Sports: Polo For The Proles

Affordable polo seems quite the oxymoron, but the sport of kings may finally be shedding its fusty origins. There's the news that World Polo Ltd. plans to bring polo to inner-city London for the first time since 1939 in a three-day Polo in the Park tournament. The tourney, which will take place in June 2009, is giving 100 free tickets to locals, with other tickets starting at £15—a boon when a regular day at the polo grounds usually costs at least £100. Then there's the growing popularity of beach polo, kayak polo and even urban bike polo (favored by Princes William and Harry, whose team plays in London's public parks), which eliminate the sport's priciest component, the ponies. With horses, the sport can cost novices upwards of £25,000 per year.

Stateside, Philadelphia's Work to Ride charity subsidizes polo training for urban youth, and recently took a team on their first trip abroad to play in Nigeria. Polo's also resurging in the lands of its origin, returning to Kashmir this month for the first time in 61 years. And it's being promoted as a national sport in Iran, where hijab-clad women are smitten with the game and where club membership has spiked 200 percent since 2003. Polo is unlikely to eclipse football as the sport of the world's masses, but all the signs point to the dawning of a new "polotariat."