Chukkers for Children
Pack your picnic baskets, grab your drinks, and join us at Hickory Hall Polo Club. This family-friendly event is one of the area’s best kept secrets where you can enjoy a polo match, candy drop from an airplane and opportunity to live out your Pretty Woman dreams of stomping divots.
The entry fee is $40 per carload, collected when you enter the facility. Proceeds from the event will be graciously donated to Indiana Wish.
Interested in becoming a tailgate sponsor?
Thanks to This Year's Sponsors
How to be the Ultimate Spectator
- Bring chairs and/or blankets if not provided in your box.
- Pop-Up tents are encouraged for sunny days; must be staked down.
- Bring a picnic & cooler. Grills are not welcome.
- Dress in summer clothes and shoes fit for turf.
- Decorate your tailgate box! It’s a polo tradition. Visit other tailgaters!
- Stomp the “non-steaming” divots at half-time.
- Bring bug spray, binoculars, a camera, sunglasses and sunscreen.
- Use provided trash bags to clean up after yourself & your dogs
- TAKE YOUR TRASH WITH YOU!!! Please pick up after yourself.
- For safety, please stay behind the second white side line while ball is in play!
- Visiting the barns is strictly prohibited.
Fun Facts About Polo
The object of the game is to move the polo ball down-field and hit it through the goal posts for a score.
- A team is made up of four players.
- A polo match lasts about an hour and a half and is divided into timed periods called chukkas. Each Chukka is seven minutes long. Play begins with a throw-in of the ball by the umpire at the opening of each chukka and after each goal.
- Players must change horses after each chukka due to the extreme demands placed on the polo pony.
During half time, spectators go onto the field to participate in a tradition called “divot stomping” to help replace the divots created by the horses hooves.
About the Horses (Polo Ponies)
Although they are not recognized as a distinct breed, polo ponies are truly unique horses that combine the traits of a number of breeds. Next to a player’s skills, the polo pony is the most important factor in polo.
- The equestrian sport of polo demands the quick burst of speed seen in Thoroughbred horses.
- The complexity and strategy of a polo match requires the intelligence of Arabian horses, and the rapid turn of play in pursuit of the ball necessitates the agility of Quarter horses.
- In the United States, thoroughbred horses are usually bred with Quarter horses to produce polo ponies.
Since 1930 some of the best polo ponies have been produced in Argentina. Argentines cross thoroughbred horses with their local Criollo horses. It takes upwards of 3-6 years to produce a “made” pony that loves to play the equestrian sport of polo.