International Polo Club Palm Beach Sold to US Polo Association
2 years ago StraightArrow Comments Off on International Polo Club Palm Beach Sold to US Polo Association
June 9, 2022
The United States Polo Association has bought the core assets of International Polo Club Palm Beach in Wellington, Florida and will rename it the USPA National Polo Center.
USPA acquired 161 acres/65ha. including Fields 1 through 5, the IPC grandstand, the Pavilion, the Mallet Grille, the Seventh Chukker, the USPA Clubhouse shop, the Outback Field, the Outback facility, and the IPC social club and its facilities, including a swimming pool, gym, and tennis courts.
USPA Board of Governors said the USPA-owned “Sunday Field” will serve as the permanent center of polo in America.
The contract was signed by USPA Chairman Stewart Armstrong and Mark Bellissimo, managing partner of Wellington Equestrian Partners, Tryon Equestrian Partners, Colorado Equestrian Partners and CEO of Equestrian Sport Productions, LLC.
Sale of IPC is the second change of ownership of a major equestrian facility in Wellington in the past year that had been owned by partnerships headed up by Mark Bellissimo.
The Global Equestrian Group led by Denmark’s Andreas Helgstrand and Ludger Beerbaum of Germany bought Palm Beach International Equestrian Center, home of the world famous Winter Equestrian Festival of jumpers and hunters, 11 months ago. It has been renamed Wellington International.
The Global Dressage Festival of 12 weeks of dressage during winter and hunter/jumper events during much of the rest of the year and located at Equestrian Village between the Wellington International show venue and the polo grounds has not been sold.
Tim Gannon, co-founder of Outback Steakhouse and three-time winner of the U.S. Open Polo Championship, will be chairman of a newly-formed USPA subsidiary created to revitalize the social club and hospitality facilities.
Ownership of the National Polo Center gives USPA a perpetual home for polo in America that will serve the same function as the AAP-controlled Palermo fields and AAP-owned Pilar fields in Argentina. In will enable USPA to showcase its tournaments, develop American players, and sustain an environment that will retain and attract new players and sponsors at every level as well as securing the future of winter and spring polo in South Florida.
IPC was created in 2002 almost a quarter century after polo began in Wellington on what had been mostly strawberry fields. Hunter/jumper competitions followed polo to Wellington and its sub-tropical weather that in winter made the area attractive to horse sports.
