City secrets in Buenos Aires: why polo is in the blood across the Pampas

All across the Pampas, polo is truly in the blood, says James Williams
Mario Mantel/Flickr
James Williams11 February 2016

It’s perhaps surprising that the reigning champion of “the Sport of Kings” is a country with no royal family, and whose best known political figure claimed to pursue the cause of social justice: Argentina.

The game’s spiritual home is an hour outside Buenos Aires. The Pampas are a seemingly never-ending stretch of green-and-gold plains, where the sun shines 10 months a year, and Porteños — Buenos Aires locals — flock on weekends.

Outside the town of Cañuelas is Puesto Viejo, arguably the most beautiful polo club in the country.

A long, tree-lined driveway leads from tasteful yet simple lodging rooms, to six polo fields and stables, and then to the clubhouse.

It’s here that I find Santiago de Estrada, better known as Chino.

He’s the cousin of Adolfo Cambiaso — the world’s number one ranked polo player, and my instructor for today’s lesson.

In Argentina, you often find that polo is a family affair, with children as young as four or five learning from parents and grandparents, along with their siblings and cousins. “It’s in the blood,” says Chino.

A lesson is made up of a combination of hard work and horsemanship, and in particular learning one difficult movement: locking the top of your thigh onto the saddle so that it supports your weight as you lean far out over the horse and swing the mallet to hit the ball. This, I learn, is the secret to a good polo swing.

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The secret of the country’s polo expertise, at least according to Chino, is simple. “Throughout our history we’ve used horses to make a living. That’s what makes us better horsemen.”

Nacho Figueras is one of Argentina’s most recognisable faces, partly because he is one of its top polo players but also as the face of Polo Ralph Lauren since 2005. “All day I’m thinking about my game and my horses. You can’t be a great polo player if you don’t love horses.”

Figueras’s goals are now shifting from being a world-class player to improving the sport. This mission is at the heart of his recently-opened Figueras Polo Club. He tells me: “I felt that it was my responsibility to make the sport bigger. It’s my mission to bring it to the rest of the world.”

And while I’ve seen little evidence to suggest Argentina is expanding the game’s audience outside its core, one can’t argue with the will to drag it into the 21st century.

James Williams hosts Buenos Aires In 24 Hours on February 13 at 1.30pm on CNN International

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