MAQU, Gansu province, Aug. 14 (Xinhua) -- It was in mid-August, and two teams of Tibetan young men were competing against each other in Hequ Polo Court, located in Maqu, a county in Gannan Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture of Gansu Province in China.

Polo club in hand, the two teams on horses were galloping on the boundless pastures, hitting the polo balls swiftly and precisely. The whole team would swing their clubs high and exclaim celebrations with each goal.

As is know to all, polo is considered a "sports for the noble" because its popularity mainly among the richer class in Europe, Middle East and South America. This kind of sports has not been seen on Maqu Prairie, or most of Tibetan areas, for hundreds of years until recently, when reporter saw it on the vast grasslands of Tibetan Plateau.

This exciting and intense game attracted quite a lot of tourists. However, different from the enthusiasm of these tourists, two men were wearing a focused look on their face, exchanging talks from now and then.

One of them is Tsaigan, sponsor of Hequ Polo Team, the other Professor Yongdrol K. Tsongkha, professor for Tibetan and ethnic study at Institute for Tibetao-burman and Altaic Studies of Lanzhou University.

Their acquaintance began with one same interest: Hequ horses. Maqu County is known for its pure animal husbandry county of Tibetan ethnic residence, as well as the main home to Hequ horses, a famous horse breed in China.

Running a pasture in Hequ Horse Ranch, Tsaigan's daily life is closely related to horses. Professor Tsongkha, on the other hand, has been studying the polo-related parts in Tibetan culture for over 20 years, and was hoping to re-start polo games in Tibetan areas.

These two went along well instantly. During summer in 2010, Tsaigan used his own grasslands as the pitch, brought together the herdsmen nearby on the back of Hequ horses from his own ranch, and formed the first polo team in Zhouqu County.

"It' s not really a 'new' sport, because it had already prevailed in the Tibetan areas during period of the seventh and eighth centuries. It' s more of a traditional sport."

Prof. Tsongkha found that polo has an unbreakable connection with the Tibetan nation. "For example, in Tibetan language, the word for 'polo' is pronounced almost exactly the same with the English word."

Looking through abundant historical documents, Prof. Tsongkha found from a Mandarin document in Tang Dynasty, a record of the Tibetan polo team from competing with the "imperial team" . Polo seems to disappear from Tibetan areas after the Yuan Dynasty as there has no more records about it ever since.

Despite the various reasons for polo to "vanish" , Professor Tsongkha has always wished to resume this traditional folk sport in Tibet, because it is one of the most precious cultural legacies in this nation.

"In the 1990s, I used to suggest to an official we start the polo sport in Tibetan areas, but he was not really interested. Now things have changed, because many people are starting to pay attention to this sport, such as him," Prof. Tsongkha pointed to Tsaigan next to him.

The first polo team in Maqu County formed by Tsaigan, the associate manager at Hequ Horse Ranch followed the traditional Tibetan rules of the game.

There is no limit to the number of participants for each team, and whoever scores a goal wins. This kind of exciting and free game style fits perfectly with the character of "the nation on horse" .

The news that Tsaigan formed a polo team attracted quite some attention from the local herdsmen. Many nearby villages sent people for consultation. With the help of Tsaigan and Prof. Tsongkha, many people joined in this sport in Maqu.

This summer at Hequ Horse Ranch, 7 teams took part in a polo game, among which, apart from the 2 teams formed by Tsaigan, 5 teams were sent by other neighboring villages. Even the officials from Maqu County government watched the game.

Tsaigan has hired a professional coach from Inner Mongolia to train the team for two months. Now the team players have mastered the rules of a British polo game. He wants to let the unique Tibetan-styled polo known to the tourists and polo fans all over the world.

Tsaigan believes polo is a sport worth long-term investment and he will carry on with it. "Many Tibetan young men now can't even ride a horse, so the motorcycle is the main transportation means in pasturing areas. I hope that through the popularizing of polo, people will get rid of motorcycles and ride horses more often, meanwhile increase their attention on the horses."

As a result of the development of the market economy, traditional functions of the horses are weakening while herdsmen choose to ride the more convenient motorcycles. Yet in recent years, as a traditional folk sports mode in China, horsemanship is returning to people' s common life in the form of mass sports for herdsmen as well as competitive sports events.

As Prof. Tsongkha understands it, polo is associated with Tibetan nomadic culture. "With the development of polo, there will be more polo players and increase the number of horse-raisers, which will make a difference to the protection of the Tibetan nomadic culture."

At sunset, a piece of victorious news came back to Hequ Horse Ranch. A racing horse from Hequ Horse Ranch has just won the title in the local horse-racing meeting that opened today. The polo players who were still training are thrilled to hear the news.

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