January 2007
Monday - 1 January
Today was the Gold Country Endurance Riders' New Year's potluck at the Milestone Saloon in Cool, so we dropped my trailer in Cool first and then rode from Third Gate along the river road. Our original plan was to ride the high trail, but we were short on time, so opted for the faster, more open route. This was good, as it turned out, because Roo was a bad pony and ran off with me because I wouldn't let him canter to catch up with Ann n' Abi - so he just took off and did it anyway - chin stuck out. <grrr> A kimberwicke and running martingale will be appearing shortly in his future . And I didn't get around to crupper-training him either, which was on the list for the Christmas holidays. <double grrr>
I was so pissed at him that I was going to ride the 9+ miles
back after lunch, but it was late by the
time we were done, so I just trailered back instead. Just as
well - it would have been dark and cold if I'd stayed out. Plus Chili was droopy that evening, so she would have been
wiped if she'd gone another 9 miles at the decent pace I
was aiming to try and do.
Tuesday - 2 January My Roomba is doing a wondrous job and my floors that normally never see a vacuum are staying under control despite our best efforts with muddy shoes and bits of firewood. And best of all, it does it while I'm emailing/quilting/cooking supper/in the shower, etc. I haven't scheduled it to go off on its own yet, mostly because I haven't gotten around to "Roomba-rize" my rooms properly yet, so there are things for it to get hung up on - so far it has gotten wedged under the fridge door, on the base of the chair, under another chair, and on the edge of the tile where we haven't finished tiling yet, so it got stuck on the waffley sub-floor that it couldn't get good grip on. It came with two "virtual walls" that are boxes with laser beams coming off them to keep the Roomba from going where it shouldn't, so I've been learning how best to use those to keep it away from things it could get stuck on. It has needed dehairing and defluffing periodically, and I usually empty the bin before it tells me it needs to. The beauty of it is that it's one of those tools that you can use when you walk past a gritty floor and think "...must vacuum that..." and then promptly forget about it for another week. With the Roomba, you just put it in the room and let it get on with it. :) Hay Barn Floor Thoughts Barn is just about cleared out, the truck is unhooked and I'm going to go and get hay around "lunchtime" (I had a couple of flakes of hay left, plus all the floor sweepings from under the palettes to keep the hungries busy for this morning). I want to pull out all the tatty tarp in the hay area, but am a little anxious that rain will blow in over the top of the south wall. That said, if we enclose it at the top, will we then have more of a condensation problem? Perhaps having it open would allow more air flow and make it less drippy? How much rain could blow in under the roof/over the wall anyway? And even if it just made it damp, surely it would dry out? I pulled the two old bales of Three-Grain out of there and noticed that the bottom one was a little moldy on the end closest to the corner where there was a hole in the tarp and much water came in. But it would puddle in there - not the same as a light dusting from above... Still need to borrow Ann's stapler to staple the new floor tarp a few feet up the walls to protect from dampness coming in under the wall. Wild Blue: We're still on the waiting list. It looks like WB did "something" around the middle of November to try and stuff more people on the system, but whatever they did didn't work very well, resulting in slow connections and p-off existing customers. My guess is they are trying to sort that out before putting more [future disgruntled] customers on there. So we're still waiting and dreaming of the days when we'll be like real folk. That said, we did finally buy a DVD player for Christmas and got to join the 21st Century. My New Year's resolution is to stretch me so that I stay bendy. Not working great so far, as I managed to tweak a hamstring over the holidays, then tweak a calf-muscle in the same leg man-handling branches the day we dropped the tree. Looks like I need to stretch more. :) Thursday - 4 January We dropped by Stateline Tack last night and I picked up a kimberwicke for Roo. Took it home and put it on him and could fit fingers either side between the edge of his mouth and the D-rings on the bit. It was a 4.75". I suspect he needs something closer to a 4.25". :) Not sure how you size such things or how much space there's supposed to be between his mouth and the bit. Some research needed there before I order one specially for his pea-head. It was only $25, so I'll keep it for Zini to wear, as both she and Provo wear a kimberwicke, but we only had one, so had to squabble as to who got to use it (not that Zini's being ridden, but it's good to stay positive). Speaking of, pft came home with a MASSIVE 800+ page lameness book. It has the scariest photos in it of all manner of bad things. At least I understand the blistering stifles concept now (although I didn't understand the other cutting the ligament surgery, as it didn't seem to do the right thing).
Kinda. I don't really feel I've done more than scratch the surface with him yet, though. He's not an obvious horse, by any stretch. We need many more miles to get to an agreement with each other. I need to resolve to do a couple of 30 minute schooling sessions with him each week. It'll get easier with daylight, but he and I could both use them. Plus, I'd like to take him out for 30 mins and just work on his walk. He hangs out at 3.2 - 3.6 mph, but is capable of 3.8 mph quite easily (I've seen him at 4.2 mph, but he was very anxious). He tends to like to schlep along and I want his walk to be better so I don't feel we're dawdling. * * * The other day I was thinking that winter was done - it was so mild and pleasant - I could practically *smell* summer coming :) - and then today it poured with rain, with supposedly snow to 2500' tonight. My hay shed is all messed up - I took the tarp flooring up and all the junk out, and have decided to put gravel down in there to prevent dampness/gophers/weeds, etc Can't put gravel in until Friday or Saturday when I have time. In the meantime, I had to get hay - so the hay is still on the truck, parked in the barn out of the rain, with the end stall closed up so they don't go in there and help themselves off the truck. But I got another couple of palettes and am going to borrow Ann's staple gun to staple my floor tarp up the sides of the walls a foot or so, so that it's nice and water tight. By Sunday, I expect to have my barn almost completed and everything back where it should be! Yay! When I pulled up the tarp at the weekend, there were all these gopher "half tunnels" where they'd gone in the dirt under the tarp, but stayed on the surface. They look like worm trails. In reality, I don't care if they're there, but I thought rock might make it less appealing for them. I'm mostly hoping to keep out the wet that could sneak in under the gap at the bottom of the walls. * * * I printed out the AERC calendar and these are my picks - not ones I'll do, but ones I would consider doing. The ones in brackets are multi-days <bite fingernails> or further to drive <have to plan vacation carefully> or both, so would require much thought and planning:
Friday - 5 January
This is what I *think* it's going to look like... still not sure about the narrow sashing around each block - have to see what it looks like. Right now, that what you see is only 39" x 46", so it'll have to have extra stuff around the outside.
As soon as I did this, I wasn't sure I liked it (standard thing - kind of like when get my hair cut) but hopefully it'll grow on me... Saturday - 6 January Didn't manage to ride today, as hoped, although I did finish my hay area - complete with gravel floor, tarp on top, and palettes on top of that. It even has tidy wood edging along the front. Yay! Cosy hay bales are now installed, along with all my feed bins and hopefully the goodies are now protected from escapees (unless Provo figures out how to push open the doors, which he will about 30 seconds after he escapes, so I'll have to put some sort of clip on them). Sunday - 7 January It was a beautiful day and warm enough to ride in shirt- sleeves. We only rode 10 miles, mostly at a walk, but did 1800' of climbing, so it was a good workout. It was nice and un-sloppy, which I'd hoped for. We did the road up towards Salmon Falls which I'd done on a mtn bike a couple of summers ago, but hadn't been on it since. I like it better on the horse, as you can see over the top of the bushes down to the river, which you can't on the bike. Getting back around the gate involved limbo-ing under a horizontal tree trunk, and then jarring to the left, off-balance and off-camber. Definitely a place to have a tight cinch. :) I downloaded our trail from today and was poking around measuring the other trails:
I put the kimberwicke on Roo's bridle - it's not as
big on him as I first thought (it's a 4.75" - a 4.5"
would probably be better, but this one worked OK),
and he didn't flip out the first time I had to apply
pressure to it (I left the curb chain relatively loose
and put the reins on the upper slots). In fact, he
seemed to like it - esp. the dangly end of the curb
chain that was hanging off and he could *just* reach it with his lip, so
played with it incessantly every
time we stopped <g>.
Monday - 8 January pft and I drove both Subarus to Sacramento this morning and got the cracked windscreens replaced. They are now *very* clean and shiny! (with luck we can get the cars home without picking up any rocks <gulp>). Tuesday - 9 January It's like summer here today. I'm in shorts with all the doors and windows open. I had to quickly mend the cotton sheet Ann gave me that was all ripped up, so I could put it on poor Roo who was baking in the thick blankie that I'd swapped him into (instead of the not-so-thick-but-waterproof-but-rubby-Amish blankie he had been wearing). Talking with Ann on the trail on Sunday reminded me that I must write a list of "lessons I have learned and must remember not to repeat". I have to paste them up in the trailer... can you tell I'm having paranoid "Don't want to break the next horse" thoughts? When we got home last night, Roomba was
marooned in the middle of the room and unable to dock itself. This
morning I took a look - turned it on and told it to go home and it just
looked confused, but then I noticed it sounded kind of funny, so I
flipped it over and found a twig firmly lodged up against the rubber
brush under the wire grate that holds the brushes in place. Took the
twig out and it found home immediately. pft came home in the middle of the day, not feeling well - he
had a temp of 102°F poor thing. He has been in bed ever since. No fun
for him... <fingers crossed> I don't get it. Roo and I managed to get out for a scamper this afternoon - set off at 4:15 and got home at 5:45 after covering 7+ miles - this was really good, considering we had to run the gauntlet of many scary horses and dogs, so were crawling/stopped at times. Plus they re-graded one of the dirt roads we were on - leaving an expanse of red slimy mud filled with *pink* rocks and boulders. It was like riding a drunk horse at times the way he was weaving. :) But what really amazes me is how good he is about crossing water or soggy, muddy, puddle-spots on the trail - he'll happily trot right through the middle of them without a care. This evening he was definitely feeling good - once we turned for home (and got away from the pink rocks), he whooshed along and I was glad for my kimberwicke. :) He wanted to trot speedily up all the hills - although about half way up most of them he realised the error of his ways. In the last few weeks he has started feeling *strong* and lost his "happily go along in a relaxed manner" attitude. Suddenly he wants to go places and get there *fast*. :) I suspect that his initial unease/tentativeness at being in a new place with a new rider has finally worn off and he's showing his true colours. He's now much more like riding Provo (only spookier ;) - but *much* more comfy) than riding Zini, which is what he felt like in the beginning. Put all my pads in the washer when I got home. Hopefully his loin rub won't get worse if I'm more conscientious about making sure they get washed often - even when they don't look that cruddy (since he's blanketed, his pads weren't that bad). I might try and ride in pft's SportSaddle for a while - it's peaked in the back, and that helped in the past. I'm pissed that he's already picked up this rub as we've only just started ramping up the training, so it can only get worse and his new coat won't be due for another 2-3 months. I had this problem with Mouse (loin rub on both sides in the late summer, fixed by swapping to pft's saddle and then laming her permanently :( ) and later with Provo (loin rub on one side, making me fret it was my riding, only to discover, after having the chiro come out, that he was all screwed up in the back end and not moving right). In Roo's case, it's one-sided, which leads me to think either:
The funny thing is, when I look at the pad, the area that looks like it's getting more pressure is the opposite side. Strange. Friday - 12 January We are having a "cold snap" here. The sky is bright blue,
and the air very crisp. I wanted to ride today / Saturday / Sunday, but watching the sharp breeze come up, I'm going
to have to bundle up to do it. Ann gave me the cotton sheet to see if my sewing machine was robust enough to mend the big rip down one side of it - it was <g>. I'm not sure I'm supposed to keep it forever, but it's working well for now. The cotton sheet is a better weight for Roo during the day when it's warm and it doesn't bind on his shoulders quite so much as his Amish Blankie did (the Amish blankie isn't as heavy as the "winter blankie", but it rubs like crazy). This morning, even though it had warmed up to 32°F, he was a bit sweaty under the winter blankie, so I swapped him back to the sheet again. I finally gave in and went online and ordered him a new blankie with gussets in the shoulders. The rubs on his shoulders are now the size of side dishes almost. He doesn't seem sore, but I'm guessing it's only a matter of time, so if I want to continue to blanket him, I needed to get him something with space in the shoulders. He does have some winter coat, but I like being able to just whip the blanket off his clean grey body when I want to ride, instead of grooming for hours first. After careful consideration, I decided to get him a turnout *sheet*, rather than a mid-weight blankie. It just doesn't get cold enough here most of the time to warrant needing a mid-weight blankie - it's warm enough most of the time during the day and he'll bake. I'd rather he was comfy during the day and I can always pop a fleecy underneath it if it looks like it's going to get really cold overnight.
I measured him three times and he was mostly 72", but then I tried to measure around his "widest" part and it came to 74"... I conclude that he actually has big shoulders (hence the rubbing), even though he doesn't look that big. To be on the safe side, I ordered him a 74". I can always ask Wendi to sew in some shoulder adjustment straps if it's too big. pft has been home sick since Tuesday with stomach flu (euwww). I hope he's better soon and I *doubly* hope I don't catch it. Saturday - 13 January Lunged Roo with a crupper on for the first time this afternoon and he did great! Actually, that's the first time I've ever lunged him since getting him in September. Whoever taught him to lunge did a good job. He's a little reluctant to go out to start with and a bit fast once he's out there, but you just have to kiss *once* and he'll immediately break into an easy canter. Wow. (this is me comparing him to Mouse who you have to chase with a big stick to get her to canter and all she does is trot faster and faster and faster). Unfortunately, before we started I discovered he was missing his left front shoe, so I put an EZ boot on the bare foot. A new "0" EZ boot was a bit too big and the next size down "00" was too small <sigh>. The "0" lasted about five minutes before flying off, causing him to leap about excitingly. I thought it was the crupper that was causing the excitement, but then realised the boot was missing. He jumped for about a third of a circle and then settled down again. (I have one old-style "0" boot, but the cable is broken on it) As far as the crupper went - he tucked a couple of times, mostly when the boot came off, and did one cat jump with all four feet, but never really looked like he was terribly bothered by it. Best of all, he didn't loose his brain, and would settle back down without my intervention. I thought he's get upset by it when he started to canter, but he really didn't care then either. We tightened it a tad and he still didn't react. I might tighten it one more tad, and see how that looks and once I'm satisfied he's OK with that, I'd like to ride him with it - but on a trail with no drop-offs to start with, just in case. :) But I don't think it's going to be a problem. I've emailed Ted to see if he can come by and put the missing shoe back on - Roo's due to be reshod in two weeks, but I don't want to wait that long since the EZ boot option didn't look too promising and I definitely expect to ride him between now and then. I'll try and stuff him into the "00" again - I could almost get his foot in it, but then the gaiter was jammed down under his heel bulbs and I couldn't get it to come up, couldn't pull up the heel strap, and couldn't get the nylon strap out <grrr>. Sunday - 14 January It got down to 19.8°F in the barn last night, but as it's so dry, it doesn't feel that bad. Friday was the worst with the bitter wind. Night before last I went down under the house to turn off the water to the outside faucets behind the house. Then I went out and was able to open one of the three spigots (the other two were already frozen solid). Then yesterday morning, pft stuck his head out the front door to refill the hummer feeders and found water pouring down the side of the house from the back. As he put it "Houston, we have a problem". We had this dread thought that the pipes to the a/c unit (behind the house) had burst, or the swamp cooler that is precariously mounted up on a platform near the roofline and I was thinking "this is going to be expensive". And it turned out, all it was was the one spigot I'd managed to open. Apparently the line I turned off went to a different outside faucet and the one going to the three spigots behind the house was still open. Once that spigot finally thawed around mid-morning, out came the water :) <phew> I've been turning all my hoses off at night and then turning them back on around mid-day when they finally thaw out. The ice is about 1/2" to 3/4" thick on the trough, but they are happy to drink it. Yesterday everyone got a BP slurpy made with hot water that I bucketed out from the basement - that seemed to go over well. I put the leftover hot water in a bucket for them. Jack seems to like it, but the others didn't really care. This morning I've got Roo shut in a stall for the next half an hour or so - we're going riding at Cronin at 11. I got him confined, brushed the mud off that bare foot, inspected the damage to the quarters <sigh> (I didn't need to rasp the curly edges off that were there last night, as they were already gone :( ). Then I wrestled that "00" boot on him. I put it on top of the central heating vent in the house first, to get it smooshy, and then made sure to keep the mid-part of the gaiter from getting jammed behind his heel like it did last night. Once the boot was on, I had a heck of a job getting the stupid strap out, but finally managed. The gaiter is only just tall enough to pull around his pastern at that point, so I'm not thrilled by how snug the back of the gaiter is against his foot - a little *too* snug, methinks, and likely to rub? (or not? maybe being really tight is good?). It doesn't seem like he's a really good fit for this size EZ boot, but the "0" goes on much too easily. We'll see. We're only doing a walking ride there today, so it's good practice to try both boot and crupper at the same time. Later that afternoon:
Rode with Ann, Jess, Erin McChesney
and her two boys today at Cronin - very "brisk" it was, but
nice - esp. in the sun. We all but walked the entire 8 miles. Monday - 15 January Dana emailed me this morning to say that Barbara McCrary was proclaiming that this is probably the last year they will be offering Swanton 100. I am bummed, as I wanted to do this ride, but wasn't exactly ready. Thinking about it, I decided I'd like to start the ride and just see how far we get. Taking part in it would be a neat thing before it goes away. Plus it'll be fun to have something like that to aim for, and go into it with the attitude that we aren't likely to finish, so just enjoy the day and the trail. So with that in mind, here's my refined thoughts on "rides we could do":
I'm hoping that the first few rides on my list are nice n' easy ones to get us warmed up, and see how he's doing and get us in the right mode. My main goal is to pace as perfectly as I can - don't waste time, don't dawdle, and don't get in a situation where I have to get him to run to make up time - and if I do, just let it go and go overtime. Post-ride Report on Mouse:
Yay! * * * We actually got to the cinema tonight (I'm not sure we managed to go at all in 2006), and went to see Casino Royale. Good film! Tuesday - 16 January
Thursday - 18
January
Mouse Update From Ann:
Friday - 19
January Zini is now no-longer in heat and the honeymoon between her and Jack has ended, with Jack being bitten if he dares to forget to run away when She Commands. Jack deserves it most of the time, still being fairly clueless about what he's supposed to be doing and ignoring the obvious signals from either Zini or me that he is supposed to *move* when asked. Saturday - 20 January GPS download: http://trail.motionbased.com/trail/activity/1934652
What we hadn't counted on was how frozen it would be down in Canyon Creek which you have to drop into before riding along the open ridge on Bottlehill Road. Canyon Creek is the place we ride down to in the summer when it's really hot everywhere else - there's a reason for that. To start with, Mecca in the front got an exciting surprise when she sank through the icy mud about 8". It was really odd the way the ice crystals had pushed the mud upwards, creating an icy air gap underneath to drop into with each footfall. Pretty soon, all four horses were stepping, cracking, and sinking through the top crust, but they did good and didn't get too weirded out by it.
Then there was the sheet-ice across the road - some with icy puddles underneath, some just flat sheet-ice. Roo nearly skittled over trying to cross the flat ice but luckily I was off leading him, having just gotten off to unlock one of three gates, so he didn't have to balance me as well - if he had, we would have fallen for sure. When I took his EZ boots off after the ride I saw why - the "new" EZ boot was worn completely smooth on the underside, while the older design one (which I think has as many miles, if not more on it) still has some tread. He was definitely slipping a lot more on the right (smooth) foot, poor guy.
Because of all the ice, and because of the footing - when it wasn't icy, it was slick mud, and when it wasn't slick mud, there was a thick carpet of pine needles to slither on - we made very poor time for the first few miles.
After being on the ridge out in the sun for a few miles, we started to shed clothing left and right. I've got string-elastic with toggles tied to the back of my saddle which works really well for attaching clothing while sitting *on* the horse. And because I don't have a cantle pack, I've also got a rump rug back there, just in case we get caught out in the cold. This did come in handy at the end of the ride, when we stripped tack and the sun dropped behind the trees - I was able to unfold the doubled-over fleecy rump rug into a mini-cooler for Roo. The more or less permanent addition of the rump rug has only been during the last few rides which were mostly walking. However, when we went out on Tuesday and were trotting cheerfully down the road, I discovered that the rolled up rump rug bounces up and over the back of my saddle, so I end up sitting on it. Not comfy. Luckily, Roo is now wearing a crupper, so I unhooked it off the back of the saddle and reattached it over the top of the rump rug. Voila. Problem solved. Cruppers are good. After stopping periodically to let Chili rest (brisk trotting along dirt roads is hard on her, as she doesn't get much of a break) and other brief pauses for bathroom breaks, puddle drinking, tack adjustments, etc. we finally trudged into Virner for lunch. Not. It turns out the restaurant at Virner isn't open for lunch. <sigh> We looked at the clock and realised that Dionne and I didn't have time to ride back again - unless we wanted to be riding in the pitch black (there's only a tiny sliver of a moon), which I wouldn't mind on normal footing, but we'd be doing the most treacherous section across the slick ice in the dark, which didn't seem the smartest idea (not to mention trying to get through the three locked gates). So Ann and Jess took Abi and Mecca home, while Dionne and I installed Virtue and Roo in a small corral in front of a couple of buckets of pellets and waited for their return (this was when I was able to use my rump rug as a cooler - I'm so proud of my home-made prototype rump rug). Virtue and Roo got on really well and were quite content sharing food and water until Ann returned with their chariot. Ann n' Jess' trailer is a two-horse straight-load, which we didn't think either Roo or Virtue had ever been in before, but after a short hesitation, both pones were very good and hopped into the trailer. And we were proud. We stopped at the mexican restaurant in Georgetown on the way home and finally got our lunch - at around 4:30. :) All in all, it was a fun ride with some good trotting and some excellent training over scary footing - even if we didn't quite manage to go the distance we were planning (but we still did 2500' of climbing). Sunday - 21 January It was a good ride, but I'm still not sure where Roo is in his conditioning. The main trouble with that ride was that it was either quite quick, or really slow - not the best pacing. He seemed kind of flat at the end - and that was only 14 miles, which shouldn't be enough to tire him out. I don't know if he's genuinely tired, or if he just wants a rest and a snack and then will bounce back. A couple of times during yesterday's ride, he turned for home and was ready to dump the others without turning a hair. I'm not sure how significant that is, though, given that the first time he did it, we'd only gone a mile or two <g>. He's definitely not a "trot 'til you
drop" type of horse, which is good in some respects, but hard to
read in others.
I still have no idea if they are all like that, or if it was just a bad batch that I happened to get hold of. I was just looking at another "new" 0 size one with a broken cable and it is about out of tread as well. I don't feel like I ride on that abrasive footing, and I don't do that many miles. But I'm not sure I'm willing to buy any more boots if they only last that long. OTOH, I'm not sure I can use these ones much more, except perhaps for riding on pavement. Certainly I can't use them anywhere I'd need any kind of tread. Tuesday - 23 January This afternoon, I took a quick break to take some
photies of Jack to show Irene,
his breeder. ...and the ones that made him look like he's going to look when we do Tevis in 2016. This is our: It's the first time I've watched him and been able to see the bigger pony within (and be able to imagine what he's going to be like as a growed up). It's also the first time I felt like he was being a little studly (being v. interested in some poop - which was probably from Zini the other day, maybe coming off her heat - and being a bit squealy. 'twas interesting. There was a lot of leaping and bounding going on and I'm glad he's small, or I would have been a bit intimidated - we need to work on respecting Lucy's space a little. We did some trotting out practice, which he was quite good at, considering the other horses were talking to him and he needed to be with them. And he did his best to hog-tie himself on numerous occasions and wasn't remotely worried except for being irritated that he could no longer mover any of his legs. :) Musing on Swanton: Who knows if we'll be even remotely ready (right now I'm not convinced we're ready for a 50 <g>), but I was encouraged by this post on the "new 100 milers" list: Crysta:
I think our pacing on Saturday was lousy for a long-distance ride, so it's just as well we only did the 14 miles. We're going to try and do Third Gate > Auburn and back this coming weekend which is 28 miles (note the "try" <g>) and I'm going to really try hard to pace nicely and not let him zoom off up things because he thinks he can. Crysta also said this:
which goes back to my idea of just riding Swanton for the experience of "being there" and enjoying the day. Ride Around the Block Roo and I did a quick spin out the back and along Andy Wolf Road for four miles this evening. I opted not to use the bald EZ boots, since "out the back" involves dropping over 250' in a 1/3 mile on slippery mud. I was very happy with how the crupper worked on this hill - last time we tried it, I had to get off and hand-walk him down the hill because I was riding up his neck. Unfortunately, going without EZ boots proved to be a mistake. When I got to the end of the trail portion and came out onto Andy Wolf Road, I realised that Roo had lost that precarious left-front shoe again. Rats. This time he removed a big chunk of hoof from the front. Farrier Ted is due to re-shoe him Friday (which is why I risked going bootless), but there's not much foot left to nail to, so I might have to just leave shoes off and have him wear boots for a bit until he grows a bit more foot. I'm hoping Ted has a pair of 0 EZ boots with gaiters that we can get to work. <sigh> Ann, watching me ride at the weekend, was trying to get me to ride less duck-footed (which I think is something I picked up from riding in the Sportsaddle and never lost). The one thing I haven't liked about the Barefoot is the tendency for my leg to slip back when the horse slows down and then I tip forwards, looking like a completely hopeless rider. She suggested I try shortening my stirrups. It turns out, I was on the top hole, so had to punch a couple more holes in the leathers so I could shorten them. This evening was the first time I'd tried the new short versions and whilst I liked my leg position (and she's right, my leg didn't flip back nearly so much), it made my knees, hips and ankles a bit crunchy posting, so I'm going to have to retrain my body to make that work. It did feel good, though. Friday - 26 January Luckily, by the time Roo's feet were trimmed up, there was actually foot to nail to, not air, so he's in shoes and they look relatively secure. Despite this, I still bought a pair of 0-sized Epics from Farrier Ted and will probably use them most of the time. It would be nice to get through this next 5-week shoeing cycle without losing any more shoes and resulting hoof. With luck, they are made of sturdier material than those dud-2004 ones that went bald.
Forging and Peeing - A couple of weeks ago when I was riding Roo in EZ boots along the ranch road, he was forging almost every stride (trotting up slight hills). To start with at the weekend, trotting along Bottlehill Road he wasn't forging at all, which I thought was curious And then we stopped and he peed, and he started to forge again. I can only assume his stride must have lengthened. Huh. Riding him on Tuesday night, when we got home, I stopped by the garage to chat with pft and Roo couldn't possibly stand still and was fidgeting, fidgeting, fidgeting. Once untacked, I shut him in a stall for a short while so that I could give him his BP slurry - and he immediately peed on the bare mats... Hmmm... could that be what he was so fidgety about? Next time, we head for some long grass to stand in. Swanton - Talked to Farrier Ted a little about Swanton. He did it a few years ago and had to run in at the end to make cut-off. He said that it has a lot of hills, but not long canyons like Tevis, so you're going up or down (eek). He said if the terrain is remotely flat, you must make time. So my trick is going to be balancing hill-work with continuous-trotting practice.
Sunday - 28
January
Roo and I rode with Dionne and Virtue and did Third Gate to Auburn
and back on Sunday. This was our first long ride since Lake Sonoma last fall, so I
was anxious to see how Roo would be - esp. since I was less than pleased
with his floppiness last weekend when we only went 14 miles (but ran up
a bunch of hills at the start, so probably pooped him out then). After spending ages on Saturday removing the heel straps from my new Epics and dremelling the straps down to accommodate Roo's lower heels, at the beginning of the ride yesterday I spent 15 minutes trying to wrestle the stupid boot onto his "long" foot, only to discover that no-way, no-how, since the shoe was sticking out the back of the foot. I had forgotten that I cut the backs out of the non-gaiter EZ boots and the shoes stick out the back - whereas with the back in place on the Epics (to keep the gaiter from sliding up) there wasn't room for the backs of his shoes. <grrr> I dug out my spare nekkid boot and discovered it still had tread
on it, so paired it up with the other not-so-bald boot and used those.
He didn't interfere at all until the very end when we were coming up the
hill into Third Gate and he was getting tired and was really hungry, and
then he started twocking. Dionne said he was hitting the middle of the
bottom of his foot. Roo was highly suspicious of all the hikers and runners and didn't want to pass them. I also discovered that he didn't like bikes when they are being pedalled, although apparently free-wheeling is OK. There were several revelations on this ride - things that I thought Roo knew or had done, only to discover I was thinking of Provo:
He did really good all day - leading almost the entire way, which he hasn't been doing much recently - and was pretty steady. Virtue doesn't like to lead, although she did come up alongside us a few times and trot along happily - and they were both so mellow they didn't get into racing, so it was very pleasant. I tried to keep him to an easy trot and would rate him whenever he began to dig in and start to accelerate, but on the whole, I was able to ride him on a loose rein. A few times when he was trotting out in front, Virtue would canter to catch up and he'd start to speed up for "no reason" - took me a while to figure out what he was doing. :) I continued to use my shortened stirrups for this ride and although my leg position was much better, my knees and hips hated me and it was harder to post - I felt like I was going up too much. I was wondering about making another stirrup hole half-way - although it must only be a half-inch difference, so perhaps I just need to retrain my body to deal with it (I know when I was trying to ride less duck-footed last weekend, my hips didn't like it, so maybe my legs are turning in more because of the stirrup length?). I'll see how it goes and hopefully it'll get better on it's own. My hip-butt muscles were stiff afterwards - perhaps from trying to put my foot in Dionne's stirrup to keep her saddle from slipping when she was getting on - that gave me a good cramp. Time to start doing iliotibial band stretches. Along the river road (the flat easy part between hw-49 and the Quarry VC), Roo kept gawping at the holes in the bank and eyeing some of the rocks suspiciously. On the way home I was getting a little tired (trying to post on my bad side as much as possible), so I think was steadying myself against the pommel when he did The Most Enormous Spook all the way across the river road and I came this > < close to falling off and thought I'd gotten whiplash. Dionne was most impressed. :))) And what was so scary? A twig on the ground... He stayed cheerful almost the entire way home, which I was pleased about - even giving me his "whoo hoo" head flick once, which I thought might lead to more exciting antics, but it didn't. Finally we hit the last hill up to Third Gate and he started to get tired. I think he was really hungry - judging by the way he kept stopping to eat. This is where I fed him most of the LMF, and in retrospect, should think about feeding it to him before we start up a long hill (if I know it's coming) - for me, the energy-lift I get from Gu can take about 20 minutes to kick in. Virtue demonstrated the benefit of Dionne's regular workout of riding down Driver's Flat Road, up to White Oak and back (several thousand feet climbing - and she says she trots a lot of the way back) - and wanted to trot up the last hill, so I would say she's in really nice shape (Roo tried for a short while and quickly came to his senses). Several times in the last few miles he pulled over off the trail wanting to pee, but didn't (which made me a little worried). However, he did pee three times during the ride and didn't drink *that* well (the weather was cool), so I wasn't convinced there was much in there to come out. He did finally pee at the trailer after the ride, so I'm not sure what that was about. Roo's loin rub is getting to large dimensions, so the use of the Dixie Midnight didn't work to slow its growth. His back is not sore at all, but I can't imagine that it won't become sore if this carries on. I'm going to experiment with my old green Skito, because it's quite thin in the back. I need to somehow lessen the rubbing in the back. The pad is for my Sportsaddle, so it's much longer than it needs to be:
Monday morning his legs were a little puffy, but not too bad, and by that evening they were completely back to normal, so I'm ecstatic about that. And his appetite was good Sunday evening. Since he coped well with this ride, I'm going back to considering the Shine-n-Shine-Only 50 on Feb 17th. Dionne said that RM said that they removed as many hills as they could so that it would be a nice easy a ride for the beginning of the season (that said, I don't know where she read that, since I can't find it on the entry). Tuesday - 30 January I rode Roo tonight and put my shoulder shims in the pad under my butt, so the pad got abruptly thinner behind me. It did "float" the pad a bit better - I kept feeling under there while I was riding and could easily slide my hand in there - but I could also feel his stubbly loin swaying vigorous back and forth under the pad. Suspect liberal use of Body Glide may be the only answer (if I can find my tube of it).
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Here's
Ann demonstrating how jockeys 
