Polo Match...

...Milwaukee Polo Club vs. A Passion for Polo, out of Illinois. 
I'd recently taken a class at a camera shop, and while there I heard about their FOCUS group. (Fun Opportunities for Capturing Unique Shots), so I joined. The shop chooses an interesting place or event to go to & take photos, & one of the shop photographers comes along to the event as well, in case you have any shooting questions. They also bring extra equipment that anyone can try, so today I tried out a Sigma lens, 150-600mm. Needless to say, I liked it!  I had so many pictures, but I picked this one as my main blip because if you look to the left of the ball, you'll see one of the horses has lost a shoe, which is still up in the air. I never knew I'd caught it until I saw the image on the computer.
Before the game started, the horses were all off in the distance alongside their trailers, so another lady from the group and I decided to walk down and across the playing field, over to the trailers to get some (closer) pictures of the horses.  We were half way across the far end of the field when we hear the announcer say (over the loud speaker) "Everyone get off the field NOW", and we just kept talking & walking. Then the guy once again says "EVERYONE get off the field NOW", so I look around, and we're the only two on the field. So I said "On my gosh, he's yelling at US", so I took off  toward the horses while the other lady ran back the way we came. Then I see a vintage airplane up above the field, coming in to land! (actually, there were three of them that came in, one after the other). Well, no wonder they wanted us off the field!!  I"m finishing my run to the horses when I realize the players and grooms are all standing together, laughing at me, & I couldn't help laughing at myself too!  I said to them: "How the heck was I supposed to guess that there would be planes coming in to land--I just wanted to get some pictures of the horses"!  They said the organizers wanted to do something special as it was the last game of the season, so arranged for the planes.  What a nice bunch of people they were. I met a husband & wife that rides with the Illinois team but are from Argentina, as was one of the grooms. I took some pictures while I had a nice chat with them, staying there until I was cleared to walk back across the field. I got quite a bit of razzing from the rest of the group when I got back to where they were, but I told them they were just jealous because I was the only one with close-ups of the horses! Haha! It was a very fun day.  :)))  (I put a few more pics into the extras if you're interested in looking).