Point Of View

I want to like the Hampton Classic. I really do. I do, after all, spend a lot of time there during its weeklong run. But the Mutt-and-Jeffing that goes on cannot be shrugged off.

From the perspective of a working journalist, at least this one, the Classic is a cross between a military dictatorship, shall we say, and Disney World.

However much the show's management tries to please - including exceedingly laudable efforts such as a fine spread by Long Island chefs for the press on opening day, a robust lunch on Grand Prix Sunday, and the distribution of various goodies on arrival - the stern, at times hostile, shepherding of the "media," a feature of the Classic's modern era, perforce leads to mixed reviews in the end.

Waiting around for an interviewee to show up in the V.I.P. tent during the two hours the media was unleashed within its confines before the Grand Prix jumping competition, I spotted a polo player I had talked with in the past, and thought it might be interesting to get his take on show jumping.

As I went to call out his name, a tall, officious guy with a purple shirt and dark glasses stepped into the breach, and, in barring the way, said the couple (the polo player was with a well-known woman) didn't want to be bothered. I wasn't interested in talking to her, I said; I wanted to talk to him. The guy held his ground, eyeing me as if I were a cur (the phrase, I think, is jackal of the press), and looked as if he were about ready to call out the goons if I had the temerity to exercise my rights to talk to my fellow man.

As it turned out, I did exercise them, happily spotting Frederic Roy, polo's popularizer, in the crowd. The three of us - Nick Manifold, Frederic, and I - talked a bit, pleasantly enough, with nothing untoward uttered or occurring, and that was that.

The point I want to make - remake, for I have written about it before - is that this kind of thing, i.e., first being herded like schoolchildren into the presence of greatness, and then being treated as if we are unclean, liable to make off with the silverware at the very least, has never happened to me at numerous polo matches or at two U.S. Opens at the Shinnecock Hills Golf Club.

Is this not America, my admittedly thin-skinned self, the four-square celebrant of egalitarianism, cries out.

Yes, Virginia, I'm afraid it is.

Well, enough. Soon there'll be football.

Jack Graves