HOLIDAYS AT CAREYES POLO CLUB
By Susan Stovall
Peru, California, France, Germany, Portugal and both Guadalajara and Mexico City were represented by players at the Costa Careyes Polo Club during the Christmas and New Year holidays. The weather was perfect and the wáter was 78 degrees for before and after relaxation. The social calendar was full with parties hosted by Corinne Schuler, owner of the Polo Club St. Tropez and Gian Franco Brignone, founder of Costa Careyes, at his El Tigre home.
Corinne Schuler won the high scoring amateur award presented to her by Giorgio Brignone, president and Ceo of the Careyes Polo Club and Resort. Guillermo Li was the high-scoring professional.
Four teams played for the coveted Copa Careyes. The Aguilar brothers, Vale(5) and Pancho(4), led the Saint Tropez team of Corinne Schuler(0) and Jorge Suarez(1) to victories in the tournaments. Hugo Villalobos (1), Sergio Guzman(0), Tico Gaibay (3) and Miguel Gomez(3) were the Cronos-Guadalajara team that handed the St Tropez’s only defeat in a surprise upset of 6-5 on the way to the finals. The format was quite simple as all teams played each other and the two teams with the best record played in the finals. The finalists did come down to the last match between the underdog Cronos against Casa Sombras/Squirt of Jorge Garciarce(1), Bolko Kissling (1), Guillermo Li (5) and Joel Acosta(2) with Li leading the Casa Sombras/Squirt team with 5 goals but the combination of Garibay and Gomez de Parada had six. The hándicap of 2 goal spread made the difference and the final score was 9 to 8 – the Cronos team victorious. Hugo Villalobos scoring 2 more goals for the winners. The subsidiary was Careyes with Giorgio Brignone(1), owner of the polo club and Careyes Resort, Alejandro Gomez de Parada (3), Manuel Matos (1) and Raul Ramirez(2) against the Casa Sombras/Squirt team – the latter team winning 7 to 5 with Bolko Kissling scoring 3 goals for the winners.
Saint Tropez Polo Team victorious in the 2009 Copa Careyes - Corinne Schuler, Jorge Suarez, Vale and Pancho Aguilar.
During the day Triunfo Tequila sponsored a special event to launch their new line of tequila. The winners for that day were presented their top of the line signature tequila by Miguel Landeros, president of Triunfo Tequila. Shots, special tequila drinks, food and entertainment was provided for everyone.
The finals are always exciting as each team came with their game faces ready to be the victor. The Aguilar brothers were tough and scored 6 of the 9 goals with Corinne Schuler putting through the uprights the other three. Cronos-Guadalajara started out goal for goal but after Tico Garibay was injured with a mallet to the hand in the third chukker of the five chukker game, they seemed to lose their momentum going down to defeat 9 to 5. Corinne Schuler and Guillermo Li were high scoring amatuer and professional for the tournament and awarded trophies by Giorgio Brignone.
Copa de Año Neuvo was a one day match game affair with St Tropez, 10 goals, against Casa Sombras/Squirt, 9 goals. The new team of Careyes , 7 goals,with Brignone, Ramirez, Miguel Gomez de Parada and Kate Falk were pitted against Quinto Sol’s team, 7 goals, of Manuel Matos, Alejandro Gomez de Parada, Chris Falk and Jim Giebeler. The winners for the New Years were St Tropez and Careyes with both games only a goal difference.
New Year's Day Bracket 1
New Year's Day Bracket II
The next event on the schedule for Careyes is the Ladies Tournament from January 12 to the 16th. Women players from California, Mexico, Illinois and Washington State are on the roster.
See http://www.careyes.com for more information.