'A Mad Dash for the ball'

The game begins with what's called a joust; so named because it involves stick-wielding men riding headlong toward each other. Patrick Koetting explained the mechanics of playing polo on bicycles while two teams of three fidgeted with bikes in preparation.

"Everyone puts their back wheel on their own curb, you put the ball in the middle, and "1-2-3-polo!" he explained. "Then it's a mad dash for the ball."

The teams fight to use mallets to knock a street hockey ball through goal cones at either end of the parking lot while keeping perched on their bikes. It's a game of grunts and near-misses, not particularly fast-paced, but all about finesse.

"And if your foot leaves the pedal, you have to leave play," Koetting points out. "You have to go touch the tap-out bucket [at either sideline] before you can come back in."

The dozen-or-so regulars have been playing Sunday nights since earlier in the summer, when Bradley Phillips decided to try and revive the game.

Mallets in hand and astride their bicycles, players ready for polo action. (Laura Simon)

"I kept hearing stories about bike polo from back in the glory days, so I thought it would be nice to get playing again," Phillips said.

From 2007 to 2009, a bike polo league in Cape Girardeau played on turf with mountain bikes and a soccer ball, but being a more ad hoc organization, it faded away.

"It's completely underground, there are no fliers or anything," he said. The group formed more or less organically once Phillips and Koetting started floating the idea. The only requirement was an affinity for all things bicycle. "It's just a fun, underground sport."

Around the time the first league was playing, Koetting recalled, bike polo was a hot trend in places such as Portland, San Fransisco or Chicago, and he thought it sounded like fun.

"I read about it when I was in the bike business, and so that's how we started at first," he said. "Basically, any town that had a [bike] messenger culture. It started with mostly messengers."

"I'd been into bikes for a while before we started playing," said Justin White. "It gives me something to do other than mindlessly drive around."

It also gives him another opportunity to fine-tune bikes. Any bike could be used for polo, but some modifications can make some bikes easier and safer than others.

"When we started out, none of our bikes were set up," he said, but that quickly changed.

Most of the players prefer road bikes with flat, narrow handlebars and a single, left-handed rear brake, to leave the mallet hand free.

"That allows you to actuate the brake with one hand without flipping over the handlebars," Koetting explained.

But even a rear brake can't guarantee you won't go over the handlebars, as Koetting found out. He was the night's referee, unable to ride after a bad crash the previous week landed him in the emergency room with 10 stitches-worth of gash on his forearm.

"It's funny, because when I play, I'm the old guy with shinguards and a helmet and kneepads," the 41-year-old said. "I just landed where I didn't have anything."

Fortunately, his has been the only real injury of the summer. The game is safe enough for Phillips to let his 11-year-old son, Hayden, join in right along with the adults. And instead of staying underground, the group has been trying to broaden its base.

"We're even looking into getting the university involved," Koetting said. Two professors regularly play with them, and he said students would help them get back to the number of players they had years ago when 6-on-6 games were the norm. "I could see it getting back to that level."

tgraef@semissourian.com

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