Women's Tourney

@carissa It would be worth getting in contact with Joelle (Sydney) and Morag (BNE) as they've been discussing this tournament for a while now and have begun early planning stages. Sam has asked me to help with formats and satellite tournie scheduling for WHBPC (outlined in the other thread) so I'd love to talk to the three of you to nut this out some more. So far it's got the first dips on your preferred date.

Im all for a lady bench or tourney at worlds, I actually think its a BLOODY GREAT IDEA!!! Im also all for another satellite ladies tourney. Brisbane put our hands up to host it, and the whole club is behind it. It was news to us that it has been relocated to Sydney the week after, but that is easily resolved as we can just host a standard party tourney that weekend.

I have been talking to international players who are already planning on coming to the east coast. A run from Brisbane, to Sydney then on to Melbs afterward would be a perfect way to encompass a lot of what our country has to offer in a three week holiday format (with polo as the focus!). By Brisbane offering a tourney the week after players can go up the coast from Brisbane to the reef or to Fraiser island, the Whitsundays, Glass house mountains/Sunny coast and down to the GC/Byron/Nimbin. All fine touristic fodder.

So to summarise, Brisbane are happy to host a ladies tourney but are happy to host a standard tourney the week after worlds.

My only comment about Sydney during Mardi Gras is accommodation will be hard to come by and expensive in an already expensive city for accom, so billeting for internationals is a must.

I've caught up with Joelle and been filled in on the progress of the Womens tournie. It's sounding great. I've been told that she's been in contact with you @carissa ?

One proposal so far:
1 week prior: NZ city or MEL (or BNE)
WHBPC
1 week after: Women's tournie in SYD
2 weeks after: BNE (or MEL)

the theory is that they fly into NZ for the week prior, get over jetlag and play a local tournie, travel to TUI then those that want to play in the womens tournie fly to SYD and those that dont travel NZ or east coast AU then all players meet the following week in either BNE or MEL. If no NZ city hosts something the week prior to WHBPC then I think MEL might be a good choice for incoming flights. Thoughts?

Yep sorry @brooktaitstyles had a heck of a week and haven't gotten back to the board till today.

Question on the tourney thing. Would people want to do a tourney prior to the worlds? Chch was thinking of doing a low key event of some kind the week after (though we could do it before but wasn't sure what people would like) The week after is "Bike to work day" hence thinking it would be a good time to leverage off of that. If people think a tourney would be attended prior to worlds we could set something up (as we are getting a city back...whoop whoop).

Otherwise I thought of trying to organise some MTBing, alley cat, bike pub crawl, other idea I haven't mentioned which could include pick up games. There's potential to work with other groups for bike powered movies and the such as well. Whatever is most likely to get people attending.

Brisbane have always planned on doing a tourney the week after worlds.

So far it seems the lady tourney will be the week after that, which works well as players can travel south, and the east coast is a pretty great part of Aus to travel.

@carissa I think people would definitely be keen for a tournament before worlds but history has shown that a low key one or something with a difference is best as players want practice but want to go easy to protect themselves. Your idea of perhaps not doing a big tournie but small events as a "welcome" party weekend could be a really good idea too as many internationals will fly into CHC that weekend then drive down to TUI.

@ollie1 Would many people be driving though? If Sydney's mardi gras is that same weekend then would that be better to not clash with? Yes, there are plenty of great spots to sight see near BNE but sydney and MLB also have plenty too so as you mention, scheduling these near each other would be best.

I think most people who come to NZ who want to sightsee will do this after TUI so that's why I thought a womens tournie the first weekend after it might be best(?), then a larger one the following weekend, once people are done travelling. perhaps a benefit of SYD two weeks after means that people can ore easily fly back home after it...?

Yeah, so if its two weeks after its Mardi Gras. If you are talking about hosting the ladies tourney the week after then you miss Mardi Gras.

From my talks with Morag who is spearheading this she is pushing for the same weekend as Mardi Gras, which leaves the week after worlds open for Brisbane. And like I said there is then a clear linear southern movement of tourneys like last years European run (Bordeaux>Montpellier>Barcelona) we could have a clear southern run of BNE>SYD>MLB.

Again I think that the Ladies tourney should have precedence on dates and what not, and other tourneys can be organised around it.

I also don't think there is a problem with holding multiple tourneys on similar weekends and holding tourneys even a month after worlds. If we can have a minimum of one tourney per weekend for a month it will give players options for the kind of holiday they want.

Morag and Joelle have both been organising it and on thursday I heard that a preference would be one week after hence our confusion in this. Perhaps I'll get in contact with them and get them to get back to us with something more cohesive. The satellite tournies aren;t as important at this stage as players cant even get plane tickets yet, but it's good to get the ball rolling.

As you've stated, I do definitely think its paramount to make it as easy as possible to plan it in a way that's easiest for travelling around both NZ and AUS and still play polo