LITTLE ROCK — The streetlights cast shadows taller than their single-speed bikes. The riders are armed with makeshift mallets MacGyver-ed from ski poles and plastic gas pipe. Colorful corrugated plastic covers the wheels of the rider's bikes, but the focus is on the little red ball spinning across the street hockey courts at MacArthur Park.
The game is bike polo, and the players — male and female ranging from their early 20s and up — are members of the Little Rock Bike Polo club. Each Monday and Wednesday evening starting at 8 p.m. (and occasionally on the weekend), the roughly 15 to 20 members engage in a couple of hours worth of hardcourt bike polo, the rough urban cousin of the dignified country club horse polo.
"It's pretty amazing," said Dave O’Brien, the de facto leader of the Little Rock club. "Once you play it you can get obsessed. The best part is you get to ride bikes, with friends and enjoy their company."
It's a club in name only. Membership is open-ended. No dues are necessary. Members bring their own bikes, helmets and, if they have them, their own mallets. If not, the club provides mallets. Show up on a bike — any type is welcomed, although single speeds and bikes owners are not afraid to slightly damage are preferred — grab a mallet and join in on the fun.
"Anyone and everyone can play," said Nathan Vandiver, an original member of the club.
The roots of bicycle polo stretch back to the 1890s and Ireland, and the sport, played on grass, was a demonstration sport at the 1908 Olympics in London. But the explosion of bike polo on hardcourt surfaces, such as the Little Rock Bike Polo club's games, can be traced to the late 20th century and the Pacific Northwest. Since then it's slowly spread across the country, with clubs ranging in size from six members (just enough to square off) to more than 50 members.
O’Brien first played the sport about two years ago in Denver, playing two games. But it wasn't until October 2009 that the Little Rock Bike Polo club first started playing, using the River Market pavilions as their courts until transitioning to the courts at MacArthur Park.
"People just showed up through word of mouth," O’Brien said. "Some people have come and gotten addicted to it and keep coming back, and some people have come out and never come back. It's a gradual thing. It's still growing."
The rules are pretty straightforward. Teams consist of three riders each, who face off against each other at the end of a hardcourt surface. The ball is placed in the court's middle and, at the signal, team members race toward the center of the court to gain possession of the ball. The game is then in motion, with riders circling the court and goalies protecting the park's street-hockey goals, about one bike length apart.
Players can't use their feet to touch the ball, but instead pass it to one another using their mallets. Goals must be scored by hitting the ball with the end of the mallet, not the side of the mallet, a maneuver known as a "shuffle." Players can also steer the ball down the court using a "ball joint," basically cradling the ball in the open end of the mallet and scooting it along the court.
Contact is allowed but only like contact: bike to bike, player to player or mallet to mallet. No mallet to the side of the face is allowed.
The falls are not high-speed crashes associated with road or mountain biking, but generally slow-motion spills. If players "foot down," or touch their feet to the ground, the player is out of play and must tap back in by riding by a bell (or a bucket at MacArthur) and hitting it with their mallet.
Scoring depends on the game, either the first one to three points or five points, or a timed game of 10 minutes.
Beyond the competitive nature of the sport, there is the social aspect. While six members play, other players relax, greeting fellow bike polo players, friends and strangers who wander in, enraptured by the glow and the action.
"We've been into touring and bike camping," said Brian Signorelli, who started playing with his wife after she noticed a flier for the club. "It took a couple of games to get the hang of it, but it really helps you develop your low-speed bike-handling skills. I don't think we are anywhere near competent right now, but we can play."
"We've enjoyed other forms of biking, from road biking to mountain biking," said Adam Taylor of his wife April and his decision to start playing. "We needed something a little low key but still dangerous."
An early 2010 posting to a bike polo website drew the attention of several national clubs, from Savannah, Ga., to Austin, Texas, to the Little Rock courts and in April the Little Rock Bike Polo club hosted the River City Rumble, a bike polo tournament featuring a dozen teams. Visiting clubs praised the Little Rock club for its courts, complete with surrounding wooden walls preventing the ball from rolling away. Other bike polo clubs outside of Little Rock might play on basketball courts, and O’Brien, although he mentions a couple of possible upgrades, said the MacArthur courts are "good courts. We got no complaints."
The tournament also made Little Rock members realize while they might treat the game as a pastime other clubs are more gung-ho.
"They were all way better than us," Vandiver said. "It inspired us.
"We were just goofing around because it was something fun to do. Then the people came down for the tournament, and we realized we had to get better."
Still, the tournament was a success, according to O’Brien, considering its impromptu nature. Prizes ranged from a steel trophy constructed by O’Brien to home brew cooked by a Little Rock Bike Polo club member and assorted biking accessories.
"It was an amazing tournament," he said. "Everybody had a blast."
Plans are for the River City Rumble to become a yearly event, held each spring before temperatures soar.
Ten minutes till 8 p.m. is the magical hour, according to members of the Little Rock Bike Polo club and Mother Nature. It's the time when the sun, just hours earlier scorching, drifts behind the trees that ring the western border of MacArthur Park. Still, even at 7:50 p.m. it's a steaming 88 degrees at gloaming on a mid-June Monday as the various members of the club start slowly circling the street hockey courts on the eastern side of the park.
O’Brien maintains the club has perhaps dissuaded crime in the park on the nights bike polo is in session. It's hard to argue with that contention. Either way, it's a beautiful sight witnessing the fun and socializing the club brings to downtown Little Rock after dark outside of the River Market.
With a cry of "3-2-1, polo!" the game begins. The traffic from the nearby interstate zooms in the background, and, if the wind blows right, the court smells of Pizza Hut pizza. On the court, tires squeak and there's the ever present rapid-fire click of spinning wheels as the bikes, such as a Fuji Absolute 3.0 and a Raleigh Reliant, circle the court, chasing a rolling red ball. There's cries of "wheels getting taco-ed." Heckling is allowed, so bystanders toss gentle insults over the course of the action.
"Is this the same game? What's going on? We only play to three!" Or this exchange between O’Brien and a fellow player: "How'd you do?" "I'm okay. I'm not bleeding yet."
While there are minor spills here and there, it's mostly gentle falls, with riders reacting in time to brace their descents. But mostly the games are low key. Riders ride and bystanders relax, enjoying the downtown night.
"There's such a homemade quality to the sport," O’Brien said. "Kind of like MacGyver. Do it yourself. People are just into whatever.
"It's a great way to meet new people. Everybody's social."