Facundo Pieres
| Facundo Pieres | |
|---|---|
 Facundo Pieres, having just won the US Open Polo Championship 2012, with team Zacara. | |
| Born |
May 19, 1986 Buenos Aires, Buenos Aires Province |
| Occupation | Polo Player |
| Parents | Gonzalo (Snr) & Cecilia |
Facundo Pieres born May 19, 1986 in Buenos Aires, Buenos Aires Province is a professional Argentine polo player with a 10-goal handicap. Currently, he is ranked number 1.[1]
Biography
Facundo was born into a family of polo players and is the second son of polo legend Gonzalo Pieres Sn and Cecilia Rodríguez Piola. His siblings are Gonzalo Pieres, also a professional polo player, Tatiana Pieres, Nicolas Pieres and Cecilia Pieres.
His career started in 1997, when he won the Copa Potrillos with the Ellerstina Jr. team, which was a subsidiary team for the Ellerstina Club founded by his father and Australian media tycoon, Kerry Packer. Since then, he played in Argentina, United Kingdom and the United States. He has won the Hurlingham Open, Tortugas Open and Jockey Club Open (all in Argentina among other tournaments. In 2008, he won the Queen’s Cup (England), though he didn’t take part in the final match, because of an injury.
He started playing in the Campeonato Argentino Abierto de Polo (Argentine Open) in 2003 and made it into the finals twice (2005 and 2007) with Ellerstina. After losing these in extra-time only, and winning the Tortugas Open 2008, the Ellerstina team is considered a strong candidate for winning the Argentine Open this year, which it actually did after a rough match against La Dolfina (Adolfo Cambiaso (h) (10), Lucas Monteverde (10), Mariano Aguerre (10) and Bartolomé Castagnola (10)) in which La Ellerstina (Facundo Pieres (10), Gonzalo Pieres (10), Pablo Mac Donough (10) and Juan Martin Nero (9)) defeated La Dolfina 13-12 in extra-time.[2]
He was promoted to handicap 10 at age 19, replacing Adolfo Cambiaso as the youngest 10-goal poloplayer.