Federation of International Polo (FIP) President Nicholas Colquhoun-Denvers:
“It has been an exciting time for the Federation. This is a year of Olympic aspirations with FIP dedicated to trying to get national teams into various IOC related events such as the Pan-American Games through Pat Nesbitt and his team and the Asian Games. With Alessandro Giachetti, Simone Perillo and Piero Dillier’s help we have also been working on the possibility of getting our sport of Snow Polo included into the Winter Olympics sometime in the future and we have created the Olympic Games Snow Polo Committee. To this end we are contacting all our National Polo Associations and Federations around the world to encourage them to ensure that they are recognised by their own National Olympic Committees. Currently we only have some 14 national Polo associations that have been recognised by their NOCs.
Having met recently at the St Moritz Snow Polo Championship with one of the senior International Olympic Committee representatives they were intrigued with the idea of polo, a recognised Olympic sport from the past, considering the option of returning to the Olympics in such a different format and appear quite encouraging and supportive of our early efforts.
In Argentina FIP are supporting the AAP in the preparations and invitations for the organisation of the polo demonstration day as part of the IOC Sport Showcasing Programme for the Youth Olympics to be held in Buenos Aires from the 6-18th October this year.
We are delighted that Nina Clarkin and Dawn Jones have accepted the invitation to become members of the FIP Woman’s International Polo Committee; we are currently waiting for the name of the nominee |from the AAP and confirmation from the Thai Polo Association of their nomination of Ploy Bhinsaeng.
Last year we had 4 Ambassador’s Cups around the world and in 2018 we have the 97th Ambassador’s Cup at the Santa Clara Polo Club in April, the 98th in Querétaro, Mexico in May at the stunning El Marques Polo Club, the 99th in August at Deauville Polo Club in France, then the 100th in August/September at the Helvetia Polo Club in Brazil, the 101th in Italy at the Roma Polo Club, September 14th to 16th and finally thanks to the on-going generosity of Ernesto Gutierrez we have the 102nd Ambassador’s Cup in Argentina once again at his beautiful La Ensenada Polo Club just prior to our General Assembly.
The XII FIP European Championships will be taking place in picturesque Villa a Sesta Polo Club located in the scenic Siena Hills near Florence where we are hoping to attract between around ten 6/8 goal teams and runs from the 20th-30th September. The Last FIP European Championships were held the historic Mayfield Stadium in Berlin and the Ireland Team captained by Stephen Hutchinson, Chairman of the HPA, took the honours with France as Runners-up. The II Ladies European Championship will also be taking place in Villa Sesta Polo Club during the same dates and we are expecting to have four national teams.
So a good year to look forward to on the international front.”
