Sarasota Polo Club season begins Sunday in Lakewood Ranch

So who is training who?

As Josh Shelton prepares his horses for the Sarasota Polo Club's opening day Dec. 15, he sometimes engages in a war of wills with one of his mighty steeds.

Take the case of Pepper, who has what Shelton describes as "a lot of personality."

Shelton was ready to take out Pepper, a mix of a thoroughbred and quarter horse called an "appendix," for a little practice polo. Shelton's wife, Mannie, picks up the story from there.

"She pulled off his helmet," Mannie Shelton said with a laugh. "Then she stood on it."

Training polo horses isn't an exact science, but that's what makes it so endearing to Josh and Mannie Shelton.

Taking the Pepper incident a little further, it is interesting to note the mare acts differently depending on whether Josh or Mannie is doing the riding.

"She will adapt with me," Mannie Shelton said.

The Sheltons, who live in the Polo Club in Lakewood Ranch, own 12 polo horses. Those snowbird horses returned to Florida from Wichita, Kansas, where they spend half the year. A lower level of polo is played in Kansas, so Josh Shelton said the faster ones get turned out for most of the summer and part of the fall to rest. The playing season in Kansas ends in September.

Upon returning to Florida on Nov. 1, they were in varying levels of playing condition.

"For every month off, a horse needs a week of work," Josh Shelton said. "But some do get fit faster."

After explaining some of their training methods, Josh and Mannie Shelton rode one of their horses and had three or four others in tow as they headed to the Sarasota Polo Club's training track for laps, or "sets."

For Josh Shelton, it is one of the least enjoyable training moments. Amanda, on the other hand, is all smiles while turning the laps.

"She just likes to ride," Josh Shelton said.

Although Mannie Shelton plays polo, she enjoys the preparation more than the event itself.

"I don't' have a competitive bone in my body," she said.

Her husband is a "two goal" player on a handicap system that goes from minus 2 to 10. Players with handicaps of five to 10 generally are professionals. A two goal player generally is an advanced player and Josh Shelton believes he can go higher.

The couple met in 1993 when she was a groom and he was a player for the Tonkawa team at the Houston Polo Club. They were both out one night and some guys were hitting on Mannie, so she asked Josh to be her blocker.

"I was telling everyone that night he was my boyfriend," she said. "Then he was."

Their mutual love of caring, training and riding horses eventually led to marriage two years ago. Now they are up early each morning to care for their beloved animals.

"Right now, it takes a lot of walking," Josh Shelton said. "Then we do circles around trees, stops, turns. We play stick and ball, where you are just by yourself, hitting the ball around."

As the horses round into shape, they begin full practices to ready for the season.

Josh Shelton's favorite horse is Riley.

"He doesn't ever give up," he said. "I have had him nine years and he gives me confidence. He also has the speed and he is very consistent."

But it takes a lot of horses to play polo, which is made up of six chukkers, 7 1/2 minutes each. Generally, a player rides a different horse each chukker, and sometimes more.

His horse, Dancer, is a mare with a world of talent, but she sometimes gets nervous and exhausts herself before she gets into the game. Josh Shelton said Dancer needs to be more fit than most of the other horses.

"When she is good, she's really good," he said.

He known most of his horses since they were both and he primarily purchases horses out of Kansas and Oklahoma. He seldom buys former thoroughbred race horses and has only one in his barn now.

While Josh Shelton is excited about the start of polo season, Mannie Shelton is in her element right now.

"I really do love this," she said of working the horses into shape. "If you do what you love, you don't work a day in your life. And how often do you get to work with your significant other?"

They got together because of polo, and they still are together because of the sport as well.

"John had a wreck in Wellington (at the International Polo Club Palm Beach) in 2016," Mannie Shelton said. "He had a bad concussion and they took him to the hospital. They found a brain tumor. They would never have known about it."

Josh Shelton said it was an aggressive form of cancer and he launched into radiation and chemotherapy treatments that last almost a year. His doctors didn't know it, but he continued playing polo during the treatments until a seizure during a stick and ball practice session with a horse convinced him to back away from polo for a few months. He appears to be in the clear, but he undergoes MRIs every month.

"Polo saved my life," he said.