In 2005, I decided to try Ride & Tie and what follows is my enthusiastic reports on how my new career went over the course of the year:
Zini scarfing beet pulp while expressing fear and alarm at the rest stop on hw-99 on the way home from DVE

Ride & Tie Is Going to Be Fun, Right?...
March 2005

Last year's goal was Tevis. OK, the actual goal was to get a sound horse to the start line and I couldn't even manage that - pushing poor Provo too hard during conditioning and causing him to strain a tendon. Provo got the rest of the year off and I fiddled with the other two horses, trying to sort out Mouse's on-n-off unsoundness, and getting Zini ready for Death Valley. For the first time in five years I not only made it to DVE, but also managed to complete two LD rides for Zini's endurance career debut. So 2004 wasn't a complete wash out, achievement-wise.

Cognisant of the fact that I need to curb my enthusiasm - or at least direct it towards causing me injury rather than the horses - this week I decided that this year's goal would be to attempt Ride and Tie (R&T).

R&T was an idea I'd vaguely considered last year while training for Tevis. At that time I was doing more running (with the horse) than I ever had before. I wasn't very good at it and didn't even particularly enjoy the actual running part, but quite liked the buzz I got off it afterwards, as well as the satisfaction of managing to do something that I was really bad at. When I was about 14, my school decided to hold a cross-country race in the nearby woods. I came 62nd out of 64 entrants and thought the entire event completely sucked (I also hasten to add that the riding instructor at school did endurance riding and I couldn't understand why anyone would want to do that either).

Which brings me to this week when I was spurred into action by a timely email from Cheryl Domnitch inviting various lunatics... uh... I mean other potential R&T-ers to join up for a R&T practice this coming weekend. I hadn't run since last October when it started getting dark early in the evenings. At that time, I'd happily run 3+ miles down the canyon and feel pretty good at the bottom. Downhill I can do. Hmm.

So on Monday I started running again and ran 2+ miles during my lunch break at work in Sacramento. OK. So far, so good. 

I started to look at the R&T calendar and discovered that the first R&T event was at the Whiskeytown Chaser endurance ride up west of Redding in mid April. I've always wanted to go to that ride but never had a horse fit enough that early in the year, so it seemed like a good sign. The Whiskeytown R&T offers a 13 and a 24 mile course and of course, if we were going to drive all that way, we would want to do the 24 mile course, right?

On Wednesday, I ran the same loop as on Monday in reverse. This time by about the half-way point I was forced to stop and hobble for a bit as my shins hurt so bad. Shuffling along the last half mile of the loop I reconsidered the idea that the 13 mile course at Whiskeytown was actually pretty respectable, right? That success should be measured in the taking part of an event rather than how far we went...

On Friday I met up with my prospective partner, Gail Ziegler, so I could introduce her to our potential R&T horses. Gail seems like a good R&T partner as she has the exact same lack of drive and ego that I do when it comes to pushing ourselves, so won't hold it against me if we come dead last by several hours. Just what is the point of pushing ourselves? I mean, we're out here, aren't we? isn't that enough? On the other hand, Gail has also completed a respectable 20 mile race at Sly Park last September and continued to run all winter, so she's not only fit, she can go distance - and she's a good rider.

Thy name shall be “arabian”... Mouse in 2002, the last time she was fit...

Since Zini seems to think she's a lippizaner (you know that thing they can do where they leap in the air and kick their legs out behind them? Zini can do that), I put Gail on Mouse. Mouse managed to be good for a whole mile before she decided to have a hissy fit and rear on poor Gail. After that, we swapped and Mouse's Jekyll (or is it Hyde?) persona retreated back into the murky depths of her mind.

Because Zini already has her budding endurance career ahead of her and Mouse could never really see the point of going long distance, I'd really like to use Mouse as our R&T mount. There are various pros and cons to this. For example, Mouse will stand quietly for you to get on and isn't likely to step on you. On the other hand, she isn't 24 mile fit, she's liable to have a melt down, and I'm not even sure if she's sound. As for Zini's qualities - well, she can be as good as gold - "can be" being the operative words - she's sound, relatively fit, and would think it a blast to do. Her cons include sometimes being a bit too enthusiastic about activities (see above comment about lippizaners), there's a strong likelihood that she'd stand on one of us, and she has a tendency to be snarky towards other horses, runners, etc. Crabby b*tch is often a good description of her persona. 

So we'll see how things go tomorrow on our first official practice. Cheryl promises me that R&T is way more fun than running alone.

April 2005

Last month saw our intrepid adventurers poised on the eve of their first Ride and Tie practice. Predictably, this didn't go smoothly. In a fit of being even-more-late-than-usual, we didn't get to the venue until 45 minutes after we were supposed to, so all the R&Ters* were already out there, rushing about in the woods.

Not deterred by this, we set out on foot, dragging the reluctant Mouse behind us and jigged the first half mile to the creek. Astonishingly at this point, we actually met up with Cheryl Domnitch ("person in charge") and Dionne Wallace ("horse babysitter"). Out of the goodness of their hearts, despite wanting to go on back to the trailers, they stayed out there with us and did a couple of loops to get us into the swing of things.

Cheryl gave me a quick lesson in what to tie to/what not to tie to/which trees to pick. I was eyeing the trees as far off the trail as possible, ever mindful of Zini's flightly back feet, while Cheryl was wisely assuring me that the closer to the trail the horse was tied, the less likely we runners were to completely miss her  and run on by.

Since that day, I've pondered this subject every single time I've run. As mentioned in last month's installment, I don't even particularly like running, so the prospect of blithely jogging past R&T-Horse-of-Choice (craftily disguised as a tree) and continuing to run on unawares for several miles fills me with dread and anxiety.

THIS WILL NOT HAPPEN.
Mouse being good for twenty seconds 
(OK, so there was food involved...)

Ok, so it probably will happen.

One plan I came up with, was to run with a bag of horse goodies. Mouse is notoriously greedy and very vocal in her demands for food. My cunning plan was that every time she saw one of us approaching (armed with our goody bag), she would trumpet her joy and greet us noisily. 

More likely she'd hide behind the tree.

The main flaw with any plan containing Mouse was that, during the practice, she was again so appallingly bad that partner Gail decided it was safer not to get on her (especially as we'd forgotten Gail's helmet back at the trailer). Mouse's career as R&T-Horse-of-Choice is not progressing as I'd hoped.

We did get to tie her to a few trees, briefly, while I stood by and admired her being tethered. And we did get to meet some travelling pack-llamas (difficult to say who was more alarmed, the llama or the horses... The llama was young and his eyes were very big as he submitted to being sniffed by Mouse and Dionne's Peter).

Mostly we just ran with her, dragging her along behind us... well dragging her along when we were heading away from the trailers and trying to avoid being trampled by her when we were heading back towards them.

And even more disappointingly, she was also lame at the end, despite having only been ridden one of the five miles we'd gone. Back to the drawing board for her shoeing. I guess Zini is first choice right now.

Whiskeytown R&T has come and gone and I stayed at home. Unfortunately, Gail was otherwise occupied that weekend, so wasn't able to go. Just as well, since Zini had a puffy fetlock the weekend before, and lost a front shoe on Sunday.

Next up is the Quicksilver Pro Am on May 21. Strangely, Gail tells me she can't make this date either. I'm starting to get suspicious. Doesn't she want to ride my cute grey mare?

But alas, I'm starting to see why R&T is such a hard sport to get in to. You don't just have to get yourself and your mount ready and present - you have to organize for two riders to be present, something that is a lot harder than it sounds. 

If anyone would like to join me and Mouse Zini Mouse Zini at Quicksilver on 21 May and be the second member of the slowest team out there, please drop me a line. 

(*Cheryl was thrilled that she had almost more R&T teams at Empire Mine that day than during the Gold Country R&T event. She is hoping to organize another practice event soon)

May 2005

Well, our R&T experience is somewhat stalled at this point. I've been busy with saddle fit issues and foot-disintegration issues, so have not progressed further with Zini's R&T education. 

I did sit down with some rope and two carabiners purchased from REI and built myself a genuine R&T tie rope to Cheryl Domnitch's specifications. This special rope has a carabiner firmly tied in at each end (why bother with pesky knots?) and secured with duct tape to stop them flopping around, and two loops tied along the middle of the rope to clip your carabiners to after wrapping the tether around the tree. I haven't actually tied Zini to a tree with it yet, but have attached it to the trailer and hung off it to make sure nothing came unravelled. So far, so good.

(note that although tying this way doesn't give much opportunity for "quick release" in an emergency, I tie my rope halter - which this R&T rope will be clipped to - with a quick release by looping the tail back through the knot, so hopefully that will work at a pinch. Tying a rope halter this way is a good idea, regardless, since it means that you can always get the darn thing undone, no matter how hard your horse sat down on its tie rope).

And I've been running. Unfortunately, most of my running is still downhill, which causes me to have the false sense of being competent at running.  I was feeling reasonably accomplished until the other evening when it was soggy and I ran from home and about suffered a cardiac arrest trying to run up the hill half a mile from my house. Running on real terrain (aka something with uphills) turns my average continuously maintainable speed from 5.3 mph to 3.6 mph, which was a bit demoralising. 

My favorite running section is from the top turnout on hw-49 after you start down the canyon from Auburn, down through the Black Hole, along the old railroad bed, over No-Hands bridge before spewing out at the bottom (where Patrick is waiting with the car - I run this loop on our way home from work). It is a whole 2.65 miles and I can do it in 28 minutes if I really scuttle.

Running this section is good practice for riding it on Tevis in the pitch dark as I now know every root, rock, and overhanging stick of poison oak intimately. At some point, I need to remember to run with my snippers and do some trail trimming along the way. This will wreck my oh-so-important running time splits (?), but I figure it's for a good cause. Another thought I've had is to take along a trowel and scoop out some of the sediment that has filled the trough in the Black Hole causing the water to only be half an inch deep.

Right now I'm giving Zini the rest of the month off, in an effort to grow out her feet. They disintegrated during the last shoeing cycle, resulting in the loss of both front shoes and her feet looking like they'd been attacked with a weed-whacker. Attempts at reconstruction with acrylic have not been terribly successful, so I decided waiting until the beginning of next month for her feet to grow out was probably a better option.

Next month things will be better, right?

June 2005

This week I about doubled my running distance and started running from the Overlook down to No-Hands. OK, so this is still mostly downhill, but at least now I have the climb up to Robie Point stuck in the middle to give me some uphill suffering - and I can assure you I suffered plenty the other afternoon when it was 89°F when I started down from the top.

One of the last times I ran from the turn-out at the top of hw-49 I kept smelling faint skunk smell. Chili Dog had been skunked a couple of weeks earlier, so my nose was very attuned to any musky smells. I concluded that a skunk must have passed that way earlier in the day... that was, until I heard a "deer" crashing in the undergrowth to my left and looked over to see the back end of a bear disappearing into the bushes. Not all musky smells are skunk related and what I'd been smelling must have been the moseyings of said bear. I wouldn't have minded too much, except he didn't look to be very old and I started wondering where mama was. Urk... run a little faster, Lucy.

So the running is still coming along. I don't think I'm going to be ready for Gold Country, but then again, neither is my horse.

Some of you may remember how I was hoping that my torn-suspensory-in-2002- but-rehabbed mare, Mouse, would be able to be our R&T mount - but that she kept coming up slightly lame after very short rides and was decidedly bolshy when being ridden. I finally got fed up with her lack of improvement after time off and took her to Great Basin Equine in Gardnerville, NV on my way to crew for a friend at NASTR last weekend.

The vet at Great Basin, Dr Marty Gardner, specialises in lameness and podiatry and I can say nothing but good things about him. He has a very sharp eye, assesses the overall horse - not just the symptoms - and was able to diagnose and then back-up his observations with both instant digital x-ray and ultra-sounds.

We began by lunging and she was gratifyingly lame (this was after running circles the previous evening, tail up over her butt, showing absolutely no signs of being lame at all). I explained that she'd been diagnosed with "sore feet" the previous summer. Dr Gardner said he didn't think that was going to be the case this time around, as arabs tend to have such good feet.

After no reaction with the hoof testers (she has feet of steel, this horse, to the extent that my farrier used to complain that she'd blunt his tools), he blocked her RF foot and she immediately improved. The vet laughed and said "so much for that theory".

Mouse was showing signs of lameness on both front feet - but much worse on the right hand side, which had been fairly typical for her on and off for the last three years. After blocking her foot and seeing some improvement, he blocked her high suspensory to see what effect that had (she was sounder still) and if it put added stress on the LF (she stayed about the same degree of gimpiness on the left).

It was time for x-rays. My high-as-a-kite the previous evening ay-rab stood like a little angel for her x-rays. She was more interested in sleeping than anything else.

In the past when I've asked people to watch her trot out when she's showing signs of lameness, she appears to hesitate before putting her foot down and watchers often report that they can hear something more than see it.

Looking at her RF with the naked eye, you can spot that she is slightly clubby and also has a broken pastern axis. This is the side she tore the suspensory on in 2002 during her first 50 at Lake Sonoma.

This was Mouse last summer, shortly before her next trim. She is now significantly less high-heeled, but you can see the conformation of her RF compared to her LF.

The x-ray below clearly shows why her hoof looks the way it does on the outside. There is a slight rotation of the coffin bone and the vet surmised that this was caused by tight tendons - which also explains her past tendon / ligament problems. Apparently the tendons reach down under the foot and attach either side of the coffin bone. The very front tip of the coffin bone is also slightly upturned à la ski jump style, indicating a problem in that area. Because the coffin bone is rotated downwards on this foot, it is suffering from more sole pressure and concussion than the LF - hence being lamer on that foot. Inflammation of the coffin bone is called "pedal osteitis".

 

Looking down on the hoof from the front, at about a 65° angle.

The front edge of the coffin bone (bottom) shows sign of deterioration with enlarged blood vessels. Apparently it's not supposed to look like an alluvial fan.

I have since read that once the coffin bone looks like this, it won't always return to normal, so isn't always an indication that there is a current problem.

 

The foot from the rear.

The "wings" either side of her hoof are the sidebones which the vet told me are normally soft cartilage (like in your ears). 

In Mouse's case, the cartilage has calcified into bone, which indicates that there is a problem in the foot. However I'm not clear why that is.

 

Looking at the way she is currently trimmed, the vet advised that her sole be more cupped under the front of the coffin bone as she has somewhat flat soles. He also recommended that she be shod in some sort of supportive/protective shoe such as Equithotics Sneakers (of course, this week every size 1 Sneaker in the state is out of stock and on back-order).

How much sole to pare out under the coffin bone has to be a farrier's nightmare. Trim too little, and you get Mouse's problem of too much sole pressure/concussion. Trim too much and you run the risk of making the horse sore from having too thin a sole. It becomes a case of damned if you do and damned if you don't. However, having these x-rays should help my farrier immensely because he'll be able to see where the coffin bone is and therefore how much sole he has to deal with.

Having satisfied himself as to what's going on with Mouse's feet, the vet turned to her suspensory problem. We moved into the bay next door and out came the ultra-sound machine. Looking at ultra-sounds is a lot less easy than the x-rays - as a friend commented "Wow, these are the best x-rays ever!  You can actually SEE stuff without a degree in x-raying!". Not so with ultra-sounds.

Below is an example of what Mouse's suspensory looked like in October 2002. I don't have copies of the ultra-sounds from last week, but they look pretty similar. Although the tear from 2002 has healed up nicely, there is a new tear higher up where the ligament attaches to the back of the cannon bone, and it has torn through about 30% of the thickness of the suspensory ligament.

 

The left side of the picture shows a "plan" view. The area ringed (1) shows the inflamed suspensory, while the inner area (2) (shows up dark) is the extent of the tear. 

Above the suspensory, you can see (if you know what you're looking at) the deep digital flexor, and above that, the superficial flexor tendon, then the back of her leg. The back of her cannon bone shows up as the bright white line at the bottom of the picture. The dark areas between the two tendons are supposed to be there - that's where the tendon aren't, as it were.

The right hand side of the picture shows the ligament/tendons in cross-section (but lying sideways). The idea is the ligament/tendons should show up as white fibres lying alongside each other, not a tangled mess, or worse, areas of black, that denote missing areas of fibre.

Watching Mouse trot around on the lunge, Dr Gardner commented "I bet she's really smooth to ride, huh?" - which she is. She's probably the smoothest horse I've ever ridden - you hardly need bother to post to her trot. But as the vet said, pulled tendons and torn suspensories are the price you pay for that. Mouse takes up all the suspension in her fetlocks, and in turn on her tendons/ligaments. 

Looking at the ultra-sounds, the vet was a lot less happy than he had been with the foot x-rays. He kindly explained that she's never going to make an endurance horse, which I basically knew already, although it makes me sad because Mouse is such a nice horse on so many levels: she's a joy to be around (except for that one time when she bit me because I wasn't walking fast enough ahead of her), is fun to ride, is comfortable (such that you don't ever want to get off... hmmm? wonder why she's lame?), and most of all, she's my baby - my first horse.

So we're back to the confinement/rehab thing.  This time around, my morale is 100% better - I get to do the rehab in the summer, instead of mid-winter as in 2002/2003 (although, looking out the window, you may not realise it's summer). And Dr Gardner's rehab program is a lot more realistic for me, working full-time. My orders - other than the cupping out the sole and shoeing her in Sneakers - is:

  • Month 1, ride at a walk, 15 mins, 3-4 x week
  • Month 2, ride at a walk, 40 mins, 3-4 x week
  • Month 3, ride at a walk, 40 mins, including 2 mins trotting on good, flat footing, 3-4 x week 
    (if she shows signs of soreness, go back to walking)
  • Month 4, increase the length of time trotting by 2 mins each week 
    (if she shows signs of soreness, go back to walking).
  • Re-ultra-sound at 60-90 days (Dr Gardner comes down to the Loomis area fairly regularly, so I'm hoping I will be able to take Mouse there as opposed to 110 miles to Nevada)

Since the thing healed last time, I've no reason to think it won't heal again this time around. The vet thought it was possible that she'd torn the ligament from trying to protect her sore feet, so hopefully if we resolve that problem and rehab the suspensory, she'll come back sound enough to be a decent trail horse. Best case scenario will be that she's capable of becoming that R&T horse I'd like her to be. Time will tell. 

On the other hand, it may be that, in the future (if I can bear to) I'll need to find her a home where she'll get to do the level of activity she'd like to grow accustomed to (i.e. as little as possible <grin>), or at least find someone who wants a super-comfortable, light riding horse. But I'm willing to wait it out a few more years and see how things turn out. 

July 2005

Seemingly, the only active thing I've managed to do in the R&T department recently is help prod Nick Warhol into trying his first event (at least I'd like to hope that my prodding made a difference). What follows is Nick's account, followed by (with no collaboration - I made sure there was no peeking) his partner Gary's explanation of their race.

Gold Country Ride & Tie
Version 1
Nick Warhol

I’ve always suspected that Ride and Tie people were absolutely nuts, and as of Saturday, July 9th, 2005, at 1:09 pm, in beautiful Georgetown, California, my suspicions have been undeniably confirmed. I’ve seen these people at some endurance rides, running along on the trail, huffing and puffing, always running, but always moving down the trail. I’ve seen horses tied to trees on the trail, some standing quietly, while some are tearing the tree down and dragging it down the trail while they run away. Why would people choose to do this insanity, when they could be riding a nice horse instead? 

Because it’s actually pretty fun! Yes, I did a ride and tie. A twenty mile ride and tie, to boot. My new horse Don is on his routine for a ride every 4 weeks, and wouldn’t you know it, the Gold Country ride fell right smack at the two week point in Don’s schedule. I was thinking about finding a horse to ride, since the GC is a fabulous ride, when my buddy Gary Fend made an off hand comment about how we should try the ride and tie. We could use his horse, Canadian Annie, the Mack truck of half Arabians. After all, Gary was a real veteran of Ride and Tie competition, having done all of one event prior to this one. What the heck? Why not? How tough could it be? I am not really a recreational runner, but I do a lot of footwork and running in regular rides with my horse, I used to be an aerobic beast on my road bicycle, and I actually had been doing a lot of running with Don lately. Sounds like fun! 

The GC ride was huge this year- there were almost 140 horses in total, and the ride management dealt with something like 50 people on the waiting list. I was impressed at the really positive attitude and overall camaraderie of the ride and tie group. They were all so jazzed and excited about the event! When they found out it was my first time, they were all over me with helpful hints, offers to crew, suggestions, and were truly excited we were giving it a try. The event seemed like any other endurance ride I have ever been to, until Saturday morning. I got to sleep in while Judy prepared and left on the 50 at 6am. Big Yawn- I got to sleep in until 8 am! That’s a civilized time to get up, let me tell you. We attended a little riders meeting where Gary and I scoped out the competition. We were a little out of our element- some of these guys looked like marathoners. There were only 12 teams in total- 6 on the 20 mile and 6 on the 10 mile. They have neat teams in the sport- they have man/woman teams, woman/woman teams, and Gary and I were a man/man team. The other team concept I liked was the “Century in the saddle” team. Oh yeah, we win this one, hands down! Gary and I combined are well over a hundred years old, but I’ll never admit how much! 

The strangest thing I felt initially was walking from the truck to the start, wearing my riding gear and helmet, without a horse! I kept looking back like I forgot him! Very strange. Gary hopped up on the massive bay Annie and we headed to the start. The theory behind a ride in tie is pretty simple- 2 riders, one horse, no riding two-up, and the winning team is the one who gets all three heartbeats across the finish line first. I really had no idea what to expect, so I had Gary start, since he’s done it before. I have heard that the start at these events can be pretty berserk, but with only 6 teams at once, it was quite tame. The ride starts, and the riders take off down the road on the horses, while the six runners (myself included) take off running. Gary trots off, but the first couple of horses are running! And so are the runners! Look at these guys! Cripes- I’m in last already, and it’s been five hundred feet! Oh well, our goal is to survive and make it to the finish. I’m running along on a nice downhill, but I can still see two runners ahead of me. After only about a mile, there’s the first horse I see tied- it’s Annie! (Impossible to miss, since she’s so huge) I run up to her, untie her from the tree branch, and notice Gary about fifty yards ahead, jogging up a hill. I hop on, and after remembering I’m riding a fifty-five gallon oil drum, (she’s that wide), I start trotting- our first rider switch was a success! The next one I saw wasn’t. A few moments later I can see a woman taking the horse from her partner. The horse isn’t standing still, and wants to go after the other horses. (Sound familiar?) She gets a foot in the stirrups, tries to swing up, but the horse is leaving, and she’s not up. Uh oh, not good. She’s on the side of the horse, and he’s trotting. She falls off, but is hanging on and being dragged! He’s cantering now, and I’m watching this- it was like in the old westerns when the cowboy falls off and just gets hauled away by the horse. She FINALLY lets go and is rolling along in the dirt, getting totally scuffed in the process. OUCH! That had to hurt. I stop, but she’s up and heading down the road. Gary turns around and catches the running horse (!) and returns it to her, where she gets up and takes off. Wow! She never even lost a place. Tough rider! I trot on by Gary, thankful he and I are wearing our helmets. 

Now it’s my turn to pick a spot to tie- how far should I go? The road is hard, but wide and rolling, so I trot along and see a tied horse. Good! They tie, I tie. I hopped off and tied her to a tree and took off running down the trail, leaving her behind. Weird feeling! Very weird. I stopped and took a look back- she‘s standing there like a statue. Good horse! I ran down the road and made a right hand turn onto a pretty single track trail that was slightly downhill. Hey, this is neat! I blast along down the trail running kind of fast, and even passed a runner. Western States 100, here I come! (Oh yeah, right. Let’s see if it feels this good in a few hours!) I ran for quite a while, since we discovered that being endurance riders, we normally don’t trot fast down hills. That meant I was going faster down the hills on foot than Gary was on the horse! I doubted that this would be a 20 mile downhill trail, and guess what, I was right. The trail turned up, and as a result, my pace slowed. I was jogging up, though, and not walking, but Gary quickly caught me. We tried a rider pass off where he just stopped and gave me the horse. I took off, leaving him running behind me. It was very strange to get up and start trotting, and be completely out of breath. Here I am, trotting along, huffing and puffing. The horse must think I am nuts! But it works! After a couple of minutes I felt fine, and was enjoying trotting along on the big mare. Yikes! I better not forget to stop and leave the horse- poor Gary would be in for quite a stint if I rode off for 30 minutes! 

We continued on for a few miles, and actually looked like we knew what we were doing. We made many rider exchanges, and rode along with two other teams, mixing it up with the runners. I was on foot when we got to the water stop at 5 miles, and after grabbing a bottle of water, I just kept going. Weird again! I was getting a good workout heading up a pretty good hill, but after a few minutes, here comes the big Annie to the rescue. I could tell it was her by her very distinctive “clomping.” (She’s a little on the heavy side.) Gary goes by, but stops to tie under a tree a hundred yards ahead. Off he goes, I get to the horse and get stung twice by yellow jackets as I hop on. Great. I hate those guys. We passed the horse back and forth between us a few times until we came to the downhill section, where I ended up running all the way down, maybe 15 minutes, since I was going as fast as the horse. Somehow the crafty Gary planned the exchanges so that I had to cross the river on foot, getting my shoes soaked in the process. Now I’m in a squish and tie. Once across the water, I started up the long climb up to the vet check. It was about a mile and a half, but on foot it seemed like three. We had to walk up the steep grade, each of us taking a couple of turns on Annie. Boy, that’s a nice relief to see the horse in front of you. My lungs were going pretty hard when we finally reached the top- the slight uphill road to the airport seemed like a downhill after that steep climb. A quick change and we were at the vet check. Here’s where it gets strange. No hold! Once the horse is at pulse criteria, and passes the vet exam, off you go. But there is some strategy involved, and as Ride and Tie Pro Dennis Tracy had coached us, we did it like the Pros. We all arrived at the same time, so the smart thing to do is immediately send the strongest runner off on the trail again, right away, while the other rider takes the horse through the vet check. Once clear of the vet, the rider with the horse takes off in pursuit of the runner. Great Plan, except for a couple of factors. We hit the vet check; I grabbed a huge drink and just turned around and took off back down the trail. The pulse criteria was 60- pretty low for a R&T I guess. It took Gary about 15 minutes to get Annie down and through the vet check; he wanted her to have a little time to eat as well. And what of me? I’m running! Down, down, all the way back down the steep climb we had just come up. This trail was really steep, so Gary would be going down very slowly on the horse. I hit the streams at the bottom and sploosh across again, supercharging my shoes with water again. It’s been about 15 minutes. I head down the road along the stream and a decent trot-very pretty and shaded; I’m running, but I’m tired. Another 10 minutes and I clear the bottom of the canyon and start the climb back up. Where is Gary? I’m walking up the steeper hills, jogging the less steep, and trying to go a little faster on the flats and downhill’s. He has our water on the horse, and I’m thirsty. Run, Run, Run. More uphills. Walk, Walk, Walk. It’s been 30 minutes now. I’m still moving forward, but I’m ready to hear the giant clomp of Annie’s hoofs behind me. No clomping. Still uphill. I begin to wonder what would happen if Annie had bee pulled at the vet check? How would I know? At the finish, I guess. How far am I going to go? I decided that if I made it to the water stop before Gary caught me, I’d just lie down and die for a while until he showed up, or I’d get a ride back in a truck. Another five miles by myself? In the open sun on those uphill roads? I don’t think so! 

I went for a long time before I finally heard those wonderful hoofs come up behind me. It knew it was Gary, since we were the last of the 20 mile teams on the trail, and there were no 50 leaders yet. Gary thought I must have gotten lost, since it was taking him so long to catch me, due to the vet check, that slow downhill, and my unbelievable speed on foot! (right) I was pretty tired and gladly got up on Annie and let my partner hoof it. We trotted off up the hill- much better! Now’s my chance to go all the way to the finish- Nah, I couldn’t do that to poor Gary. We went back to our standard trading scheme of something like a half mile each, with enough time to let Annie get a rest while tied. Not too much further we got back to the water stop where I had the guy just douse me with water. I was scooping myself from head to toe. Five miles to go! Neither Gary nor I had a lot of motivation left, but we kept going, walking the uphills and jogging the rest. Gary came across Annie standing in the middle of the road with the tree I had tied her to attached to the end of her lead rope. Bad choice of tree to tie to! I t was more like a sapling. We trudged up the hills in the direct sun, each waiting for that wonderful horse to come up from behind. Some of the top 15 or so riders coming the other way on their second loop would offer me water. I must have looked pretty tired! We finally reached the little cutoff trail that did a little loop of a mile or so. I was still running, but slowly, and only on level and downhill. I realized at this point that my “forward” was leaving me. My gait was okay, but my impulsion was a C at best. I walked up the last hill and made it back to the main road- a mile to go. We traded about 4 times in that last mile, since neither of us had any real desire to be on foot much. At long last we arrived at the little hill that led right to the finish on top. Gary was on the horse, I was walking along beside them up the hill. We could see the finish in a couple hundred yards, when here comes my wife, Judy, riding with Lucy Trumbul Chapman [he tells me he does this to taunt me. LCT] and Merri Melde. They were heading out on their second loop. We figured they would cheer us on, and help celebrate, but all we got was “What? How come you aren’t running?” Groan! I was done, as was Gary. Lady was by far perkier than both of us combined. We actually ran across the finish line, and then stopped. Done. Finished. Completed. Thank goodness. 

Wow. What a workout. Annie got very good scores at the post ride check- she did great. The runners? I was happy to sit down. Had it been 5 miles more it would have been a little iffy, although we probably could have walked it. We did end up second in our class, (out of 2) and 6th overall (out of 6). I was pleased to hear we only finished a little over an hour slower than the winner, though. That really helped, although I’m not sure why it really mattered. We made it to the finish. 

What did I learn? I realized that this sport is not what I thought it was. It’s a running event where you use a horse a little to help you out, as opposed to a horse event where you do a little running. Being a good runner is everything. Considering neither Gary nor I did any training, I figure we did pretty well. And now that it’s over, it was fun. Will I do it again? I won’t be turning in my AERC card any time soon, but given the right event, and maybe a few miles shorter, who knows. The best summation of how Gary and I felt at the end was when the winner of the 50 caught us with a half mile to go. We got off the trail, (glad to stop for a moment), as she came swooping by. She said: “Wow, you Ride and Tie guys really are amazing, you are Supermen!” Gary’s reply was classic- he smiled, and said, “Thanks, but at the moment I don’t feel very super.” I could not have expressed it any better. But two hours, and some much needed food and drink later, we were feeling pretty darn good. 

Nick Warhol 
Hayward, CA

Gold Country Ride & Tie
Version 2
Gary Fend

The Ride and Tie National Championships were held at Euer Valley in Truckee in three of the last five years. While riding the 50 mile endurance rides there I thought it might be fun to give it a try some time. There were numerous reasons why I was reluctant to do so. I had not done any running since high school 30+ years ago, I did not have a partner, I was unsure if my horse would agree to being tied while other horses raced by, and the six to seven thousand foot elevation of Euer Valley scared me. I mentioned this to my daughter, Jamie, and she didn’t hesitate to volunteer to partner up so we were on for next year. Luckily, the Ride and Tie Championships the next year were in Mendocino—sea level. In addition, I got a new horse, Annie, who was steady as a rock and nothing seemed to faze her. She was just starting her endurance career and what could be better training than a short ride with numerous rest stops along the trail. I wasn’t going to let the fact that I was still out of shape stop us now. Jamie and I did the short (16 mile) course at Mendocino, we both had a great time, and Annie was fantastic.

A few months ago while sitting around drinking margaritas, I was telling Nick Warhol about my R & T experience and he confessed that he, too, had thought about giving it a try. We looked at the ride calendar and saw that the Gold Country Endurance Riders were including a R & T with their annual endurance ride so we penciled the date on our schedule. I have ridden the GC endurance ride many times and it is one of my favorites. We decided to ride Annie and enter the 20-mile distance instead of the shorter one for some reason that escapes me now. 

I was leaving the Bay Area a few hours before Nick and Judy so I agreed to save them a spot in camp. As I approached Dru Barner I found a line of rigs backed up half way to the Georgetown Divide. I figured it was a just bunch of people trying to locate the perfect camping spot so I proceeded to go around them and use one of the other entrances. I didn’t see the sign that said “valet parking” and although there weren’t many people in camp yet I was surprised to find so many prime spots still available. I unloaded Annie and was walking around camp when I ran into Cherryl, the ride manager, who informed me of my faux pas. She led me by my ear to the parking supervisors and after a brief flogging I was allowed to park where I had started to set up. The GCER volunteers are great! They were even parking rigs for people who were uncomfortable about maneuvering between the trees to optimize space. I was amazed at how they could back into places with two people giving them conflicting directions.

We all hit the sack unusually early considering the R&T ride meeting wasn’t until 8:30 the next morning. By 6:15 I could no longer sleep, had breakfast, and was roaming the near-empty ridecamp. I felt like I should go for a ride or something, I had so much time on my hands. In reality, I didn’t have as much time as I thought. For some reason I thought the ride started at 9:30 so I would have time to saddle up after the meeting. Turns out it started at 9:00 and I had to leave the meeting early to take care of it. At the meeting we were told we would have to do an exchange at the vet stop and were advised that the stronger runner should ride into the stop and let the better rider (notice I didn’t say “weak runner”) take care of the horse and vet in. We didn’t discuss the issue at the time but I assumed since Nick is younger and Annie is my horse, Nick would ride into the vet stop.

The start of the ride was humdrum by R & T standards. Maybe it was because there were only six teams but there was no whooping and hollering and hardly anybody fell off. I did catch a loose horse about a half mile from the start, but the dirt-covered rider quickly caught up and was on her way as if it happens all the time. After about a mile Nick and I settled into our place in the field and at about the two-mile mark the 10 milers (they left 5 minutes behind us) began to pass us. It wasn’t long before we realized we were wasting time unhooking the reins from the bit, re-hooking the reins to the halter bridle ring, tying to the tree, and then the procedure in reverse. I took Ann’s bit off and we rode the rest of the way with just the halter. If we had done it earlier we probably wouldn’t have been passed by so many 10 milers.

At the ride meeting we were warned of a steep 1.5 mile climb into the vet check. At the bottom of the climb we crossed a creek a few times. As Ann and I crossed the creeks I couldn’t help but think how glad I was that I was riding instead of wading through the ankle deep water in my year old Costco/Kirkwood Court Classic sneakers. Nick had a brand new pair of high tech, Gortex running shoes that I’m sure were even comfortable full of pollywogs.

The climb was brutal. We switched often in the next mile. When I arrived at an almost level spot I caught up with Ann walking down the trail dragging an old dried up twig about ½ inch in diameter. She wasn’t going anywhere but I was worried she would step on her reins, pull up, and break the snap. She has done that trick about 20 times in her short life and I actually carried spare reins on the saddle in anticipation.
We arrived at the vet check with Nick running about 20 yards ahead of me. It was unclear where the vet check actually began. I looked for a line that declared “the person riding past this point must hand off and begin running“ so we both got off and Nick continued down the trail as if he rode in. As he took off he yelled back, “Fill my water bottles…” I spent about 5 minutes letting Ann eat, another 5 minutes getting her pulse down, and 5 minutes more for the vet check. When we were done I felt bad that while I was standing around Nick was on foot so instead of letting Ann eat some more I started back out. Until I realized that I forgot to fill water bottles. The water was near a table on the other end of the vet check area. I started going through the half dozen ice chests around the table looking for some water when I realized Ann was helping herself to a serving plate of watermelon. 

After all the delays, it took forever to catch up with Nick. I thought for sure he got lost. He was probably thinking I got pulled at the vet check. Soon we were nearing the finish. With about 2 miles to go my legs were getting rubbery and I wasn’t completely catching my breath during the horseback segment. The finish line was a welcome sight.

When people ask if I will ever do a ride and tie again I tell them I don’t know. But I have quit drinking margaritas.

Gary Fend

September 2005

The trouble with announcing to the world that you're going to do something, is that it becomes very evident when it doesn't happen. I freely admit that my R&T "career" is well and truly stalled.

The main problem is that when summer comes, running in a hundred degree temperatures rapidly loses its appeal. The last time I ran was the Monday following Tevis when I ran down from the Overlook to see if I could spot the shoe lost by my friend who finished Tevis in the early hours of Sunday morning. As we walked her mare down to the stadium, we were shocked to notice that she was missing a front shoe - would she be sound at the finish? <bite nails>. As it turned out, Elly was fine, and Dorothy said thought she'd lost the shoe coming out of the creek in the last mile before the finish. Lucky.

In the event, I never found the shoe, but did find scuff marks where poor Janine Esler went off-trail just before the finish and thereby went overtime and didn't complete. As far as I can work out, her horse lost its footing in the exactly same place that Jon Saunder's Rocky went off a few weeks previously. It just goes to show that you can never let your concentration go until the very end.

So August and most of September swept by. My running came close to suffering a revival when my friend Dana talked me in to doing the half-marathon out of Cool at the beginning of October to celebrate her birthday. But alas, she suffered a stress fracture to her foot, so won't be able to participate – and it just wouldn't be the same without her.... <honest>

Perhaps I would have still considered it, had I not been out trail trimming poison oak while riding in shorts, and managed to self-infect myself by brushing bits of twig off my saddle. That resulted in a miserable ten days of itchy weeping all down the backs of my knees and legs (and what looked like a case of measles on my torso) which was only marginally relieved by liberal applications of Zanfel. 

A week into it, I suffered a minor panic about Zini's state of fitness: she hadn't really done anything since Bridgeport and is supposed to be doing East Bay next weekend. So I cooked up a plan to ride from Third Gate to Auburn Overlook and back, which I figured was about a 28 mile round trip. 

Sheila Larsen joined us for the first hour on her youngster, Georgi, but after Brown's Bar we continued on alone. Zini was actually very good about it and didn't seem at all put out leaving her new friend behind. Coming into Auburn, we met up with another friend, Nina Vasiliev, who happened to be riding down. Because her horse was suffering from the "bleahs", they followed us back up to the Overlook and hung out while Zini and I took our "30 minute hold" and then joined us for the ride back down as far as No Hands Bridge. 

I was glad of her company because although Zini was quite cheerful to go to Auburn, the idea of returning back to Third Gate didn't seem quite as thrilling to her. After leading down through the Black Hole, she pulled over to let Nina's horse go in front - evidently having to do all that "keeping watch" business was more than she wanted to deal with. 

I was also glad for the company because by then, my weepiest patch of poison oak on the back of my leg had begun to rub on my sheepskin saddle cover (I was riding in shorts, out of necessity) and I was having to squirm bizarrely in the saddle to keep my leg from gluing itself permanently to the saddle - having someone to talk to, to take my mind of it, was a good thing. (Later that evening, I spent a sad 20 minutes in the shower, trying to unpick bits of black sheepskin from my leg).

Once again, Zini didn't seem to care much when we parted company with Nina, but our return trip was much less animated than the journey out. We completed the trail in a little over six hours including our "hold", so I was quite content that our performance had mirrored a real ride. Zini's legs looked good the following morning – despite not icing/hosing/wrapping – which surprised me given the amount of trotting we'd done on the hard river road. Hopefully East Bay will be a success... fingers crossed.

Fast-forward to 2006...

First Real Ride & Tie Practice
May 7

Cheryl and Mocha Brown sampling the trail wares

What follows is probably excruciatingly dull unless you're interested in the workings of how R&T works, as seen through a newbie's eyes...  (distances are us, on foot)

* * * *

After spending all day painting on Saturday (thank goodness we ran out of paint), on Sunday pft and I (with Zini and Provo) joined Cheryl Domnitch and rode from Auburn down to No-Hands and up into Cool (7.5 miles).

Once there, we tied the pones up with hay bags and water buckets and pft and I jumped in the car we'd left in Cool and zipped back to Auburn to pick up the trailer. pft took Provo and Zini home for a well-deserved rest - that's the furthest and fastest they've gone since September for Zini and ... <yikes> May 2004 for Provo (although he did do a couple of laps of Cronin in 2005).

At that point, Cheryl and I joined some other practising R&Ters and continued on for another 8+ miles.

* * * 

It started off pretty good. We went out the south side of Cool and followed the main outer loop trail. Cheryl rode the first part, so I ran about a mile before she tied Mocha and I got to do my first ever horse swap - whooo! 

Me: 0.875 mile

Mocha looked marginally miffed that I'd come along so soon, since he was settling in to eat grass. Cheryl's saddle is very easy to mount from - doesn't slip at all - and even though she's only about 4'10", she rides pretty long, so the stirrups just felt a little short for me, but OK. I hopped up and thankfully - given my poor mounting skills - it actually felt like I "hopped" up, not "scrambled up like a lame noodle", which is what I was expecting. Considering two horses had just passed us, Mocha was exceedingly well behaved and obediently started to trot slowly after them (but would have stopped very easily had I asked him to, had I not been ready). He's a good boy. We dipped through a creek and up the other side where I promptly fumbled and dropped the tie rope and it began to wrap around his front legs. Great start, Lucy, for your first "go" on Mocha.

The "tie rope" is a section of half-inch thick rope about 3' long, with a carabiner on each end and has a couple of inch-wide rings tied into it along its length. One end snaps to the horse's halter and it means that you don't have to mess with actually tying a knot - you can either wrap the rope around a tree and snap it back to itself or onto one of the rings. Very efficient. Except when you drop it. I had to lie along his neck, arm flailing wildly at his chin to retrieve it.

Settled back in the saddle and enjoying Mocha's nice big strides and steady, planted-feeling, we passed Cheryl on the ground and I rode 0.8 mile before stopping to tie himto an old dead tree... no, he'll break it and get loose... how 'bout this branch? no, too small...how 'bout this tree...? ...at which point Cheryl arrived. She runs much faster than I ride, apparently.

Cheryl: 0.825 mile

We had a quick lesson on the relative merits of various trees to tie to (no, not that one - it's hidden behind a bush; no not that one it's too far off the trail and the horse could be missed; yes that one, even though it's wimpy and could break, Mocha's a good boy and doesn't pull...). Tying for R&T is different to "tying at the side of the trail". The idea is speed, so the further off the trail you tie, the  longer its going to take for your partner to retrieve the horse. Note to self - tie right on the trail if possible.

Off I ran down the hill, over the little bridge, along the gravel flat part, only to realise - urk - here comes that big hill (all of 1500' long) that pft once made me cycle up and I nearly died, honest. I ran slower, hoping that Cheryl would catch up... she did, but explained that there weren't any trees to tie to ("but...but...I can see a bushlet...what's the matter with that??") and that she'd tie him at the top of the hill. So me an' another lady who was also practising for the first time trudged sadly up the long, sun-baked hill (keep in mind it was all of 75°F out there) and finally staggered to the top.

In the shade at the top, Mocha was again munching contentedly on grass and eyed me with distaste when I crashed the 8' through the undergrowth towards him. There was another brown horse tied nearby and I made a mental note to ask Cheryl to tie something obvious to his tail lest I get confused and try to take someone else's horse by mistake. Recognising your *own* horse has got to be one of the main cardinal rules in R&T and spotting "brown" horses are definitely not my forte. ...now greys, that's another matter.

(Hmm - thinks - Zini would make a *great* R&T horse, since she's so obvious!)

Me: 0.6 mile

Off we went again, ridin', ridin', ridin' - me thinking all the time that "any minute" we'd catch Cheryl. And sure enough, afterslowing to go down a hill, we saw the top of her head bobbing along over the tall grass. Mocha's ears pricked and he perked up and picked up speed... only to slow again when he realised that *wasn't* her at all - it was the rider/runner of one of the other tied horses. 

On we went, trying to catch her. A couple of times we saw her *way* in the distance, but then she'd disappear around the corner when I'd have to slow for for some rough footing or a downhill. 

(The short stirrups didn't work well for my downhill balance and my bad right knee was whining a little bit when I tried, and my right calf was also starting to rub a little from riding in shorts all day. By then I'd maybe ridden 10 miles, included what I did on Provo who is pretty rough to ride, so shorts might still work on the day of the R&T.)

(I shouldn't complain, though. Cheryl told me that she partnered with Alina Vale at Whiskeytown last month. Alina has got to be about 5'8"+ and rode with Cheryl-length stirrups willingly. Alina is also young and bendy. Yes. That's it)(never mind that I never have been, and never will be, as fit and lithe as Alina) 

Finally we caught Cheryl (at the top corner by Pilot Hill where the signs are), but only because she'd stopped because she wasn't sure which way the trail went. She instructed me to ride about ten yards ahead of her and jump off the right side of Mocha and she'd grab him from the left. It actually went quite smoothly - except for the discouragement of seeing the  horse trot off without you. :) I was getting hot.

Cheryl: 0.9 mile

Not to worry, Cheryl has a halo - I went all of about 0.2 mile and there was Mocha tied to a tree again. Yay!

Me: 0.2 

So once again, off we set in hot pursuit. This time I was  determined to catch up with her in a decent time interval. 

At one point earlier in the practice, as I passed her on the ground, she'd instructed me to "ride another two minutes and then tie". This would be fine if a) I was wearing a watch (I substituted "two minutes" for "counting to 200" and then couldn't keep count properly because I had to negotiate a crowd of tied horses and horse-baby-sitters); b) we ever actually went fast enough to get ahead of her in that time period.

Mocha and I zoomed along a flat piece of trail, slowed for a crummy, rocky downhill section and then I let him go going up the next short hill. He cheerfully broke into a canter - a  little too cheerfully as it turned out. Cheryl had told me  that he occasionally likes to stretch his neck way down to  the ground when he canters, so I wasn't too concerned when he started to do this. 

After dropping the tie rope on that first pickup, I'd snapped the rope back onto a ring and had the loop dangling around my wrist as we rode along. I was *just* forming the thought that maybe it wasn't such a great idea being attached to the horse like that, in case he "stumbled", when Mocha bucked and I burst out laughing. I popped his head up and he responded by spooking at the "scary" fence at the top of the hill and trotting off, grinning. At least he wasn't tired, that's for sure. :)

We finally caught and passed Cheryl in a big open meadow and trotted up the next hill to some trees where I tied him - finally ahead enough that Cheryl wasn't walking up as I completed my tying, which is how it'd gone on the first few exchanges and is kind of embarrassing. 

Mocha isn't the most cooperative when it comes to "leading over to the tree". As far as he's concerned, as soon as you get off, you're on *his* time and that's when he eats - never mind that you still have 8' to go to get to the tree, so a bit of dragging and clucking (and muttered curses) goes on between the "getting off" and the "being tied" stage. Note to self - ride Mocha as close to the tying-tree as possible before dismounting.

Cheryl: 1.0

The beauty of my tie was that it was at the top of a hill,so I could actually run somewhat speedily down the next section, dunk my bandana in the trough-let at the bottom, mop my face, arms and legs with pollywogged-water, and have nearly finished trudging to the top of the next hill (the one with the gate-to-nowhere) by the time Cheryl and Mocha came cantering past. I told Cheryl about Mocha bucking and she looked horrified, not realising that it wasn't a big deal. Since the next part of the trail was still more or less "uphill" (if you squinted), I walked the rest of the way and was starting to think about the next downhill and how I should have told Cheryl to take Mocha on down and I'd grab him at the bottom when coming around the corner, there he was again, tethered to a small bush.

Me: 0.52

Knowing that I'd be able to run faster with him on foot, I led him all the way down to the bottom. Mocha once again demonstrated that he's not just the legs, but also the brains of our duo, by stopping once when his reins had come un-snagged from the pommel where they'd been  hooked and were starting to dangle close to the ground, and stopped dead again just as I was starting to think "this is too rough footing - we should walk". Smart pony.

At the bottom of the hill is Knickerbocker Creek and I was astonished to see a small footbridge across it that has never been there before. It made a perfect mounting block with Mocha standing in the creek... provided, of course, I could get him anywhere near it, which was tricky since it obviously came under the category of  "a suspicious object".

The hill up the other side is horrid, steep shale rock and I was eternally grateful that I was on the horse - albeit walking - rather than on foot. Since the whole next section was still uphill and rough, it took us a while before we caught Cheryl who once again had stopped and was waiting for us (are you picking up a pattern here?). 

Wanting me to have fun on my first practice (bless her),  she suggested maybe we should take the short way back to  the trailhead from there. OTOH, I knew that that route  has no shade at all (I've run it in the summer before),  so assured her that I was fine and we should continue along the main outer trail. We rode/ran together for a short  while, past the turn-off to Elliot Springs, and I rode Mocha up to the top of the next hill to tie him. We were supposed to be trotting, but Mocha wasn't too keen, wanting to stay with Mom (shows what he thought of my company).

Cheryl: 0.85

The next section of trail was a steep, steep, third of a mile-long downhill, so we both walked down it on foot. At the turn off to the old Coffer Dam trail (an alternative route back to Auburn), Mocha balked, suggesting to Cheryl that they take that option, but instead we cruelly forced him onwards down to Salt Creek (where he drank like a good boy). I pretended to run up the hill from there (failing dismally, but at least I was on foot, not embarrassingly monopolising the horse). Cheryl rode with me and we discussed our strategy for the race.

She said that she thought it would be best if we did flying exchanges (where I ride up and hand the horse off to her) since we'd do better and waste less time (what? you mean the part where I can't get more than 20' ahead of you?). The race is at Quicksilver Park in San Jose and she knows the trail very well, so will be able to figure out our best timing. This takes any thought-process away from me, which is good, since at this point I'm still somewhat on sensory overload, trying to figure everything out.

Half-way up the rocky hill towards Pointed Rocks, I worked out that we'd do better to take the singletrack past Indian Grinding Rocks Lake because it would bring us out right by the turn-off that Cheryl needed to take to get her and Mocha back to Auburn (instead of going into Cool and then having to backtrack). So we swapped again and she ran on from there. 

Me: 0.7

At the top of the hill past the lake, we flushed a healthy- looking coyote and he bounded away, bouncing in places to  see over the top of the long grass. Funny. I was glad that Chili wasn't with us as she might have given chase...although  knowing her, she probably would have missed the whole thing (and wouldn't have known what to do if she got anywhere near the coyote anyway). I've seen a coyote there before and wonder  if he's the same one. Perhaps there's a healthy population of small rodents in that meadow?

Just before Cheryl's turn off, I stopped Mocha and let him graze for a while, announcing to Cheryl as she ran up, that I'd "tied" him to that tree over there (there's nothing like a good imagination to substitute for the real thing). We swapped again and then once Mocha had eaten his fill, he decided it was time for them to turn for home, so off they went.

Cheryl: 0.78

From there, I ran in the last mile on my own and was tired, but not completely dragging. Not completely, at least. :)

Doing the math later, I was relieved to discover that, mostly because of that last mile, the amount of time we'd each spent on foot was pretty much even. This was the breakdown, to give you an idea of how far we each went on each section:

Me: 0.875
Cheryl: 0.825
Me: 0.6
Cheryl: 0.9
Me: 0.2 
Cheryl: 1.0
Me: 0.52
Cheryl: 0.85
Me: 0.7
Cheryl: 0.78
Me: 1.0

= 8.25 miles

I uploaded my GPS data from the practice to the MotionBased  website:

http://trail.motionbased.com/trail/episode/view.mb?episodePk.pkValue=740869

Keep in mind, I had the GPS on me, so it reflects me  on the ground and on Mocha. Notice the large amount  of time spent at 3-4 mph and the lack of high speed, even while on the horse... :) Racers R us.

The spike at about 1 mile (23 mph? I don't think so) is a GPS glitch, unless it's from me flailing around trying to grab the tie rope.

The spike to 15 mph around 3.8 miles is where Mocha was cantering and bucking... :)

Notice also, the way I go slower and slower as the time progresses :))

All in all it was good fun. I'll enjoy it more when I'm in better shape (and also more if I don't ride Provo first <g>, although it was really nice to get out on him). 

It definitely teaches you to not be uptight and I think is less alarming for a horse than you might think (of  course, this is based on watching what a veteran like Mocha does). Certainly, he was almost always dozing or eating whenever I came up, not looking remotely stressed. 

The whole thing is very fun. :)

Thanks to Cheryl for dragging me out and getting me going.

Both Provo and Zini were a little stocked up in the lower legs from their efforts - neither has done much work this year and that's not just the furthest, but the fastest, they've gone in months. I turned them out in the grass when I got home and their legs went down, but this morning, after standing eating hay all night, they were stocked up again. They'll be fine, but they need loads more work to get them properly conditioned.

I'd hoped to get Provo ready for the 30 at the Moonlight ride in NV on 10th June, but I'm not convinced he'll be properly prepared by then...it's possible, but not likely - esp. not, when I said I'd only do distance on him again if I could get him to do it nicely... He's 18 this year and bouncing back slower each year - not that he's noticed. Cheryl was marvelling at how he could canter practically in place when Zini left him behind (and wasn't it a joy to ride easy-Mocha in comparison?!).

May 8 - Flushed With Success

Conversation with Cheryl:

Cheryl:
I thoroughly enjoyed your story! How did you remember the most minute details? 

That's why I get on sensory-overload, my brain stores everything. I can look at a map afterwards and remember what was going on. Ask me a routine phone number, however, and I'm hopeless. :)

Can I send your article to the R & T Newsletter for publication?  It would be good for other first time "practicers" (is that a word) to read?

'course. You may need to edit it a bit (I put in some of the references to where we were on the trail for those who know that area, but it would be meaningless to most readers... as would the reference to Zini being an easy to recognise horse - you may have to put in a note to say she's a pinto.) 

As for practice this weekend - I want to, but am currently coming to the tail end of my second 60-hour week in a row. I'm just finishing my work now - or at least trying to - I've been doing such graphic intensive stuff all day, my computer has all but seized up, which is why I'm typing this, waiting for it to un-seize so I can close some of the programs I've got open. As a result, I completely pooped and no further along with my painting/tiling than I was last weekend. <grr> 

Oh, and I tried to kill Mouse by shutting her in a paddock on her own so she could go on a diet - not realising the automatic waterer in that paddock had been turned off. ACK. Luckily no harm done, but it kind of shows what overload I've been on.

If it looks good sometime this weekend, I might call, but don't hold your breath.

We'll talk later in the week about arrangements to get to Quicksilver - I could travel with you (maybe meet in Auburn and I'll leave my car for the weekend?). D'you usually come home on Saturday afterwards? Or stay over until Sunday morning? (I'm fine with either).

May 17 - Perfect Weather!

Ooh! It looks like it'll be pleasantly cool on Saturday - maybe around 70 degrees! Just perfect (I had visions of me "running" along, looking like a beetroot). 

May 18 - What to Pack?

Tomorrow we drive down to San Jose to do the R&T on Saturday. I haven't run since our practice, and am astonishingly out of shape. Hey ho. :)   Oh, my big toenail from that 10 mile run at Cronin is starting to think about maybe parting company with my toe. It should hold for the weekend, but I suspect my feet won't look pretty afterwards. I'm packing bandaids, bodyglide and nu-skin. Luckily the forecast is for low 70s and maybe sprinkles (rather than mid-90s, which is what we've been having). Cheryl told me today she doesn't ride in the rain, but doesn't mind running, so if it rains, I'll be riding a lot. Perhaps I should pray for rain... :)

May 20 - The Big Day

Well, we finished and were actually pretty fast... if you don't compare us to everyone else in the race. They should have had more crap slow teams, as we were the only representative of such.  :)))

It was slightly less than 22 miles and we did it in 3:50 ish - a moving average of 5.9 mph, overall average 5.4 mph - and we only "stopped" for 10 mins total over the course - and some of that was going through the vet check mid-way.

The winning team finished in 2:45 or thereabouts, so we weren't ludicrously slow. They also had an 11 mile race, which did the same loop as us and they started them 15 mins behind us and the front runner 11s came past me in the last half mile, so we weren't too bad. I've still to download my GPS to show what we did.

It looks like I ran ~9 miles and Cheryl ran 14 (given that there were times she was running with the horse on some of the downhills)

Mocha was fun to ride and I'd love to do this with one of my own horses - I think they'd really learn a lot (about galloping and stopping, galloping and stopping... it might teach Provie the joys of stopping and resting).

Today the bottoms of my feet hurt, my calves, my knees, my hips, my back, and I feel like a panda from being tired (feel like I have rings around my eyes).  :)

May 22

To Cheryl:

Gosh I had fun this weekend (even though I was so sore on Saturday night I could hardly turn over in bed). Already I'm thinking strategy and figuring out where I can do more uphill running that won't totally piss me off and demoralize me <g> (lack-of-motivation-for-uphills R us).

Mostly I need new shoes (will be visiting Jim in Grass Valley). The soles of my feet are sore (they don't so much feel bruised as scalded, so friction I 'spose) and my toe-nail is not amused on that one foot.

I've been doing those stretches you showed me and they have helped immensely. We spent most of Sunday putting down sub-floor and tiling, so I kept stretching. The good thing is, I don't seem to be any sorer today than yesterday and am hardly waddling at all. Honest.

May 23 - Trying to Recruit Others - Recapping the Event...

I forwarded you message to Dennis. I'm up for giving it a shot and Socks might work, but I'm concerned about leaving him tied and how much it would take to teach him that someone will be along to rescue him.

Question: When you tie Socks to the trailer, does he care? That's kind of how the horses were at R&T. They inspected the bushes around them (never know if they might find a snack) and kind of went to sleep in the shade of the bush/tree.

Cheryl complimented me on one of my ties - there was a bank with grass on it and a small bonsai-like oak tree at about waist height. So I tied Mocha to that and he got to munch on the grass on the bank. 

We'll definitely practice, but the tying (provided you're relatively smart about how/where you tied) doesn't seem to be nearly as much a big deal as you might think. And the more you practice, the more idea you get about what works and what doesn't. The weirdest thing was just figuring it all out and actually doing it. I mean, how hard can it be to tie a horse, quickly, to a tree? But it was quite hard... I'd be riding along, counting to 200 and as I was getting up there, starting to look for "likely candidates".

Cheryl and I went along rows of trees the afternoon before when we went on a 3 mile hike, and discussed the relative merits of trees as well, which was helpful.

In any case, to begin with, you practice with a baby-sitter horse. So you need two runner/riders + novice horse and one person on another horse who baby-sits the tied horse, to make sure nothing untoward happens.

It struck me that it was actually a really good thing for horses to learn to deal with - stuff that was "not normal" (you know how they are about that: "This isn't how we *normally* do this...") but pretty soon they figured it out.

Several of the horses there at the weekend were complete novices and just took it in their stride. The horse that won the 11 mile loop was six and it was his first ever event doing anything. He was a maniac at the trailer the evening before because they had two horses and were fiddling around trying to get the stirrups sorted for the two riders. Every time they took the other horse more than 20' away, the young horse started to jump up and down and paw and generally make a fuss. However, out on the trail (away from his buddy), he apparently behaved like a trouper - tied and behaved himself.

I think having to hold water bottles while running would get on my nerves.
Yuh, I'm with you. I like to flap my hands and hold them out to cool them down. Although those straps they have, so you don't have to *hold* the bottle, it just sort of sits in your hand aren't bad.

I ran with my backpack Camelbak Saturday and that was fine - I'd just rather have more air circulating on my back, since I overheat so much.

And when running, I wouldn't carry 100 oz of water anyway. This waistpack carries 45 oz, which is about what I drank during the R&T, maybe a little more, since I had a diluted gatorade on the saddle.

As far as Socks, I share your concern about the tying.  But then I was SO worried before my first ride about tying Marcha to the trailer the whole night long, gasp.  Of course she did fine, and ever since then whenever I really worry about things it seems like they never are as bad as I think they will be.

I think that's pretty much it. It sounds strange to *us* to tie to some tree in the middle of nowhere, but the horse prolly doesn't care.
What I had been thinking about, though, was never actually tying the horse.  Gail and I were just going to stick together and take turn riding and that way we'd never have to actually tie the horse.  That's the chicken way, I suppose, but it would work :-) 

Cheryl and I did a few "flying changes" where one of us would ride up, jump off one side and the other would hop on from the other. But if you do it the way you're describing, the horse never gets a rest (and to eat grass), while they do when you tie them.

...one never comes in last place at a run if one considers one's "competition" all those couch potatoes sitting at home when they could be out doing something. 

:)

...I hate May. Lucy is correct.  Both she and Renee are probably in way better shape than me now.

I know I'm not. I was lucky to get one 2.5 mile run downhill in every two weeks. I should count how many miles I'd actually done this year before doing the R&T. It's guaranteed to be most amusing in it's pathetic-ness.