Style: February 09, 2018

18 STYLE | report
Australian Open, 2017
Part of the Rodd & Gunn team that won
the NZ Polo Open, 2015
NZ Polo Open, 2016
When you live the life Sam Hopkinson
has, your ultimate holiday is to come
home to the family farm near Rakaia and
do very little. The 35-year-old Cantabrian
has lived a life most of us could never
imagine. He’s spent the majority of his
adult life travelling and chasing summers.
He’s frequently socialised with royals and
celebrities, dining in castles and estates the
globe over.
Sam is a professional polo player and is
one of the people bringing the Heineken
Urban Polo to New Zealand. It’s a sport
that he’s good at, he’s passionate about
and one which has given him a life like no
other. “Winston Churchill once said: ‘A
polo handicap is a person’s ticket to the
world’ and it’s true,” says Sam Hopkinson.
“Polo really does open up a world that
most people won’t ever see.”
Sam was once voted as one of polo’s
hottest horsemen by Vanity Fair magazine.
And he’s been living a lifestyle that’s
a far cry from his rural New Zealand
beginnings. Sam grew up riding horses but
didn’t start playing polo until he was 17
years old, quite late compared to most
but that hasn’t hindered him. He’s in the
top rank of world polo players and has
represented New Zealand regularly on the
international circuit. “It was a life I never
dreamed of, it really was.”
As a young man, Sam first got a glimpse
of the glamorous lifestyle when he went to
the UK as a groomer on the polo circuit.
“I got an insight into what the polo lifestyle
could offer and that’s what drove me. I
came home determined to go back as a
professional player.” When he finished
school, he moved to Auckland where the
sport most flourishes in New Zealand.
After some travelling through polo and
when he realised his talent, he took a big
gamble and flew his horses out to the
UK to base himself there. He lived for six
years in Cirencester and played for the
local club. “It’s very well known as it’s right
beside Prince Charles’ Highgrove Estate,
so it has strong links to the royals and they
play there regularly,” says Sam. “It was an
incredible time of my life, an incredible
place to be a young and professional
polo player. We’d be at parties with the
royal family, constantly dined with lords
and ladies, you’d see things you only read
about in Jilly Cooper novels. The wealth is
incredible.”
It became the norm for Sam to see
Princes Charles, William and Harry on a
regular basis. “They were always there,