📘 This guide covers Section 10 of the North American Hardcourt Bike Polo (NAH) Ruleset, the standard used at tournaments across North America.
Bike polo allows some physical contact, but it has clear limits. Section 10 covers those limits: what you can hit with, where you can make contact, and when contact becomes a foul.
These fouls use the penalty levels from Section 6. One rule from Section 7 frames everything here: you can only start contact with the player who has the ball. Contact with anyone else is Body Interference.
🤝 What Legal Contact Looks Like
When you make contact with the ball carrier, it should be:
Shoulder first. The shoulder is the main point of contact.
High and even. Meet them side by side at about the same height, not from behind and not low.
Arms tucked. You can keep your arm close to your body as you go in and come out of contact.
Everything below is what happens when contact doesn’t follow those rules.
💪 Extension
Extension is pushing out with your elbow, forearm, or hand to start contact or to push someone after contact. Raising or pushing your arm out from the shoulder to push, jab, or punch is a penalty. Keeping it tucked against your body is fine.
🎯 Charging
The player starting contact has to meet the opponent high and even. It’s charging if you hit someone:
In the lower back, kidneys, or ribs
From behind, carrying your momentum through them
Exception: if the other player changes their body position right before contact and puts themselves in that spot, it’s not a penalty on you.
✊ Holding
Holding is using your body to hold an opponent’s mallet, body, or bike so they can’t move. Blocking their path is different from holding them, and blocking is allowed.
🦵 Kicking
Kicking an opponent’s body, their equipment, or the ball is a penalty.
🪖 Head Contact
Starting contact with an opponent’s head or neck, with any part of your body, is a penalty.
🚲 Handlebar and Steering Arm Contact
Two parts of an opponent’s setup are always off limits, because hitting them makes the rider lose control:
Handlebars: don’t start contact with an opponent’s handlebars.
Steering arm: don’t start contact with the arm they steer with, at or below the elbow.
🧱 Trapping
Trapping is pinning the ball carrier against the boards for a long time, by leaning on them or otherwise blocking them, without trying to play the ball. Contesting the ball against the boards is fine. Just holding someone there isn’t.
🚨 Flagrance
Flagrance covers contact that’s dangerous or has no purpose in the game. It applies to everyone, including the ball carrier. The Ref calls it when a player:
Uses excessive force on an opponent who can’t defend themselves
Starts contact legally, but then keeps using force for no tactical reason
Starts contact and then dabs or falls themselves, without knocking the other player down
Starts contact that causes a potentially dangerous crash, or that the Ref considers dangerous
Uses an elbow, forearm, or hand to start contact in a way that has no tactical purpose
Quick Reference
What each penalty is called and what they look like:
Extension - Pushing out with an elbow, forearm, or hand
Charging - Contact to the lower back, kidneys, or ribs, or from behind
Holding - Holding an opponent’s mallet, body, or bike with your body
Kicking - Kicking a player, their gear, or the ball
Head Contact - Starting contact with the head or neck
Handlebar Contact - Starting contact with an opponent’s handlebars
Steering Arm Contact - Starting contact with the steering arm at or below the elbow
Trapping - Pinning the ball carrier on the boards without going for the ball
Flagrance - Excessive, pointless, or dangerous contact
Bringing It Back to Pickup
Contact is part of bike polo, but you don't have to play physically to play well. If you’re new, you don’t need to start contact at all while you’re learning. Positioning and ball control will get you further than leaning on people. If you’re not comfortable with contact yet, say so. People will adjust.
📚 Read the Full Section
This post is based on the NAH Ruleset (2022 edition). The full rulebook is here:
👉 https://www.nahardcourt.com/rules/
Check for updates before you ref or organize a game.
That’s the Whole Ruleset
This is the last post in our NAH rules series. If you’re just finding it, start with Section 1 on refs and officials, or browse the full series on the blog.
You don’t need to know any of this to show up and play. The best way to learn the rules is on the court. Come play with us on Tuesday evenings and Saturday afternoons at Gateway Park in TR, and Sunday afternoons at Malvern Hills Park with AVL Bike Polo. We have loaner gear.
