Riding Star

by Stacy Gregg

  “We have a new pupil with us today,” polo master Heath Brompton told the class. He looked down at the piece of paper in his hands and then did a double take when he saw Georgie. “George Parker?”

  “Georgie,” she corrected him. “It’s short for Georgina.” Heath Brompton looked anxious. “I must have read it wrong when I approved your transfer…” He paused. “The thing is, Parker, you’re the only girl in the class.”

  Georgie smiled. “I can see that, sir.”

  Heath Brompton frowned. He didn’t want a girl in his class. He’d have to make special allowances. There was only one changing room for starters; where would she get dressed? And how would she handle rough-housing with the lads? She would probably burst into tears the minute another player came near her.

  “I’ll have to talk to the headmistress about this,” Heath harrumphed. “I doubt she’ll allow—”

  “Mrs Dickins-Thomson has already approved the transfer.”

  Heath Brompton wasn’t convinced. “I’m sure the Blainford rules don’t allow girls to play.”

  “There’s nothing about girls playing polo in the school rules – I already checked.”

  Heath Brompton was an odd-looking man. He reminded Georgie a little bit of Gordon Ramsay with his deep frown lines and his cheeks marked with pocks and crevices. On top of his head he had a thick thatch of black hair, and a pair of bushy black eyebrows sat heavily over his hooded eyes. He raised one of those furry brows at Georgie’s comment. “It may not be in the rules as such, Parker, but I think you’ll find that historically girls have never played—”

  “Excuse me, sir, but my mother played for the school,” Georgie insisted. Then she added with particular emphasis, “Polo is a big tradition in my family.”

  Georgie knew what the teachers were like here at Blainford, always on about the school traditions and customs. Well, if they wanted to play it that way then she could too. If a woman had played back in her mum’s day then surely Georgie could join the team too?

  When Georgie had stumbled upon her mother’s photo in the yearbook it had been the first time she had ever considered polo as a possibility. She had smuggled the book back to the dorm with her and shown it to Alice.

  “She was team captain,” Georgie told her proudly, reading out the text beneath the picture.

  “After being undefeated all season the Blainford Polo Team, led by Virginia Lang, lost their final game against Byerley Park by a narrow margin in the penalty shoot-out, with a score of eight goals to nine.”

  “That’s your mum?” Alice had been impressed. “I thought I knew everything about this place, but I had no idea that girls used to play polo.”

  Neither did Georgie. She had never even considered it when she was looking for something to replace cross-country class as an option subject. She’d watched the matches at the school between the boys’ houses – particularly Luhmuhlen and Burghley who held an annual grudge match at the start of the first term. Alex and Cam both played for Luhmuhlen, and James Kirkwood and Conrad both played for Burghley. But it had never occurred to Georgie that a girl could play until she saw that picture of her mum.

  “This isn’t going to work out, Parker.” Heath Brompton looked distinctly unhappy. “You don’t have the right kit. And if this is the mare you’re planning to ride then she’s too large. A polo mare should usually be no more than fifteen-two.”

  “I know she’s a bit big,” Georgie said, “but I’ve been reading about the sport and apparently a lot of the Argentinian riders are choosing taller mares now. The main thing is that the polo mare should be athletic, short-coupled with strong hocks and rump and a long neck – so she’s got the perfect conformation.” Georgie paused for breath. “I’ve already ordered my polo kit from the school store. I’ll have it in time for the next lesson; this is just what I’m wearing today.”

  Heath Brompton didn’t look any more pleased after the explanation, but it was clear this girl wasn’t giving up.

  “We’re having stick-and-ball today,” he said, reaching into his kit bag to pass Georgie a mallet. “The easiest way to learn is to just join in with the other players. You’ll pick it up as you go.”

  Stick-and-ball turned out to be the polo equivalent of a football kick-about. There were no real rules and the point of the exercise was to settle the ponies and get them accustomed to having the mallet swung about right beside them without shying. At the same time the riders also worked on their own stick skills, practising their forehand and backhand shots.

  Determined not to waste any of his precious coaching time on his new pupil, Heath Brompton promptly turned his back on Georgie and focused his energies on his best players. He shouted out advice as the riders loped about, rising up and down in the saddle with each canter stride in that peculiar way that only polo players do.

  Georgie began to imitate the other riders, practising her rising canter, going up and down on the sidelines of the field.

  There were several balls scattered across the fields and the riders were taking it in turns to hit them, timing it right to strike the surface cleanly with their mallets, then urging their ponies on to give chase and hit the ball a second time to pass it to the next player.

  Georgie rode Belle forward to join in, but on her first attempt, she hit the ball at a skewed angle so that it bounced straight into a snowdrift on the side of the field.

  “Oops!”

  Heath Brompton glared at her. “Not into the snow, Parker! Down the field!”

  Georgie began to try and dig the ball out with her mallet when a rider on a bay mare came over to help her.

  “It’s not your fault,” the boy on the bay said as he used his mallet to help her dig. “We usually have the sideboards round the fields to keep the balls in, but the grounds have only just been snow-ploughed so the boards haven’t been put back yet.”

  The boy looked at Georgie. “I know you, don’t I? You’re friends with Cameron Fraser and Alex Chang?”

  Georgie nodded. “I used to be in their eventing class. How do you know Cam and Alex?”

  “We’re on the Luhmuhlen house polo team together,” the boy said.

  Georgie recognised him now. She had seen him playing last term against Burghley House.

  The boy put his mallet in his left hand along with the bundle of reins that he was already clutching, so that he could reach over and shake her hand.

  “My name is JP. JP Lewis.”

  “Georgie Parker,” she smiled back. “Or George, according to Mr Brompton.”

  “So you’ve never played polo before?” JP asked.

  “Nope.”

  “Would you like me to show you how to hold your stick properly?” he offered. “You’ve got it almost like a baseball bat the way you’re holding it at the moment. It needs to be more like a golf club. Wrap the cord like this round your thumb and then the stick rests in the palm of your hand like this.”

  He demonstrated with his own stick, and Georgie mirrored him.

  “Don’t grip it tight,” JP advised. “Hold it nice and loose. When you hit the ball, you don’t try and whack it – keep your shoulder loose and the power comes from the timing of your swing. Here, watch me!”

  JP cantered his mare out on to the field and turned back to take aim at a ball lying on the ground in front of him. He took his swing as if he had all the time in the world, shoulders loose and wrists relaxed. The mallet contacted the ball with a hard thwack and drove it all the way to the far end of the field.

  “See?” JP grinned at her. “Now you have a go.”

  It took Georgie a few more goes to master the polo grip and get her timing right before she could do a half-decent forehand shot. The backhand still seemed clumsy to her and she was doing something funny with her wrist. “Don’t turn your mallet, just swing backwards!” JP instructed her. “That’s better!”

  If Georgie was taking a while to catch on, it took Belle no time at all. Right from the start, the bay mare seemed to have a natural instinct for
the sport, chasing the ball down, and never flinching as Georgie swung the mallet beside her.

  “She’s a nice mare,” JP said. “Some of them take to it straight away. They have that competitive urge to beat the other mares to the ball.”

  “Why are polo ponies always mares?” Georgie asked.

  JP shrugged. “Mares just seem to be more aggressive than geldings on the field – they chase the ball better. Nobody knows why.”

  Belle stood out from the other mares on the field. Even though they were called polo ponies, they were actually horses – most of them between fifteen and fifteen-two hands high. At sixteen hands, Belle was a good two inches taller than most, which meant that Georgie had to stretch down lower, hanging right out of the saddle to sweep at the ball. And while the rest of the ponies on the field had their tails tied up and their manes hogged to a short bristle along the neckline, Belle’s mane and tail were still flowing free.

  “Polo mares always have their manes hogged,” JP told her. “Your hands could get tangled – plus you’ve already got two sets of reins and a mallet to hold. You can’t have the mane getting in the way as well.”

  The polo mares all wore their tails tied up for the same reason. “It can really hurt a mare if she gets her tail hooked and yanked by a mallet,” JP winced. He turned his mare Tosca round to show Georgie her tail.

  “For stick-and-ball training, I just tie it up in an Argie knot,” JP said. “But if it’s like a proper tournament then I tape her tail.”

  “Why is it called an Argie knot?” Georgie asked.

  “It’s short for Argentinian Knot,” JP said. “I’ve played a bit of polo over there – it’s a much faster game than in Britain and—”

  “JP!” Heath Brompton was striding across the field towards them.

  “You’re not going to make the squad if you spend all your time helping beginners to learn the game. Get out on the field. We’ve still got another ten minutes before class finishes.”

  Georgie followed JP out on to the field, aware that Heath Brompton was glaring at her. She focused on the ball and tried to swing at it, but nerves got the better of her and she missed the ball entirely.

  “Come on, Georgie!” Heath Brompton called out, “Hit it!”

  When she failed to stop the next ball and it went whistling past and smacked into the fetlocks of another pony he just about went berserk. “You’re supposed to trap it! Turn that mare round! You’re moving too slow. If you can’t execute a turn at the canter then you’re useless in a game!”

  Georgie nodded to acknowledge her teacher and then rode Belle on hard after the ball. She caught up with a boy on a grey mare, and managed to put some of JP’s advice into practice, stealing the ball by executing a clever sideways shot that went straight under Belle’s own belly.

  It was a slick move, but Heath Brompton remained unimpressed.

  “A lucky shot. Your ball skills are minimal,” he told Georgie as the players headed back to the changing rooms. “I can tell that you’ve never played before. If you’re planning to remain in this class then you need to work on stick-and-ball outside of school time. We’ll be dividing into teams for a game next week. I want you in proper kit. Full polo whites, gag and martingale.”

  At least Heath Brompton was talking about the next lesson. She hadn’t actually been kicked out of his class yet.

  “Oh, and Parker?” the polo master added as they rode off back towards the stables. “Get that mare’s mane hogged!”

  *

  The next day after school Georgie stood beside Belle with the mane clippers in her hands. She could feel the engine vibrating, ready to power the blades into action. Belle was standing there perfectly calm, unperturbed by the whirr of the motor. All Georgie needed to do was hold the clippers up against the crest of the mare’s neck and run the blades along to shave the mane off at the roots from the withers to the forelock.

  Georgie raised the clippers… and then completely lost her bottle, switched them off and put them down.

  “I can’t do it,” Georgie murmured to the mare as she reached out and ran her fingers through the long, silky black strands. Belle had a gorgeous mane. It was thick and jet-black, a perfect contrast against the mare’s russet-bay body. Georgie always kept it neatly pulled, so that it finished in a tidy line along the neck rather than having scraggy split ends. She imagined Belle without her mane, just the stubble left over like the bristles of a loo brush running up the crest of her neck. Ughh! It was too horrible. Georgie would rather shave her own head than do this!

  She put the clippers away. There had to be some other way. She got out her grooming kit and rummaged around until she found the mane comb, glycerine gel and a packet of rubber bands. She would plait Belle up instead.

  It took her an hour to plait up and by then Georgie was due on the polo field. She had arranged to meet JP, along with Alex and Cam for a bit of casual stick-and-ball. The three boys were already there ahead of her. JP was mounted up on the same polo mare he’d ridden in class the day before, and Alex and Cam both rode two of the Luhmuhlen House polo ponies.

  “Hey, Georgie,” Cam smiled as she approached them. “I never picked you for a polo player.” Cam tapped the ball towards her, as if he was batting a Ping-Pong ball to a kitten and Georgie responded by kicking Belle into a canter and striking the ball straight back with a fairly good forehand shot.

  “Whoa!”

  “Nice stroke,” JP grinned. “Come on, let’s play two aside. Georgie is on my team.”

  It was a fast-paced stick-and-ball session. This time, instead of feeling like she was totally uncoordinated, Georgie was able to hold her own against the others. By the end of the session she could strike the ball forehand and backhand and even lift her stick over Belle’s shoulder to take a nearside shot.

  She held the mallet in her right hand just as JP had shown her. In her other hand she now held four reins because Belle was kitted out in her new polo double bridle. Alex had explained how to hold the two sets of reins all in the one hand in the complicated arrangement known as an English Bridge. But Georgie far preferred the hold that Cameron showed her, with the reins snaking up between her fingers and thumb of her left hand, a style known as the Argentinian grip.

  The practice session lasted for half an hour and by the end the ponies were sweating, flanks heaving.

  JP looked over at Belle, who had worked up a lather of white foam on her neck. “So what are your other ponies like?” he asked Georgie.

  “What do you mean?” Georgie asked. “I don’t have any other ponies.”

  “Well you’ll need a string,” JP said. “If you’re serious about playing.”

  “Uhh, when you say a ‘string’,” Georgie said anxiously, “how many ponies do you mean exactly? Like two or three?”

  “Yeah, right,” JP said. “Try six or seven!”

  Georgie felt her heart sink. Of course she needed more than one pony! When she thought back to the polo matches she’d seen at Blainford she’d watched them swap over ponies after each chukka. The galloping pace of a polo game was so fast and furious the ponies were exhausted after seven minutes. A fresh pony was required for each chukka – and there were six chukkas in a game!

  “Don’t freak out,” JP said. “You can maybe get away with four ponies at low goal level – there’re only four chukkas in a low goal game.”

  Georgie still felt sick. Four ponies were three more than she had!

  Georgie looked over at Cam and Alex. “But you guys don’t have your own string.”

  “That’s true,” Cam said, “but we’ve got the Luhmuhlen ponies to use.”

  Luhmuhlen and the other boys’ boarding houses all had strings of sixteen school ponies in their stables, enough horses to supply a team of four boys. But the girls’ boarding houses didn’t have their own polo strings.

  “You don’t need four ponies for Heath Brompton’s classes,” JP reassured her as they hacked together back towards the stables. “But if you want to compete o
r play in any of the school tournaments then you’ll definitely need them.”

  “Do you ride Luhmuhlen ponies?” Georgie asked.

  “Me?” JP looked a bit insulted. “No, I’ve got my own string. I keep them stabled with the Luhmuhlen ponies though.”

  “So, if you’ve played in Argentina does that mean you’re a really good player?” Georgie asked.

  “My family all play polo so I’ve been on the circuit during the school holidays,” JP said. “Players get graded between minus-two and ten. Ten goals is the best – there’s hardly any ten-goal players in the world. My dad is a six-goal player and I’m a two-goal player – which is pretty good for someone who’s just about to turn fourteen…”

  There was a thunder of hooves across the fields. Georgie looked up and saw James Kirkwood riding towards them at a flat gallop on his polo mare. When he reached Georgie and JP he pulled the mare up to an abrupt stop alongside them.

  “Hey, Georgie,” James said, trying to act casual as if he hadn’t just done a mad gallop to catch her. “I didn’t know you were a polo player.”

  “I just started playing,” Georgie said. “It’s my new option subject.”

  “Georgie’s just joined my class,” JP added.

  James narrowed his eyes suspiciously at JP. “How are things, John-Patrick?”

  “Same as,” JP responded.

  “I hope you weren’t boring Georgie with your stories about what a polo hero you are?” James said. Then, with his voice dripping sarcasm he added, “Like you’re the big two-goal superstar!”

  JP frowned. “What’s your problem, Kirkwood? I was just showing Georgie a few moves.”

  “I bet you were.” James looked indignant. “Well she doesn’t need your help. In case you hadn’t heard I’m due to get regraded mid-season so I’ll be two goals as well. I think I’m qualified to take over Georgie’s training schedule from here.”

  “Geez, dude,” JP raised his hands in mock surrender. “We were just playing a bit of stick-and-ball. There’s no need to go all alpha male on me.”