The Holy Donuts of Memphis are in a heated battle with Hot Dog Water. It's Sunday morning, day two of the June 25-26 Summer Solstice Slam III bike polo tournament.
The score is tied, 1-1, as each three-person team battles for position on the court in Little Rock's MacArthur Park, whacking viciously at the red plastic ball with their mallets in an effort to score or pass while somehow managing to actually ride their bicycles, mostly one-handed, and not end up in a heap on the hot concrete.
The teams have fought for 10 minutes and, since this is a tournament, there has to be a winner to advance.
The scorekeeper calls time. Holy Donuts and Hot Dog Water are in overtime.
A few minutes later, Hot Dog Water scores, ending the match.
The tired teams guide their bikes off the court and two other squads mount up to play.
It would go on this way deep into Sunday evening -- until the eventual winners, The Cereal Killers, were crowned.
Although the Summer Solstice Slam is a weekend tournament and summer solstice was actually a few days earlier, the event is also dubbed "The Longest Day of Bike Polo."
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The Slam got rolling the day before, June 25, as 22 teams started the friendly tournament on a quest for bike polo glory and more than a little fun. Players from Wisconsin, Florida, Tennessee, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, Indiana, Texas and North Carolina descended upon Little Rock to do battle on their bikes.
"This is one of the best courts in the South," says Rob Moore, sounding not unlike an Arkansas version of Jeff Spicoli, while relaxing in a hammock under the shade of a willow oak on the south end of the court. "This is a pretty big deal in the polo world."
Moore is from Fayetteville, where bike polo is just getting off the ground.
"We're an infant version of what they have down here."
The tournament was hosted by the Little Rock Bike Polo club, a group that got started in 2009.
"We started playing in the River Market pavilion," says Dave O'Brien, "and then we found this place."
The MacArthur Park court, 120 feet long by 55 feet wide and also used for street hockey and soccer, turned out to be ideal for blitzing around on bicycles while trying to smack a ball into a net about four feet wide.
The club plays each Sunday afternoon, usually from 2 to 4 p.m., and about 7 p.m. each Tuesday, year-round, with eight to 10 players usually showing up for pickup games, O'Brien says.
O'Brien and fellow club members James Vaughn and Jared Rickman teamed up as Scoregasm to compete during the tournament.
Vaughn, 30, who works at Spokes bicycle shop in Little Rock, started out riding mountain bikes before getting into bike polo. O'Brien, who moved to Little Rock from Denver, was also a mountain biker and, at 48, is somewhat of an elder statesman.
"I'm pretty old for this sport. I used to ride mountain bikes in Colorado, but the terrain here is different. There are a lot of sharp rocks and I've had some horrific crashes. It's safer to play bike polo," he says, as a match takes place and some spectators and riders cool off in a large above-ground pool filled by hoses dripping a steady stream of water from holes cut into a blue tarp above.
Rickman, 30, a bearded and bespectacled sustainability consultant for a commercial construction firm, started playing six years ago, about a year after he moved to Little Rock from Tulsa.
"I had a roommate who knew some of the people who played. I followed my roommate out here and started playing," he says. "I wasn't a real cyclist. I was just riding my bike around and commuting. This was one of the first groups of people I got to know here."
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Bike polo started in Seattle in the early 2000s, when bored bike messengers began messing around and stumbled onto a new sport, making their own mallets and gear. Portland, Ore., messengers picked up on it and, as people moved to other parts of the country, the sport spread. (A distant cousin, cycle polo, played on grass, started in 1891 in County Wicklow, Ireland. The original
polo, played on horses, dates to either the sixth century B.C. or the first century A.D. in Iran, depending on the source.)
Watching a bike polo match is like seeing the mutated descendant of hockey, soccer, roller derby, BMX and traditional polo come charging to life.
Each match begins with the two teams lined up, back wheels against the fence, on opposite ends of the court. A referee places the ball in the center of the court and the game begins with a joust.
And the joust, at full speed, is thrilling to behold.
During one Saturday morning match, a rider came rocketing out to the joust in a sprint that would have made pro road racer Mark Cavendish proud. Added to that speed was the fact that he was dashing to a spot on the court against another rider going almost as fast to almost the exact same spot -- and they were both carrying sticks.
What follows is a kind of elegant ballet on bicycles, with players gripping their mallets with one hand and handlebar with the other, stopping and starting quickly, sometimes bumping each other and swinging at the ball in an effort to get it into their opponent's goal, which is usually guarded by someone sitting still on a bike.
And all of this happens with feet on pedals. Touching the court with a foot, called dabbing, results in having to take oneself out of a play and tap a gate on the side of the court before one can return.
"Some of these guys' passing skills are amazing," says O'Brien with admiration while watching a match.
There are no set positions on a team -- players trade off guarding the goal, for instance.
"You switch off and on to give each other a break," O'Brien says.
The Slam had coed teams as well as teams of all guys. The matches were 10 minutes long, or were called when a team reached five goals.
Most of the polo bikes are single-speeds and are made of steel, with at least a front brake. Many players wear shoes that clip into their pedals, which makes hopping and accelerating easier, and it's common to see players use their mallets to pivot and balance their bikes.
Of course, it's not always graceful. Gravity is such a cruel mistress. During one Sunday morning match a player unceremoniously, and all alone in the center of the court, crashed in a clumsy pile of body and bike.
"How did that even happen?" wondered one spectator.
And if staying upright on two wheels while controlled chaos swirls all around isn't hard enough, that ball is very hard. The little sphere, about the size of an apple, can come flying at a player from the end of a mallet like a Clayton Kershaw fastball.
"The harder balls fly like crazy," O'Brien says, recalling the time he was hit in the upper arm and "my whole arm went dead."
No wonder some polo players wear full-face masks. At the very least, most wear helmets and various pads to cover their tender and exposed bits.
"I used to play with just a helmet and gloves," Vaughn, whose pierced earlobes sport gauges, says. "Then the harder I played, the more I realized I needed more pads." Now he wears knee and shin pads along with thick shoes originally made for downhill mountain biking.
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"We're real excited about the bike polo club," says Sharon Priest of the MacArthur Park Group, which was founded in 2006 to develop ways to enhance MacArthur Park. "But there is no way I'd ever get out there. It looks too dangerous."
The Little Rock club has worked closely with the park group and the Little Rock Parks and Recreation Department.
"They like to help us, and we help them as much as we can," Rickman says. "The parks department is aware of what we're doing and they are really supportive. Years ago, we were the only people using the park continuously. Now there's the dog park and other stuff. Other clubs don't have a supportive parks department like we do."
Priest expects money from a 2011 sales tax can be used to build another court.
"That's what's cool about this club," says former Little Rock Bike Polo member Toby Chu, who now lives in New Orleans, from the pool next to the court Saturday morning. "It's a very tightknit community and they do things with the city. It's really special compared to other cities. There's no sneaking around. This is legit."
Visit with spectators and players between matches, and the social aspect of the sport is on full display. Teams aren't necessarily the common bond, with players mingling regardless of their affiliation. The whole vibe leans distinctly toward "chill," even in 90-plus degree heat.
"It's fun when you get to travel," says Funlola Coker of the Holy Donuts team.
"I love traveling for bike polo tournaments," says Michelle Toledo of Houston and the Jalapeno Bidness team. Toledo has been playing more than three years and has been to tournaments all over the nation and in Mexico. "Usually the host team will offer places where you can crash on someone's floor. We all support each other."
The Little Rock club offered spare bedrooms and couches, but the group also helped get the new Firehouse Hostel and Museum at 212 Commerce St., ready for the 30 or so visiting players who stayed there over the tournament weekend.
"It's like high school sports for grown-ups," says Rob Moore from his hammock. "It's a real neat community."
For information about the Little Rock Bike Polo Club, visit facebook.com/lrbpolo
ActiveStyle on 07/04/2016