“It’s a chance to see these guys in a different light altogether,” Russell said. “They are so down to earth. There are no airs to them. You can get any of them to talk about horses for six hours straight. Once you are out on the playing field, everybody is treated equal.”
After the pregame, the pros take to the field. Domingo Questel and Joel Baker will return to the center’s equidome on June 28 to relive the golden days of polo there, Russell said.
Back in the sport’s heyday, more people learned how to play polo at the Los Angeles Equestrian Center polo school than any other place in the country, Russell said. More than 1,000 polo players have been taught at the center since 1983.
“Eighty percent did it for pleasure, and 20% became professional polo players,” he said.
Russell credits polo’s popularity at that time to actress and equestrian Stefanie Powers.
“She wanted to do a celebrity game, and she brought in Bill Devane, Alex Cord, Doug Sheehan and Pamela Sue Martin, who had never played before in their life and taught them to play polo,” Russell said. “And I’d say of the 50 who have come to the equestrian center, about 75% turned it into a lifestyle.”
Sheehan continued to play on the celebrity team for 15 years after learning the game.
“I flew around with Pamela Sue Martin, Bill Devane and Alex Cord to play the pregames to raise money for various charities and raised a lot of money,” he said. “It was great. We got to meet everybody in the polo world at the time.”
After Cord and Devane quit the celebrity team, Sheehan continued to play and international invitations started coming his way, he said.
