2012 Moab Canyons Endurance Ride, Day 1

We made the two day drive to Moab, Utah, for this awesome ride. Despite the length of the drive, and the hassle of finding places to park along the highway over night, it's absolutely worth it. On our way, I did get to stop in Las Vegas and visit briefly with my son.

When we arrived at camp, the wind was blowing hard enough to need safety glasses. I was pretty sure I was going to get sandblasted.

I found a place to park which was reasonably protected from the wind, by dint of parking next to another rig so it and my truck acted as a wind break. Hoss was relatively well protected by the trailer. Somewhat on a whim, I decided to use the horse collar I've been lugging around in the trailer tack room to tie Hoss with rather than his halter. I figured it was high time I saw if it would work for him. He doesn't really like to drink with the halter on, since it gets hooked on the bucket, and he's always rubbing is head on things. I gave up leaving a halter on him in the trailer because he just rubbed it off. The collar is slightly big on him, really needing another hole, but I decided to try it anyway. Figured it was unlikely he could get it off.

During the ride meeting, someone hollered about a buckskin stallion being loose. My ears always prick up when someone says "buckskin," because Hoss is nearly always the only one in camp. The part about it being a stallion only temporarily threw me off. I stood up, and there was Hoss, visiting with a mule not far from our camp. I initially thought he'd slipped out of the collar, but was relieved when I realized he'd just come untied. I caught him up and tied him back to the trailer.

Ride start was 7:30 local time, which was 6:30 to me. I got up two hours before ride time to feed Hoss. I went back to bed for a short time before dressing and making myself some breakfast.

We saddled up and hit the trail on time. Hoss was his typical, hyper self on the start, but once again settled fairly quickly. I was able to ask for a trot early on, and this time he set off cleanly. As we were trotting along, I could not figure out why I didn't feel right. I was posting way too high. Eventually I realized the stirrups were too short because Wendy had been the last person to ride. I pulled off the side of the trail and dismounted to adjust the stirrups. One rider asked if all was well as he passed, to which I responded I had forgotten I wasn't the last person to ride the horse.

Back in the saddle, we headed on down the trail. Hoss was feeling good in the nice low temperatures. I didn't exactly give him his head, but I didn't do a whole lot of holding him back, either.

About halfway through the first loop, we came to the dreaded Wipe Out Hill. I wasn't very concerned about going up it, but I knew it would be a challenge. I had borrowed a folding cane from my mother just for the purpose of getting up and down Wipe Out Hill. My hip is still a problem and I knew I would need the extra support. I've been using a walking stick on my morning walks, but it doesn't fold down small enough to fit in a saddle bag, so cane it was.

I dismounted and pulled out the cane. Hoss started up the hill, and I held on to the reins to help guide him. We made it up uneventfully.

Since Wipe Out Hill is at just about 12 miles into the ride, I went ahead and gave Hoss his first dose of electrolytes before getting back on. There was a water stop about two miles on, giving ample time to clear the taste of the paste from his mouth so he would drink.

 
We came in to the vet check at 25 miles in just over four hours. Hoss looked excited and strong.

Hoss pulsed down as close to right away as he always does. Criteria was set at 60. He was down within five minutes. I took Hoss to the water tank to be sure he had gotten enough to drink. We found our crew bag, and I set him up with an electrolyte bran mash and hay. I set up my little tripod stool and ate the lunch I had packed for myself. I've found it's easier, with the dietary restrictions, to make myself lunch than try to find something at a management-provided lunch table. They always do their best, but my diet is kinda ridiculous, so I don't expect to be accommodated.

After our hour hold, we headed back out on the trail. We were passed shortly by a pair of horses who continued on faster than Hoss can reasonably keep up with. He let them go with little fuss.

Going through the trough of a hill, I spied a hoof boot from one of the horses that had passed us on the ground. I took the time to get off and retrieve it, knowing those things are expensive. Not long after, we caught up to the other horses as the rider of the horse that had lost the boot was replacing said boot. I stopped long enough to give them back the boot I had found.

The problem with stopping for any length of time with other horses except at a water stop is Hoss decides we must be going to ride with those horses. When I asked him to move on, he did the hoof-dragging thing, wanting to let the other horses catch up. They did, of course, and moved on ahead of us. I tried to keep Hoss far enough back that he wasn't really "with" them. It wasn't terribly effective.

As we rode along, we started gradually catching up with the other horses. They had started doing the trot a little/walk a little thing. Eventually they were walking enough that we needed to get around them and move out. I forced Hoss to get by them and keep going by dint of relentless kicking. Once we got ahead of them by a quarter mile or so, he gave up trying to stay with them and went to work.

At some point about five miles away from camp, something told me to check Hoss's shoes. I looked down and sure enough, he'd lost a front shoe. I was terribly annoyed. I got off and put one of his boots on. This time, I had had the sense to bring along every boot I have for him. Lose 'em all now. I have spares....

We rode the rest of the way in to camp. The trail in went past our camp, so I quickly unsaddled him before taking him to the vet for our completion. We ended up doing the first day, 55 miles, in 7 hours, 35 minutes. It's not an exceptionally challenging ride, but I am well pleased with that time, only 15 minutes longer than Manzanita with an additional 5 miles.

Of course, after vetting, I had to unload the truck and replace Hoss's lost shoe. The wind was blowing horribly again, so hard it was blowing the back door on my truck closed on the forge. Still I managed to get Hoss's  shoe replaced.

When I went to bed that night, I realized the wind had blown fine red sand into my tent through the netting. It turned everything a dusty red. There was even dust under the screen protector on my phone. Fortunately I had closed my duffel bag and pulled my sleeping bag closed.

Halloween Fun Show at Hyslop Horse Heaven

My friend and neighbor, Patty Hyslop, held a Halloween fun show at her ranch just two miles from home. A friend from church, Wendy Turner, had started coming out to ride with me. She rides Hoss while I ride DC, giving DC the confidence of having Hoss around for her early trail riding. Wendy has been having a wonderful time with Hoss, and we decided we'd participate in the fun show.

On that Saturday morning, Wendy arrived about 8am and we rode the horses the two miles or so to Patty's ranch. We hadn't had a great deal of warning, so we didn't have costumes. Wendy did bring along a little paint to put markings on Hoss to make him a Indian horse, so that was fun.

The first class was the costume class. Although we didn't really have costumes, we both rode in the class. DC was very well behaved. Hoss, not so much. DC pulled away from him and he got very upset. I spent a great deal of time half turned in the saddle to instruct Wendy while DC carried me handily around the arena. It was her first experience in an arena with a bunch of other horses, too. The only problem I had with her was when she got behind the mini. The precious little thing is smaller than our biggest dog, Ash. I think DC thought he *was* a dog and expected him, therefore, to get out of her way.

Neither Wendy nor I got anything in that class, but honestly, how could we have expected to?

The next riding class was the obstacle course. I took some time beforehand to lead DC through some of the obstacles, knowing she had never done anything like it. There was a PVC framework with "caution" tape hanging down from it we had to walk under, a barrel with a stuffed rat that had to be dropped into a bucket, a blue tarp to walk over, a broom which had to be spun around and placed back on the barrel without being dropped (difficult to explain), a mailbox with a skull in it, a pair of pylons to do a figure 8 through, a wooden bridge to cross, a small jump/step over with one of those blow-up Halloween things next to it, and a pole on the ground to do a side pass over with the pole between the horse's front and hind legs.

Once I had worked DC through some of the obstacles, I helped Wendy get Hoss through some of the obstacles I knew he was going to give her a hard time with.

We waited and watched several other riders go through the course. When we were down to the last few riders, I went in with DC.

I wasn't confident of riding her through the dangling tape or over the tarp, so I led her through the tape, did the rat in the bucket, led her over the tarp, and tried the broom on the ground. Despite not even being on the horse, I managed to dump the broom on the ground. Once we were past that obstacle, I mounted up.

DC did pretty well with the mailbox. By this time I've already stopped next to our mailbox at home and gotten the mail. This mailbox was at rider height, so DC was less sure of this one. However, she finally settled to a halt next to it and let me open it, get out the skull, and put it back. We then went through the figure 8 quite nicely. She wanted to go around the bridge rather than over it, but it only took a few corrections before she went ahead and crossed it properly. The jump I felt was too high for her to attempt with a rider, and we've never jumped anything, so I dismounted and hand jumped her over it. She didn't want to go past the Halloween blowy thing, but managed it okay. I then got back on and rode her to the pole on the ground. I expected no better than to get her to stop over the pole, but she did a pretty passable turn on the forehand once we were there. It was mostly because she really did not want to be over the pole, but I'll take it.

Wendy got Hoss through the obstacle course, but he did give her some fits about it. She's really a beginner rider at this point, so without some serious instruction she did very well, especially with a horse who'll try any evasion he can think of.

DC and I placed third in the obstacle course, pretty cool.

The last event was a carrot hunt. A large number of carrots had been hidden all over the property, including one "golden carrot" worth $20 to the person who found it. We were not allowed to put any carrots we found in saddle bags; they must be on our person. Wendy had made the fortuitous decision to wear cargo pants.

We rode together around the property. Wendy turned out to be exceptional at finding the carrots. Wendy does work that involves spotting desert tortoises, so she has a fantastic eye. The carrots were probably easier to find than the desert tortoises are! In the end, we didn't find the golden carrot, but Wendy found the most carrots and won the hunt.

At the end of the day, we collected our "winnings" and headed for home. Wendy got a great big plastic pumpkin full of candy; I got a basket of soaps. We crammed them both in the saddle bags on Hoss's saddle (sure glad I'd left it on there), along with our lead ropes, collected up the dogs and rode home. It was a great deal of fun and a wonderful day. Wendy was already talking about what we should do for costumes for next year.

2012 Manzanita Endurance Ride

My original plan had been to arrive at camp early and bring DC along for her first camping experience. Unfortunately my husband was unexpectedly called back to work early. I didn't want DC to be by herself, so she didn't get to go.

We wound up arriving fairly late. Since I didn't have my wonderful husband to cook for me, it was easier to get there later so I could eat at home. Friday night dinner was included in the entry, so I only had to worry about lunch and breakfast on Saturday. Not that Terry doesn't provide breakfast; it's just mostly not anything I can have.

I got camp set up and Hoss vetted without incident. Went to the ride meeting and dinner and spent some time visiting. Over night, though, my air mattress deflated several times. I vowed I would never use an air mattress again.

In the morning I got up plenty early to feed Hoss and have breakfast. I got camp packed up before saddling and hitting the trail.

Hoss behaved himself pretty well. So I asked him for a trot earlier than usual. Unfortunately, he was sure I was lying or something and he went into his "I'm fighting to go faster" trot. It took a few tries, but he finally settled in.

We got stuck in traffic for much of the first six miles. Once the trail opened up, we got out ahead of the other horses. We sped up long enough to leave them behind. Hoss was cheerful and moved out nicely. We arrived at the first vet check in good time. Hoss recovered quickly and we started our 20 minute hold.

I didn't want to overuse my remaining tubes of electrolyte, so I had elected to send crew bags to all three vet checks. The one advantage of three vet check rides is having the opportunity to send something out for each electrolyting interval. I set Hoss up with his electrolyte bran mash and hay. So of course Hoss wasn't particularly interested in the bran mash. Should've seen that one coming.

We headed out for the second loop, hitting the "lollipop" loop before cutting back across the road and down into the valley. Because it's getting close to our Tevis attempt, I decided it was time to start really pushing Hoss for quicker finishes. The conditions were perfect. We were able to keep up a steady pace.

The second vet check was back at camp. I got off the lead Hoss the last few hundred yards back into camp. A rider on the 25 mile event was holding his horse near the vets, waiting for it to recover. The horse pulled away from the rider and came barreling at us. I pretty quickly realized it was headed for Hoss, so was able to safely intercept it and return it to its rider.

Once we had returned the other horse, I let Hoss get a drink and recover, then vetted him through. We headed to the trailer for electrolyte bran mash and hay for him, and some lunch for me. Once I had him set up, I headed down and found what I could have at the rider lunch table. Not much, but I did okay.

After our one hour hold, we set back out on the trail. Riding out of camp and up the road, I made the left turn I knew I needed to make. Another rider went straight. I called out to her, trying unsuccessfully to get her attention. Several other riders started yelling. I assumed they were trying to get the other rider's attention, too. We had trotted down the road some way when an SUV pulled up alongside us and the driver insisted we were going the wrong way. I was pretty sure we weren't, but I turned around anyway. Should've listened to myself. We hadn't gone far when, lo and behold, the rider who had taken the other trail came riding toward us. She had been told she was going the wrong way. Since I knew from previous years the way I had been going was right, I turned around and we headed the right way once again.

We ended up with the other rider who had headed the wrong way and two others for a time. I was content to stay with them for a while, but really wanted to be with just my horse. At a water stop I took the opportunity to head off on our own. The others caught back up to us, but went ahead and left us behind, to my relief.

We came into the third vet check well ahead of cut off. One of the horses that had passed us was still having a hard time recovering. I don't know if it ever did. Hoss recovered quickly and I got him vetted through and eating.

Once our hold was over we headed out on the trail again. We quickly got stuck behind two horses whose riders were doing that trot a little ways, walk for a while thing that annoys the snot out of me. It took a little time, but I got by them. Then it was a matter of convincing Hoss to keep going so we'd leave them behind. By this point in the ride he wasn't thrilled about leaving the other horses. It took some doing, but I got him going. Once we turned the corner and were headed back toward the vet check for our five minute hold, he moved out a bit better.

By the time we got to the five minute hold, Hoss was convinced he was starving. One of the drawbacks of the three vet check ride is, he gets this idea that there'll be food just around the corner and he doesn't need to eat now if he doesn't really feel like it. Which results in the starving at 40 miles effect. Eventually I had to drag him off the hay in order to finish the last 8 miles.

There was some objection to leaving the food, but Hoss did pick it up and get moving. Checking my watch, I realized we were on target to get done in 8 hours or a little over. I kept him moving. I really wanted him to break that barrier.

We got back to camp and it was time to wind it down in terms of speed. Naturally at that point, Hoss had decided he wanted to catch another horse and wouldn't slow down. I finally simply dismounted and led him in. As we approached the finish, I realized he was missing a shoe. Dratted horse.

In the end our completion time was 7 hours, 20 minutes. I was extremely pleased with the result. While we have had similar finish times, it has always been at significantly easier rides. To get that at this ride was a victory.

*Sadly, I have no images for this post. My computer was stolen and I lost all the pictures I had taken.

2012 Virginia City 100

We didn’t make it to Bridgeport. We didn’t make it to Grand Canyon. That’s 300 miles we missed out on with the temporary financial disaster we had. We did make it to Virginia City – and we sure had a crappy day.

Between this ride and Vail Lake I started a new diet. I started it as a result of my asthma having become much worse at the beginning of the year. Some time ago, a diet for asthmatics came out which cut out red wheat, dairy, and refined sugars. So I went on this to see what it did for my asthma. My results have been remarkable. A pain I’ve had for something like a decade has disappeared completely. My doctor thought it was my gall bladder but nothing was ever discovered. I’d started pursuing it with a gastroenterologist but dropped it when it became clear my new diet solved the problem. I also promptly dropped ten pounds.

The new diet does create a bit of a problem. It’s difficult to find things that will survive in the saddle bag which fit into the new diet. I’ve done pretty well in that department, finding several gluten-free breakfast and granola-type bar selections which seem to do well. I can’t drink Gatorade anymore, as it uses a wheat product as a sweetener, so I had to find a different electrolyte replacer. So far I’m doing reasonably well on providing my own foods. Foods provided by ride management can be harder to work with. I plan to mostly depend on myself as much as possible.

The ride started at 5am. The starting line was in the heart of down town Virginia City, about a 30 minute ride out of base camp. So I had Hoss saddled at ready to go and mounted up at 4:30am. We rode to the start in the pitch dark. Knowing many riders don’t like the use of head lamps, I kept mine turned to the red setting. It really didn’t do me any good. I couldn’t see much of anything or tell where the road was. I was reliant on Hoss, who was much too hopped up by the energy of ride day to make good decisions.

Once we started and got a little separated from the large body of riders, I turned my head lamp to the white light so I’d have some chance of seeing where we were going. Hoss initially spooked when I switched it over. Once it was on, though, he headed out confidently. It really helps when the rider has an idea where the horse is supposed to be going. We caught up to another rider who slowed down to let us pass. I’d say it was clear she didn’t like the light I was using.

I understand most people do just fine without additional light. I don’t. I need that extra light, or it’s like riding in the pitch black and zero idea where anything is. If Hoss steps off the trail, I won’t know anything about it until he’s headed off down some crazy slope. And, no, I can’t trust him not to do that. If we’re on any kind of switch back, he will head off cross country to catch up with the other horses, and he doesn’t seem to much care about the terrain. So I need the head lamp. I try to be respectful of other riders. I expect the same from them. I try to balance my needs with the preferences of others, and there’s only so far that can go.

 As the sky lightened I was able to shut of my head lamp. Which was probably fortunate as we had caught up with other riders on a section of single track trail. We weren’t going any faster than the leaders in that pack, so we were pretty stuck in the group for a time.

It eventually opened up into a nice trail where the faster horses left us behind. Hoss was trying to keep up with a couple of horses that were significantly faster than him on a section of dirt road when they got out of sight. We continued down the road for some time before I realized I hadn’t seen any trail markers in a while. I turned back. When I saw other riders coming toward us, I figured we must be on the right track and turned around again. All of us rode around aimlessly for a while before realizing we must have missed a turn. Heading back up the road, we found the turn. It was marked pretty well if you were coming at it from the wrong direction. I’m not sure why Hoss missed it. Usually he catches that sort of thing. This time he moved confidently on down the wrong way.

Once we were back on track, I noticed I’d lost my cell phone! At this point we were with two other riders. I commented my phone was gone. Lo and behold, one of the riders had seen it on the trail, gotten off and picked it up. It wouldn’t have been the end of the world if I hadn’t gotten it back – especially since it died less than a week later, forcing me to go to the trouble of replacing the damn thing – but I wasn’t heartbroken to have it back.

Cut off time for the first vet check was 9am, so we needed to really keep our pace up to make it. The first twenty four miles were fairly easy, with trail that was largely trottable, so it wasn’t impossible, but the way the cut off times were split struck me as odd. Four hours for the first twenty four miles, four hours and fifteen minutes for the next fifteen miles, two hours and forty-five minutes for the next twelve miles, five hours for the next twenty five miles, four hours and fifteen minutes for the next sixteen miles, and one hour and fifteen minutes for the last eight miles. That is, of course, assuming one is riding right at the cut off times. A rider would have more time if they were riding ahead of the cut off times.

We made it in to the first vet check well under our cut off time. I had a limited supply of syringe doses of electrolytes to give Hoss on the trail. Between that, and knowing ride management would not be taking anything to the last vet check, I rode all the way to the first vet check without electrolyting Hoss. I figured that was the easiest way to manage him. He would do best skipping a dose early in the ride rather than later. As it was, he took a little longer than usual to come down at the vet check but did just fine. Once he ate his electrolyte bran mash his heart rate regularized and I was happy with how he was looking.

 During the first twenty four miles, Hoss had gotten cut in his mouth somewhere. I couldn’t figure out what had gotten bloodied, and even the vet couldn’t find anything. Still I chose to continue on without the bit at all, simply attaching my reins to the sides of his halter. After twenty five miles I was reasonably sure he’d be manageable enough to deal with sans bit.

The second half of the first loop was a bit more challenging, and I began to understand why the cut off times were split up so oddly. We got in to Bailey Canyon and it was a slog. The rocks were large and unstable. About five miles in, Hoss got stuck in the rocks and lost a hind shoe. He wasn’t sore, being at six weeks since I last shod him, so we kept going at a reasonable pace. I knew we’d have to slow down if the ground got hard, so we made time on the soft stuff.

We were once again trotting confidently along when I realized the horses ahead of us weren’t on the ride. I perused my map and decided we’d missed yet another turn. Another rider did catch up to us at this point and we turned around together. The turn we missed was shortly after crossing the road, once again not excessively well marked for the direction we had come at it. I think we’d done an extra mile or more.

We got to the “trot-by” vet check at mile thirty nine with plenty of time left. Hoss was beginning to feel that lost shoe by this point. He showed a little off to the vet at the trot by. After our fifteen minute hold, I gave him a dose of electrolytes and we made our best effort to walk twelve miles in just over four hours.

This sounds like a pretty easy thing to do. Not so much with Hoss. He must have the world’s slowest equine walk. Left to his own devices, he won’t exceed three miles an hour, and prefers something closer to two miles per hour. He’ll trot an easy seven to ten miles per hour, but his walk simply doesn’t match up. To complicate matters, the rest of the loop back to camp was nothing if not rocky and hard. So we really couldn’t trot at all.

A section of this trail is referred to as the “S.O.B.’s.” When we got there, I understood why. Two of the steepest uphill and downhill sections of trail I think I have ever seen. There’s a power line access road near trails I train on here at home that’s similar. It’s just as steep. What it doesn’t have is the loose scree rock. It was clear to me I wasn’t going to be able to safely walk up or down those hills. Hoss was going to have to carry me, lost shoe or not. It took some doing, and he lost a front shoe in the bottom of one of the hills – I expect he stepped on it but didn’t pull it in Bailey Canyon – but we made it through.

We got back to base camp just at 5:00pm, cut off time. I was leading Hoss on the road in to camp. His other hind shoe was loose. I didn’t want to ride him on the paved area because I was afraid he’d be more likely to slip. With half his shoes gone and one nearly off, I had to shoe Hoss before I vetted him through. We had an hour hold. I think I set a personal best record for shoeing a horse.

Once he was shod I took him to the vet and he passed, although I was asked to trot him twice. Not really a surprise. The same vet saw him at Twenty Mule Team and she made me trot him several times there, too. He was his usual obstinate self about the trot out.

We headed back out on the trail at 6:00pm, with less than ten hours of real trail time left to us to complete the last forty nine miles. At Twenty Mule Team, it took Hoss nine hours to complete the last thirty five miles. I knew I had my work cut out for me, and our odds of beating cut off times were slender, but we had to try.

We were the last ones out on the trail. No one left behind us. We got out of the stickiest part before dark, and were climbing a hill some eight miles out of camp when Hoss snatched off a front shoe. He was immediately foot sore, the kind of foot soreness that made him dangerous to ride. He would stumble when he stepped on something unpleasant. At this point we were eight miles and two hours out. In order to make the cut off, we needed to be making a solid five miles an hour or better. We’d made four miles per hour. There was no way we were going to finish. Even if he hadn’t lost the shoe, we probably would not have made cut off. I dismounted, got over my frustration, and began walking back.

There were no glow bars on this part of the trail. We were walking back in an area with multiple turn offs. It was very easy to make wrong turns. I had my head lamp on and was carefully looking at the road for hoof prints. Using hoof prints wasn’t as good a trick as one might think, as the area has multiple herds of wild horses. In the daylight I can easily discern the difference between shod and bare hoof prints, but in the dark it’s not nearly so easy. I had my GPS on the bread-crumb track screen and watched that to get us back. I got off track several times in spite of the GPS. I would head down a road and the track on the GPS wouldn’t diverge until I’d gone some way and we’d have to turn around and track back. I think if I hadn’t had the GPS I might very well have unsaddled Hoss and found myself a reasonably comfortable place to lay down until dawn or someone thought to call me, whichever came first.

A few times I made Hoss pack me up a hill or on the softer sections of the trail where he wasn’t so foot sore. During the times I was riding him he made very clear he knew where he was going. Unfortunately when I was off he didn’t seem to realize we need to go back down the same trail and didn’t indicate to me when I’d made a wrong turn.

Four times I took a fall. The first time was while walking along what I thought was flat road. I couldn’t see the rut in the artificial light of my head lamp. I set my foot on the edge and slipped, falling right on my butt. Twice I slipped on rocks while walking down hill and fell. The fourth time nearly cost Hoss his life. We were walking on a downhill when Hoss decided he had to have a bite to eat, and he had to have it right then. He stopped and whipped his head to the side to snatch at some grass, yanking me right off my feet. It didn’t help Hoss was behaving somewhat like a thousand pound lead weight I had to drag behind me. When he pulled me off my feet, it was all I could do not to just leave him there.

By the time all was said and done, we rolled in to camp about 1:00am. Between all the wrong turns, we added an extra two miles to our trip back. I presented Hoss to the vet, then got him unsaddled and settled in for the night. I crawled in to my tent and sulked my way to sleep.

 I’m really hoping our run of bad luck is over now.

Nothin’ Much Goin’ On Lately

After the Descanso ride, Hoss and I have taken a little break from competing. Hoss went to the trainer for a month for polishing work, and DC went with him to be started.

After a couple of weeks, DC started showing signs of, not lameness exactly, but certainly being off. We suspected she had strained something in her leg, so I brought her home to rest and recover. After a couple of days, I started taking her for the morning walk again. She had been very unhappy to be left behind and wasn't thrilled about living alone either, so I took pity on her. After a couple of morning walks and doing our exercises given by the trainer, I contemplated her feet.

It had only been a couple of weeks since I had trimmed her, and I was very unhappy with how her feet looked. I thought about it for a while, and decided to go ahead and shoe her. Due very likely to a certain degree of neglect when she was quite young, and not getting the exercise she needed, her feet simply do not match. She has either a mild club foot, or what is known as a negative palmar angle on the other foot (essentially, the bone inside the foot is pointing up at the toe rather than slightly down; the only way I can know for sure is through radiographs, so at the moment I am content to simply see if I can fix this through external observation and correction). Her hind feet are a bit of a wreck, too, with one foot wearing off significantly on the outside, making it impossible to get level through trimming alone, and the foot was quite short, making me suspect it to be sore.

Having made these observations, I made the decision to nail shoes on her. She was very well-behaved about the entire process, standing quietly beside me with her lead rope tucked in my back pocket while I went around her trimming feet and fitting up shoes. She was great about getting the shoes burned on, though I didn't do a full burn like I'd do on a horse that's been getting it done for a while. Turning the forge on caused her a little alarm which she let go of easily enough. I expect her feet to improve with time, shoeing, and work. My observation over the course of my career is, when a horse is working correctly, its feet will improve vastly over a few shoeings.

I gave DC a day off from exercises, although took her on the morning walk. The next day I put her back to what we laughingly call "work." I noticed immediately she looked sound and much more confident than she had before the shoes. So I started doing a little more with her each day. I set up a saddle for her and started taking her on the walk with a saddle on. She loved it. I started working with her on being mounted and in not many days, I was sitting astride. Within a few days of that, she took a few steps. Now we're riding up and down the driveway. She would really like to go further, but I'm riding her in just her rope halter and reins, so I'm not terribly confident about taking her off-property quite yet.

DC will be heading back to the trainer for her last two weeks of starting work. Once that is done, she'll come home for conditioning and continued schooling to the level I am capable of. I am hoping to take her to Death Valley to do the limited distance rides, if not every day, then at least a couple of days. I'm confident she can fit up enough to do four slow LDs between now and the end of December.

Beth (my trainer, as previously mentioned) was concerned about Hoss's topline and the fact he really hasn't been interested in cantering. He'd trot everywhere, but cantering did not interest him. I squared off his hind feet some time ago to partially address the topline issue. He was over-using his loins and not using his butt to propel him forward. By squaring off his hind toes, I forced him to stop using his loins and start using his butt more. Still, I am not a trainer, nor am I a particularly accomplished rider, 100 mile finish aside. He needed time under Beth to get him properly collected and improve his appearance.

It took some doing, Hoss being the extra-stubborn Mustang he is, but Beth got him to come around. In just thirty days, his topline improved to the point he looks much more normal. His way of going is far better. Watching him free-lunge, his gait is much more relaxed and free-flowing. He used to look sort of like he was pistoning his legs around. Beth describes it as not using his body. He's also much more eager to canter.

Now that Hoss is home, we are working on the cantering thing. Right now our homework is to canter. A bunch. As much as possible. It's killing me. I am quite fit for trotting, but cantering? Not so much. Still I get him out nearly every day and we ride up to a section of wide, flat trail and canter back and forth. Most days I bring him home in a full body sweat. It's hot here, even in the evenings, and we keep going for 20 to 30 minutes each time. Hoss seems to be enjoying it for the most part. He especially likes it if I let him hand gallop up the small hill at the far end of the trail. He has his moments. He's pretty good while we're headed away from home, but as soon as we turn around, he wants to "Nazi" canter, meaning a rough, runaway sort of cantering. So we go back and forth a whole lot until he finally decides he'd better canter properly or we might be out there all night. Of course, there's always me to blame for not getting it right. And we are taking our weekly lesson.

A couple of days ago, I took Hoss out for our canter workout and while we were doing our back and forth cantering, he stopped responding appropriately to the bit. I was quite puzzled. I noticed a metal-on-metal sound. Upon investigation I discovered the curb chain on the bit had broken. Well. No wonder his response was off. Can't respond properly if the bit isn't working properly. So I cut our workout short and rode him home.

Our next planned ride is August 18, the Eastern High Sierra Classic. This is sort of a no-brainer. Having already completed all four days of 50s at Death Valley and the 100 at Twenty Mule Team, we are just this one ride away from being awarded the Fire Mountain Horse of Excellence award. Not going would be a bit of 99 yards and drown*.

Since this is a pretty significant ride, of course problems have arisen. Because we haven't competed for two months, and I haven't been going in to church three times a week, we should have been able to sock away some money and get all squared away. This was not to be.

My husband was recruited by a new company, making significantly more money than his previous employer. Part of the process was a required physical exam. Okay, fine. This I am not worried about. He's been passing physicals for this industry for five years. Then I get a call. He's flying back home, 24 hours after having left. The physical had included an EKG, which the computer interpreted as showing a cardiac infarction. Until he could get an echocardiogram and a stress test, the application process for the new job was stalled out.

Hubby had already been home and not working for three weeks, which is normal. Not normal is not going back to work at the end of those three weeks. He came home and started hitting up his doctors at the VA to get the wheels set in motion. Of course this took for-stinking-ever. Eventually all was taken care of. Not only was the echocardiogram completely normal, the stress test was beyond easy for him. He was finally able to fly back out to retake the physical, which he passed, and start the new job.

The fallout from all this has been a financial squeeze. I don't yet know when hubby will get his first paycheck, but I hope it's soon. We cannot survive on my income alone, let alone can I get to an endurance ride. So, keep your collective fingers crossed for us. I really do want Hoss to get that Horse of Excellence award!

*In middle school, the band director told this story/joke when someone came close to accomplishing something, then blew it at the end:
You take a boat and row out 100 yards. At this point the boat sinks. You start swimming back. You swim 99 yards and drown.

2012 Descanso Endurance Ride 50

Since this ride is so close to home, we did our normal Friday routine and went to Sun Coast Farm in Imperial Beach for a lesson. I got a couple of horses trimmed while we were there as well. Because the ride manager – Terry Woolley-Howe – elected to include a Friday night dinner this year, I didn't have to pack any food for myself at all. There's a reason many of us differentiate between rides by referring to "Terry" rides. At a "Terry" ride, one hardly needs bother to pack a thing for ride day, for horse or rider. Of course, because of Hoss's dietary restrictions, I usually still pack him something to send to the vet checks. This year I only packed a bran mash with electrolyte to send to the mid vet check. I knew there would be enough hay he could have at the other two checks, plus if all the mashes had stuff he couldn't have in them, I could always procure more without it.

Before getting my dinner, I went over to the vendors and picked up another saddle pack. Now I have enough storage for all four of my water bottles, snacks and Gatorade mix for me, electrolytes for Hoss, my camera, spray sunscreen and bug repellent, a stethoscope, a hoof pick, and first aid supplies. And I could probably get more into it, but that was all I could think to cram into the packs on Friday evening.

The ride started at 6am on Saturday. I got up at 4:30 to feed Hoss and get dressed. Breakfast (fruit and donuts and coffee and hot chocolate and juice) was served at 5am. I walked over and grabbed food, then walked back to eat it in my truck. Once I'd eaten and Hoss and polished off his breakfast, I got him saddled up and we rode over to the start.

At NASTR, I had still been using an S-hack on Hoss. After the ride, he had pulled so much and so hard that not only were my hands horribly sore, the hair had been rubbed off his nose. My trainer and I elected to switch him over to a curb bit. So the previous two lessons had been taken in the curb bit to get him used to it. He wasn't any less antsy on the way to the start, but he was significantly easier to control. Although while we were walking he got a bit too frantic and I decided to back him in an effort to redirect his brain. We hadn't practiced backing in the curb bit in lessons, and it didn't occur to me doing it in such a fraught situation might result in rather more dramatic behavior than usual. I stopped Hoss then asked gently for him to back up. The next thing I knew, he had dropped back on his hocks and nearly fallen to his knees! It was quite disconcerting, but I kept my head and got him back on his feet. He seemed appropriately chastened by the experience and once I was reasonably sure he hadn't hurt himself we continued to the start line.

Once the start was announced I held Hoss to a walk and felt pretty good about his behavior. So I asked him for a trot pretty early on. He really wanted to keep up with the front runners. Knowing he'd never last, I kept him back some, knowing they'd get away from him soon enough. We came to a steep downhill everyone was slowing down for. By the time we got to it, all the other horses had continued jamming on down the trail. This made Hoss a bit anxious and he wanted to bomb down the hill to catch up. I forced him to walk to the bottom of the hill. Unfortunately when I asked him for a trot at the bottom of the hill he tried to bolt. That doesn't fly. I cranked him back to a walk and his "trotting privileges" had been revoked until he could get himself back under control.

Time for the frustrating if necessary part. I held Hoss back to a walk while he tried every trick he's ever come up with to go faster. With the curb bit it took much less effort on my part to keep him down. Even when he was misbehaving I was able to spend a good deal of time on a loose rein. Of course making him walk resulted in being passed by many horses, which just spins Hoss up. I told him, over and over, if he would just walk calmly and trot calmly we could pick up our pace, but if he was going to threaten to bolt he was going to be walking until he gave that crap up. Of course I wanted to get on with it just as much as he did. Which doesn't mean I'm going to put up with dangerous behavior.

It took some time and a few miles, but Hoss finally gave it up and walked a few good steps. I asked him for a trot and we were off again. He didn't bolt and kept a reasonable trot and listened to me. At this point we were behind two riders, Gabriele Mitteregger and Don Huston. We had to keep a little further back than usual from Gabriele's horse, as he was kicking out in frustration. He wasn't kicking at Hoss, it was kicking to express his displeasure. Hoss pretty quickly got the idea and stayed well back to keep from getting his nose kicked in.

For the most part Don or Gabriele led, but there were moments when their horses flagged and Hoss would take the lead. Of course as soon as Hoss was out front he'd slow down, but during the morning he didn't slow down to the point I needed to pedal him.

Climbing the hill up West Mesa Fire Road, I wondered how I could ever have viewed it has a particularly challenging hill. Sure, it's a hill, but it's nothing like what we saw at Vail Lake. Hoss trotted up the hill with little pushing from me. He seemed just as unimpressed as me.

Coming down into the vet check, Don and Gabriele got off their horses to walk in. I continued to ride in. I figure he's fit enough at this point to carry me all the way. Besides, in this particular area getting off and leading is treacherous for me. Coming downhill among the rocks really increases the odds I'll hurt myself. It's better for both of us if he just packs me in. So we came in a little ahead of Don and Gabriele, which I figured wouldn't make a great deal of difference as Hoss wouldn't come down immediately.

As it turned out Hoss's heart rate did come down quite quickly and we wound up leaving the vet check well ahead of Don and Gabriele. I'd rather not let Hoss get too used to being with other horses all the time, so I was perfectly okay with these circumstances. We were passed by other horses, which stimulated Hoss to try to keep up. But he's not consistently fast enough, so I held him back and tried to keep him from getting overly focused on the other horses. After a time we wound up in a "pocket" by ourselves.

About halfway through the second loop I realized I'd forgotten to give Hoss his electrolytes before we left the vet check. I went ahead and gave him the missed dose before we continued up the steep fire road toward the lake.

Shortly before we got into the second vet check Don and Gabriele caught up to us. Once in Hoss took a few minutes to recover, then we started our hold. I made up a bran mash with electrolytes for Hoss. The vet running the vet check decided we needed to remove saddles, so I stripped it off of him. I didn't want him standing around too long with his sweaty back uncovered to get cold. As soon as he'd slurped up most of his bran mash, I took him to the vet and got him cleared. Once back with his bran and hay I put the saddle back on him. We hung out for the duration of our hold.

Done with our hold I got Hoss's bit back in his mouth and saddle adjusted and we headed out. Don and Gabriele were out shortly after us and caught us up quickly. Hoss wasn't much feeling the trot up the hill thing, so it worked to our advantage to have Don and Gabriele catch up. Having the other two horses kept Hoss motivated, and he even led some up the hill.

We came into the last vet check well ahead of the cut off time. There were even a fairly significant number of horses behind us. We did our twenty minute hold, I gave Hoss his electrolytes, and we were on our way.

After crossing the water under the Sweetwater Bridge, we headed back toward camp. Somehow Hoss and I ended up ahead of Don and Gabriele. Hoss kept up a good trot for a while, but he started to die off. By the time I was pedaling him hard, Don asked if they could pass and I gratefully allowed them to go ahead. I'd just been about to suggest the idea when Don spoke up. Once Don and Gabriele were ahead of us, Hoss was plenty motivated to keep a decent speed going.

There was a five-minute hold about two miles from the finish. It has been in a different place in past years. This year, we had to make a deliberate left turn to get to the location. Unfortunately it was poorly marked. Don, Gabriele and I made it into the hold as required, but we learned later many riders had missed it. A yellow sign on the trail directed the ride and tie participants to head back to camp. Another sign, up and to the left, directed endurance riders to the five minute hold. It was not well placed. I could easily see how so many people missed it.

We arrived at the finish line just before 5:00pm. I was quite pleased with our finish time. About 9 hours and 20 minutes, give or take. Hoss is getting a little bit faster at this, which he really needs to be for Tevis. I'm hoping by the time we go to Tevis next year, he'll be consistently staying ahead of cut off times.

2012 NASTR 75

Due to Kody’s continuing troubles after his injury at the Nevada Derby, Hoss and I were on our own for this ride. We set out on Friday for the Sunday ride. I expected to take the better part of two days to get to ride camp, thinking we’d get there about mid-day on Saturday. My plan was to overnight in Bishop at the fairgrounds. Unfortunately, as we arrived in Bishop in the evening on Friday I realized this was not going to happen. I’d completely forgotten Memorial Day Weekend is when Mule Days happens in Bishop. So the fairgrounds were occupied and we were forced to continue on our way. I didn’t have a clear idea where we’d find to pull off. From driving through on our way to Derby, I knew our choices were limited at best. In the end we spent the night in a highway rest stop. Hoss chose to stay in the trailer after we walked around for a bit. I put his blanket on, as it was snowing lightly and rather cold before letting him back in the trailer. I spent six or so hours sleeping in the back seat of my truck, before my hip was screaming at me and it was time to go. I checked on Hoss, gave him water and his breakfast beet pulp mush, and we were on our way.

It took far less time to get to ride camp from there than I had anticipated. I even stopped for a sit down breakfast. Still we arrived in camp at just after 9am. There was not another soul in camp. Not even ride management was there. After scoping the place out, I decided on a decent spot to set up camp in and got set up. While I was getting situated, ride management did arrive and I spoke with them briefly. My plan was to get my tent set up and lay down for a while. There was a storm moving through the area, so I knew I was going to get rained on. It did rain quite significantly later in the day. I ate my dinner in my truck while hail pelted the windshield. Fortunately the rain was largely gone by the time the ride meeting was held, and Sunday dawned cold but clear.

The ride started at a truly inhuman 5am. For me this meant crawling out of my sleeping bag at 3am to get Hoss fed. He was truly an eager eater. He wanted his beet pulp right now, thank you very much, and chowed down with a will. I got back in my tent, dressed and laid down for another hour or so before saddling in the dark. I had gotten my pack loaded and my vet check bag set up. This ride had one place where all vet checks would be held, which was quite nice. I only needed one crew bag for the entire day, with two bran mashes and two flakes of hay and my second set of water bottles.

Once saddled up I rode Hoss over and we checked in for the start. Hoss was quite excited and really wanted to go. I had difficulty holding him back with just the hackamore. We had quite the battle for the first several miles of the ride as other horses passed him and he tried to bolt after them. My new rule has been, if he can’t walk with control, he can’t move up to the trot. So we walked. Or, at least, I told him he needed to walk and he did an awful lot of doing everything in his power to go faster.

In the midst of having this little discussion with Hoss, I realized my GPS had shut off. I turned it back on only to have it shut down again. The third time I turned it back on I kept it in my hand long enough to realize its batteries were dead. Not long after that, I realized the batteries in my camera were dead as well. My phone had a low battery, so I had shut it down. So I was without my tech devices other than Hoss’s heart rate monitor for the duration of this ride.

The one and only picture I was able to take

After some time we finally managed to get into a “pocket” by ourselves and I was able to get a walk and then a decent controlled trot out of Hoss. We caught up with another horse and rider and passed them, but only for a short time. They caught back up to us and we rode together for some time. The other horse led quite a bit, as he was a good deal faster than Hoss.

We rode up into higher elevations, and I realized what I had thought were water droplets clinging to the ends of the pine needles were in fact frozen. It was beautiful and cold. I ended up getting my gloves out for a while to keep my hands warm. We were not up in those elevations long, but it stayed chilly for a good deal of the first loop. The first loop was 26 miles, an interval Hoss seems to think it pretty good. He doesn’t seem to feel the need to stop every 12.5 miles like some rides have us doing.

Because the GPS was down, I had to guess based on our typical speed when it was time to give Hoss his first dose of electrolytes. I got off at about 7:30, figuring this was about as near as I was going to get to knowing we were about halfway to the vet check, and gave Hoss his electrolytes.

We got into the vet check right around 10am, going a little faster than I’d expected to go. The first hold was 40 minutes. After Hoss had recovered and our hold time started I got my crew bag and set up an area for us to hang out in. I gave Hoss his electrolyte-laced bran mash. He was having a particularly contrary day and did not eat it. He was only interested in his hay. Having only brought along two syringe doses of electrolytes and depending on three mashes to give him his other doses at vet checks, I had little choice but to hope he’d be okay despite not getting his usual doses.

After our hold we headed out on the second, 25 mile loop. The temperature never got particularly hot, in fact I spent much of the day trying to find the right combination of t-shirt, sweatshirt and jacket in order to be comfortable. This did, however, enable Hoss to do okay without his regular electrolyte dosing.

On the second loop we were caught up by four other riders, with whom we more or less ended up riding the rest of the loop. When they caught up to us, we were moving along near a ranch. Hoss was slowing down as they caught up. Once they passed us, he picked up the pace.

It wasn’t long after they had passed us that the group of us realized we hadn’t seen a trail marker in while. It didn’t take long after that to realize we had missed a turn. Fortunately Dave Rabe was in the group and he was able to get us back on trail.

About halfway through the loop we came to a water trough with a special treat for the riders in it. Beer. At that point in the day it was warm enough for a beer to sound just about right. Unfortunately there was only one left, and Dave split it with me, kind man that he is. I gave Hoss another dose of electrolytes and we headed on our way.

We came to another trough with yet more beer in it. There was enough for those of us who wanted them and still leave some for the last rider, who was about ten minutes behind us. Dave and I even got two a piece. We loitered at the trough until some riders started feeling a bit cranky about it and went on our way.

As we approached the vet check we could hear the crack of gunfire. Campers were target shooting near the vet check. I’m a little less annoyed about my neighbor’s habitual shooting of ground squirrels. Hoss’s reaction to the gun fire was mostly to pretty much think, “oh, that freak-o neighbor guy is out here, too,” and keep doing whatever it was he was doing. Many of the other horses flinched at each shot.

The second hold was one hour. It was about 2:30pm. I gave Hoss the uneaten bran mash from the first vet check and left him in search of lunch for myself. This time Hoss ate the mash. I had a hamburger and some chips and found a bucket to upturn and sit on while I waited for our hold. Hoss ate well over the course of the hold, and even took a nap for about ten minutes or so. When our hold time was up, I got us out of there close to on time. I wanted to get done and not spend more time in the check than necessary.

The other riders I was with had better recoveries and should have left the check at least a few minutes ahead of Hoss and me. Instead they dawdled in the vet check. I really wanted to get the third, 10 mile loop done in two hours or less, and be back for the third check by 6pm. So we set out and once I felt Hoss was warmed back up adequately, I pushed him into a trot. Without other, faster horses to pull him along it was a bit more of a challenge to keep him moving. I know that he’s got it in him. He just wants to be motivated by something other than, y’know, me. He did maintain a reasonable speed over most of the ten miles and we were back at the vet check in less than two hours and well before 6pm. The other four riders came in some ten minutes later.

The third hold was twenty minutes. Once Hoss was recovered I got him to our spot and gave him another bran mash, which he ate reasonably well. He spent more of this hold resting than eating, but having been there only two hours earlier it didn’t really surprise me. I got our gear packed up and moved to where it would be hauled back to camp and got us back on the trail on time, again ten minutes ahead of Dave Rabe and crew.

The final leg was 14 miles back to camp. I figured we should be able to get that done in something around three hours. The challenge being keeping him moving without the motivation of the company of other horses.

At this point Hoss had spent just enough time with other horses to think he should be allowed to wait for others to catch up to him. We were by now far enough ahead of the riders behind us and far enough behind the riders ahead of us to be in something of a “pocket.” If he maintained a decent speed, he would neither catch up to nor be caught up by other horses. Of course he wasn’t keen on this notion. He told me I don’t know how many times he was just dying and couldn’t possibly go on another trot step. But I could feel him and he was bluffing me. He just wanted to be caught up to. I pushed him an awful lot. I was able to keep him going if at a somewhat lower speed than I’d like him to be doing until the (now three) horses behind us got close enough for him to hear them.

Hoss does a rather peculiar thing. With the exception of the beginning of a ride, when the very idea of being passed by another horse is a terrible affront, he will slow down when there are horses behind him. Once they pass him, he’ll cheerfully speed up once again. While other horses are behind us, though, I’m pedaling like a maniac just to keep him trotting at all. Now that the horses we’d spent some time with had caught back up, he was slowing down determinedly. Once they caught up I was forced to pull him off and let them pass.  Once he was behind them, it was like riding the same horse I’d started the morning with.

The only drawback to being behind this group again was they were not keeping up a consistent trot speed. I would have much preferred to consistently trot all the way back. Instead, partly because they were rather taking up the entire trail and partly because there’d be little point in passing them anyway, we had to go at their chosen speed. And they were faster when they trotted, resulting in Hoss falling further and further behind and getting more and more annoyed by it. By the time we got back to camp, I had to get off to keep him from charging after them.

We finished the ride in a respectable 14 hours and 21 minutes. For reasons I cannot begin to explain the results show us finishing in 15 hours 21 minutes, but I know we were in at 9:20pm and there were 2 hours of hold time, so somebody got the math wrong. Not that it makes any difference.