well, and if you don't want to do any of that, then just remember these details seem sort of sophisticated.
• 33:21
  Speaker A: Let's see what you got.
• 33:22
  Speaker B: I don't know. Well, number one, polo started as literal cavalry training in ancient Persia roughly 2000 years ago. Kings and the military elite played it to keep their riders sharp for war. And that's how it became known as the sport of kings. Number two, the British picked it up in colonial India in the 1800s. They got obsessed. They standardized the rules and they exported it back to England as an aristocratic sport. They didn't invent polo. They branded it. If you're like me and a naive American, you just associated it with the royals. Anyway, so they did a Good job. Number three, America's first polo club was founded in Newport in 1876 after publisher James Gordon Bennett Jr. Saw a match in England and brought the idea home. It landed right in the middle of the Gilded age when families like the Vanderbilts and Astors used it to signal old money sophistication. And it's celebrating its 150th anniversary right now with an active playing season. Number four, elite players use strings of six or more horses per match because the physical toll on the horse is so extreme that riding the same one for the whole game would injure or even kill it. And finally, sports become wealth coded through a stack of three things. Access to land and time, institutional gatekeeping like country clubs, and scarcity that reinforces its own prestige over time. It's not just about the price tag. Once a sport is associated with wealth, staying associated with wealth becomes part of the point.
• 34:44
  Speaker A: Which is the reason why Amanda and I will never end up learning.
• 34:47
  Speaker B: Here we are.
• 34:48
  Speaker A: Bingo. There you have it, dear listeners. A sport that started as a wild eyed idea to keep cavalry sharp for war ended up becoming the single greatest flex that the ruling class ever invented. Not on purpose, exactly, but somehow, through 2,000 years of empires, colonizers, and a gilded age, it survived. If we did our job today, the next time you hear the sport of kings, you'll not just be picturing champagne and white pants anymore. You're picturing actual kings, actual cavalry, an entire economic engine dressed up as, I guess, a lawn party. And you'll know exactly why. Football is a working class sport and polo will never be not an accident by design. As always. If you like what you listen to, hit, subscribe, leave a review, and share with someone who thinks polo is just watching rich people standing near horses. Because now you know, the horses were never the point. The scarcity was. Until next time, stay curious, stay right handed, and remember, the exclusivity was always the product. You just needed someone to hand you the receipt.