| Holland,
1977: First learned to ride at eleven years old. Holland is a
place not known for its wide open spaces or elevation changes and I
spent most of that time lapping arenas on Friesians and Fjord ponies
(the school horses of choice in Holland). Occasionally, I'd
get to ride a welsh pony and that was most excellent - their size
and temperament fit me best. Welsh ponies are like mini-arabians
with faster legs, and I dreamed of one day owning a whole field full
of horses. Be careful what you wish for.
Sacramento, California, 1997: I saw a "Cougar Rock" photo on the wall of a co-worker and realised I "wanted that". Didn't really know what "that" was, but I knew I wanted it. Within the year I owned two arabians, was learning the marvels of Sierra foothill singletrack, and had been to Tevis as a spectator, taking photos and posting them on the web. Started endurance riding, injured myself and had knee surgery; horse #1 injured himself; started horse #2; horse #2 injured herself... 1998-2008: Helped out at Tevis in some capacity, taking photos, doing the webcast (single-handed - how much fun was that? <grin>), crewing, practising sleep deprivation, and collecting lots of volunteer t-shirts. 2004: I actually entered the Ride with horse #1. We had tons of fun that winter and spring getting ready for the ride, but alas my enthusiasm outshone my common sense and by May injury-prone Provo was out with a tendon pull. 2005: back to the drawing board with horse #3 who suffered a career-ending pasture-injury to her knee after a year. 2006: Enter horse #4 - AM Ruwala Land, aka Roop - the six year old son of AM Sands ofTime (a successful local endurance mare); grandson of SSA Csea Dream (competed twice in the PanAm Championships) x Al-Marah Xanthium (eleven 100 mile completions including a tie for the Tevis Cup in 1992). Fingers crossed for this one. 2007: Roo and I did plenty of rides and got to know one another. 2008: Managed to squeeze in our first 100 (Patriot) and was setting up for the next when I got kicked at the Hat Creek ride and broke both bones in my leg. 2009: This is the year - we're going to do it, we're going to do it! |
Part I - The Preparation
Wednesday 29th - Getting the Show on the Road
Crew-member Ashley Wingert was flying in from Phoenix at 3:30. Since I work ten minutes from Sacramento airport, picking her up didn't seem a terribly complicated task. However, as predicted, the line to my desk was about four people thick around the time I needed to leave, so escaping from work proved tricky and the relief of finally getting out of there was a weight off my shoulders.
Let's do this thing!
We were too early for the pre-ride BBQ in Auburn, so we filled in time perusing the horse barns and hiking down the first 3/4 mile of trail so I could show Ashley where Roo fell off the trail the previous weekend and scraped up his leg <sigh>. This inauspicious pre-ride also saw me dumped on the ground when Roo spotted a trailside sumac attack-bush. I was doing my best to block out my misgivings and not doing a great job of it.
Thursday 30th - Packing the Crew Boxes
Our prime directive for this day was to pack up the crew boxes, make up all of Roo's food, and have everything ready for an early start to Robie Park the following morning.
We sat in the barn with ten pans/buckets in front of us and scooped the relevant food into each bucket. Each bucket was then transferred to a ziploc baggie labelled with its destination and specific contents. Ashley broke all the carrots into "Roo-sized pieces" (Mr Dainty Mouth can't possibly gobble carrots, he has to bite them delicately) and a handful of oats was carefully added to each bag as "seasoning".
Roo helping with the bagging of the food
My crew were divided into Team A (Robinson Flat, Foresthill, Auburn), Team B (Rig moving and Michigan Bluff) and Team C (Lucy and Crew replenishment). After consultation with the Chief Schlepper, Russell (Team A), the crew equipment went as follows:
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Each tub was marked with its destination and "TRUMBULL" (it's like sending a child off to camp - you wonder how much of this stuff will find its way back home).
Ashley and I then mimed our way through each vet check, discussing how we thought it would go, figuring out any potential problems, and adding items to the boxes as they came up. One of the things Ash had mentioned from her previous crewing experience was people getting in each other's way and not having a specific task. So we decided if it came to that, she would be in charge of everything below Roo's knees and Renee would be in charge of everything above the knee.
Leg Stretch
Late on Thursday afternoon, we took the pones for a stroll along the lane so I could check out the new pad I'd been working on, the HRM which I hadn't used in years, and the new boot bag that I'd just finished making. I was also supposed to try a pair of splint boots, but forgot.
HRM: Roo rubs really easily. Even riding two miles, the HRM electrode rubbed a hole in his back and I realised that wasn't going to work. All I wanted was to ascertain what his pulse was on arrival at each vet check so I decided to carry the HRM with me in the pommel bag and pull out the electrodes and stuff them under the saddle whenever I needed it - a system which worked extremely well on the day.
The boot bag worked perfectly. Roo would be wearing Glue-ons, but I wanted to carry a full set of Gloves as sparesies with me on the saddle just in case. Each draw-string sausage-shaped bag carries two boots and they fit neatly behind my thigh, out of the way and well-cinched down in no-bounce mode. I never knew they were there the entire day.
Finally, the pad - my current Skito pad hadn't been working so well in recent times and had been rubbing slightly under the "stirrup bars" (if my Sensation saddle had stirrup bars, which it doesn't). I'd refurbished it with heavier-duty plastic shims and fluffed out the matted sheepskin with a spiky dog brush, and as a precaution, also ordered a completely new Skito pad. When that arrived, the shims were different and everyone knows you must never use anything different so I worked on refurbishing the new pad to mimic the old and although it felt OK on our short two mile ride, I was still vacillating back and forth - <wibble> - what to do? Eventually I decided to start with the old pad and switch it out for the new one if it became necessary. In retrospect, it was necessary (the old pad rubbed Roo along the withers, which it has only done once before), but my brain wasn't functioning enough to make the decision to switch pads <sigh>.
Fire!
Shortly after we got back, a large helicopter went over the house and we noticed smoke to the south of us. Uh oh. Left Roo and Fergus wandering the property and jumped in the car to go and check it out. It turned out that Mount Murphy, about five miles to the south of us, was burning but they were fighting it pretty aggressively with two bombers dropping pink fire retardant, two helicopters repetitively scooping water from the American River, and one spotter plane.
Apparently HRMs work better if: a)
the electrode is under the girth, not hanging down next to the horse,
and
b) once under the girth, the electrode faces the horse, not the
neoprene....
Ashley
and I redid the FH food and began to clip Roo in the dark. We clipped his
neck (as far back as the most forward-point of his breast collar), his
belly, and his flanks. Finally we called it a day and fell into bed,
leaving all the lights on and the front door wide open to welcome crew Renee
and Russell who were driving down from Eureka and wouldn't arrive until
around 2 am.
My last task of the night was to henna my hand. I started doing this a while back and consider it to be a way to ward off the attentions of the endurance gods who so like to prey upon optimistic endurance riders. And it's a way to remind me to stay happy.
Friday
31st - Robie Park
Washing Roo the night before seemed pointless as he'd just get filthy again, so he got his bath Friday morning. Ashley came equipped with blueberry-smelling shampoo for his red dirt tail, and I scraped at his mane with avocado-smelling conditioner. If nothing else, he'd smell good. Most of his scrapes and bald patches had grown in, so he didn't look as bad as I'd feared.
Our gluing appointment with Garrett Ford of Easy Care was for 2 p.m. and we arrived at Robie Park right at 1:50. Parked the rig and jogged Roo all the way from one end of Robie to the other. I have to say, he didn't look great at that point - a little short, but then he had just got out of the trailer and was completely barefoot, so I was hoping that was the problem.
We had a crowd watching as Garrett diligently set about gluing the boots on. First he roughed up Roo's hoof walls with the edge of his rasp, scratching in distinct striations which I hadn't done in the past. He sprayed on denatured alcohol to remove any grease and dried the bottom of the foot with a heat gun (that was the part Roo wasn't so fond of). Goober Glue was applied to the bottom of the foot as packing (this stuff is super-rubbery and we'd used it in the past) and Adhere was used to glue on the boots over the top, then a bead of Adhere applied around the top edge to seal the boot up. Any excess Goober Glue could ooze out the back of the boot. Garrett told me to avoid walking on any pokey rocks, so the GG wouldn't ooze out too enthusiastically.
While we were gluing, Dave Rabe came out of the vetting area and announced that the horse he was supposed to be riding had failed vet in. <gulp>
Ashley, Renee and Russell kindly scuttled back to fetch Roo's tack for us, while I led Roo quietly around. It was very hot in the sun and I wanted him to eat - except there wasn't really anything available except for the odd scrap of grass. I found someone's empty horse area and let Roo filch some of their hay and started to feel a bit peculiar, having neglected to eat all day (dummy).
Vetting In
After an hour or so, Garrett gave me the go-ahead to vet in and we were officially on our way.
At this point I was going on total overload. Luckily, the person who vetted us in was my local vet, Larry Goss, and seeing a familiar face and being able to joke helped a little. Roo was vetting fine until the trot out: after our first out and back Larry felt Roo was moving a little strangely and had me trot for a second time.
When you are asked to trot a second time, your stomach just plummets. I ran him as fast as I could to get him moving properly and tried to maintain a positive outlook, but my brain felt like sludge... to get this far and then fail at that point just felt like a nightmare. I was already going into protective mode: could I get backup horse Fergus* up to Robie in time? did I even want to start on Fergus? did I want to feel that rushed? what were the ramifications of switching horses?...
(*to date, Fergus, my husband's 16+ hh TWH, hadn't completed a 50, and I'd only ridden him for about five minutes prior to this, but we'd discussed the idea ahead of time and thought that if for some reason Roo didn't vet in, it would be worthwhile at least starting on Fergus to give us both experience - and just expect that we wouldn't get much further than Robinson Flat).
Larry and I discussed the boots and how recently they'd been applied and he came to the conclusion that what he was seeing was Roo being tentative - getting used to his new footwear. He wasn't uneven in his stride, just peculiar.
Renee and Ashley, watching from the sidelines felt that he was funky looking on the front end, while Larry was seeing something in the back end. Either way, although we got through, it wasn't a very reassuring position to be in.
Horses aren't black and white - the vets at this point are trying to be as diligent as possible to avoid problems by letting horses start that shouldn't. I was glad that whatever Larry Goss saw was subtle enough and even-strided enough that he didn't consider it to be a problem (and from prior experience, I know Larry has a great eye for lameness).
By now, I was feeling thoroughly nauseous and weak-kneed and just wanted to get on the horse and get out of there for a while. Roo and I did a short 30 minute jaunt out towards the start line and although he was weaving like a drunken fool on the way out (ah the pleasures of riding a horse that wants to stay with his new best friends), we found Linda Upton and her youngster Jamal on the way back and Roo suddenly started to feel like a real horse again.
Friday was Patrick's birthday. I've told him he should have an honorary birthday, like what the Queen does because his birthday always seems to coincide with Tevis.
At the ride dinner/meeting, I force-fed myself as much as I could, all the while trying to trick my body - fairly successfully - into not noticing I was doing so. Hah.
After the ride meeting, we had a quick crew meeting and my friend Dennis produced the t-shirts and hats he'd made from my designs for my CRoo:
(Dennis is for hire and does embroidery and screen-printing in large and small quantities, specialising in endurance events. Contact him at: 530-281-6631)
By 10 pm I was in bed, pretending to fall asleep. By 10:30 I stopped reading (my attempt to switch my brain off) and pretended to fall asleep. By 11 pm I was still pretending to fall asleep and thinking happy thoughts and trying to direct my body away from a rolling boil every five minutes. I thought about how nice the volunteers were and how fun it would be to banter with them at the checks. I thought about how good Roo looked and how calm and contented he'd been munching on his Spring Tie. I did not think about how he'd nearly not vetted through, or about how rambunctious he could be at the start, or about how far we had to go, or about how he'd deal with big crowds of horses, or about how I needed to sleep RIGHT NOW because my alarm was set for 3:30. At some point my body did shut off, only to wake up again at 2 am, nauseous. Great.
