Pirate Run (Part 4)

[Howard4567@aol.com]

I didn't stay up too late Friday night.  I wanted to make the ride on time.  
I live for the start of these things; I don't know why, must be some sort of 
death wish or something.  This conversion to Central time, from Eastern, had 
me a little off center.  I socialized a bit, even got invited to an 
exceptional dinner, courtesy of Cindy and her daughter Ashley.  Cindy cooks 
this vegetable dish that is to die for; I, normally, eat nothing but meat at 
these rides, sandwiches and I usually grill a steak or two.  I'm pretty sure 
I got back to my tent before midnight, which is early for me when I'm only 
riding a 25 mile ride.  If I do a 50 I try and get to bed by ten.  A 50 is 
serious business; a 25 is pure fun.

I had to get out of bed a little earlier than planned. When Mary Ellen 
started saddling up her horse for her 50 mile ride, Princess, right on cue, 
started acting up.  Since I had my tent very close to Princess' pen, her 
neighing noises and running around woke me up.  She was moving so quickly 
around the corral, when she came to a sudden stop where three rungs of 
electric tape required her to do so, she even kicked dirt on to my tent.  I 
got out of the tent, quickly, before she had a chance to stampede through my 
electric corral.  There I was, outside, yelling at my horse, when it dawned 
on me that I didn't take the time to put on any pants.  Exit, stage right, 
quickly back into the tent.  It was early enough, and dark enough where I 
don't think anyone noticed that my butt was whiter than my mare's.

So, when Mary Ellen took her gelding out of her pen, I did the same with 
Princess.  This time I was dressed.  And we both saddled up our respective 
horses, even though I wasn't leaving for over an hour and a half.  Princess 
was anxious, but much easier to control than my hyper Saddlebred, Dance Line. 
 He cannot sit still right before the start of a run.  I kind of missed my 
Ole buddy who, normally, accompanies me at a ride, but I found myself quite 
attached to Princess, and looked forward to the day when I'd have both of 
them at an endurance event.

After I saddled up my mare, I knew I had to have some coffee.  I put Princess 
back in her pen and she behaved for me.  Mary Ellen's horse was out of sight. 
 I fired up my propane burner (I finally did get rid of that alcohol one that 
was such a fire hazard) and made some fresh perked coffee.  I sat down with 
the hot coffee, ate a granola bar, and just looked at my beautiful mare, all 
saddled up and ready to go.  And she had no clue as to what she was in for 
today.  Pure excitement, with a dash of adrenaline rush thrown in for good 
measure.  My stomach began to churn, in a good way, as I thought of what was 
to come.

I get real emotional when it comes to this sport.  I can't tell you exactly 
why; probably,  cause I love it so much.  I was discussing this with Lee, a 
little after he told his fantastic "Bruce Lee" tale.  Bernie had wandered off 
somewhere.  I told Lee that I think I'm going through some sort of male 
menopausal thing, cause there have been times, here at these rides, when I've 
just broken down and cried.  In front of others; just not able to help 
myself.  Sometimes cause of a bad experience, sometimes cause of a good one, 
sometimes over just about nothing at all.  But it only seems to happen to me 
here, at a ride, or, maybe, at home, when I try and write about one.

I looked at my horse and thought what a wonderful thing this is.  This moment 
in time,  before the start of an endurance run, right before dawn.  No matter 
how many times I repeat doing it, I still get the same excited and euphoric 
feeling at every ride.  And I know I'm surrounded by others who feel the same 
way.  I stood up and gave my horse one of my granola bars.  As I watched her 
eat it, with a look of satisfaction on her face, I said to her, "Princess, 
let's go out there and kick some Arab butt today."  And I think she 
understood me completely.

Fifteen minutes till our start time I got on her and we started warming up.  
She was extremely tense and unsure of herself.  Everything was new and she 
wasn't certain of any of it.  She started prancing (I think Dance Line taught 
her this move) and then she did this lateral lope move, close to the starting 
area, that she had never done before.  And I just knew she was one damn good 
looking horse; people were staring and I heard someone call out my name and 
then, someone else, called out hers.  It's showtime.

Nancy, time keeper extraordinaire, did her countdown.  I don't know how any 
other ride functions without Nancy; I see her at just about every one I go 
to.  She even knows my name, for which I am grateful.  "Good morning, Nancy, 
like my new horse?"

Nancy says go, and we all do.  My guess is about 30 or so riders are at the 
start of this 25 miler.  Princess and I are the last to pass Nancy in the 
group.  We make a right turn onto the dirt road, Princess sees all the horses 
in front of her, and she just takes off.  Dance Line must have told her about 
this part too, cause she's acting just like him.

She's into an instant canter; moving like she has springs attached to the 
bottom of her hooves.  We just start flying, passing the riders in front of 
us, one by one.  I slow her down a bit, she's approaching that galloping 
speed.  Man, this horse is really fast; we don't ever travel like this at 
home while training.  It's like the horse knows, they know what this is all 
about and don't want to be thought of, by the other competitors, as a slow 
nag.  

I let her canter for a while then get her into an extended trot.  She has the 
springiest legs of any horse I've ever ridden.  BOING, BOING, BOING.  We 
really cover some ground here and continue passing others, some of them in a 
canter while she's still trotting.  BOING!  I feel like I'm riding a cartoon 
character here.  BOING.

There is something to be said for riding a young horse.  Since I know this is 
all knew to her; it's a first time experience, I'm enjoying it even more than 
I would on a seasoned endurance horse.  I'm getting a kick just watching her 
as she passes other horses.  She glances at them, but never turns her head, 
even when some of the horses seem to get upset at this young upstart trotting 
by them.  She looks all serious and focused about the whole thing.  One Arab 
even tried to take a bite at her as she passes him by, but this never phased 
my Princess.  BOING, BOING.  Bye, bye, Mr. Arab.

We're on the yellow loop, which is supposed to be 14 miles.  Everything is 
very well marked and there's plenty of riders ahead of us for me to follow.  
We end up behind a couple, both riding Paso's (I asked), and they're keeping 
a good pace.  I want to give Princess a bit of a challenge on this first 
loop; I'm damn curious to see how fast her heart rate comes down when we get 
back to camp.  The vet checks have always been quite a challenge for me and 
Dance Line.  I'm hoping this will change today, so I do plan on testing the 
horse, whom I feel is in excellent shape because of our training.

The male rider tells me he checked out this yellow loop yesterday, and is 
familiar with it.  Since I've only done the orange loop, prior to today, I 
decide to keep following him and his female companion, provided they keep 
this pace.  They canter, Princess stays in that extended trot.  She's not 
breathing hard or fast and I'm enjoying every moment of this first loop.  

I know most of you might not believe me, but I can find not one fault with my 
horse, Princess, except, maybe, that creek thing, which is on the next loop.  
But I attribute that to her youth, and I'm sure we'll be able to overcome 
those kind of hurdles as time goes on.  I find myself thinking about this as 
she and I fly along the yellow trail.  BOING, BOING.

Dance Line is hyper; there's not much doubt about that one.  He is just about 
out of control, no matter what I do with him, on that first loop.  Dance kind 
of scares the crap out of me sometimes, but it is an experience I truly live 
for.  Problem is, he takes awhile to come down at the vet check. Heart rate 
is up and I have to be very careful with him when we attempt a 50 together.  
I almost lost him at one ride and it was all my fault.

Rebel, my daughter's Arabian horse, is a follower, to the extent where he 
will not pass the horse in front of him unless he's following Dance Line.  
And, his other problem, is he trips, especially when 4 or 5 weeks have gone 
by since his last shoeing.  And he can trip really bad; my wife is limping 
around the house now as I write this cause of one of Rebel's falls.  Anyone 
want to buy a horse?

But Princess, bless her sweet little heart, shows no signs of any of the 
above.  And, today, right here, right now, she sure is proving, to me, that 
she has heart.  And, I think, she really likes this new sport I've introduced 
her to.  BOING, BOING.

We eventually pass the Paso couple.  I guess Princess got tired of looking at 
their long flowing tails, which almost touched the ground.  The air is still 
cool and crisp so I do let her go, hoping I'm not making a mistake by doing 
so.

We get into camp very quickly.  I can't believe we just did 14 miles.  I pass 
Bernie's trailer and see him attending to his Buckskin.  I figured he was 
ahead of us, but it doesn't look like he was by much.

I take off Princess's tack, sponge her, let her drink (she gulps and gulps 
and gulps down the water) and then I go to the vet area.  There's no line.  I 
figured she'd be high, but I was curious and planned on waiting around if she 
was.  This is something I would never do with Dance Line.  With him, I wait 
at least 15 minutes before getting his pulse rate checked.

The volunteer doing the check on Princess say's, "Time in on Y."  She was 52. 
 Wow!  I'm just blown away.  We go through the check and get all "A's" on 
everything except for a B+ on gut.  The vet tells me she looks excellent.  I 
can't believe my horse today.

The hold is 30 minutes long.  I take her back to the pen and watch her eat 
and drink.  I reheat some coffee and drink a little Gatorade.  I add a bit of 
grain to the beet pulp in Princess's feed bucket and she just gobbles it up.  
She has always had a voracious appetite, which I think is crucial in the 
sport of endurance.

After 20 minutes pass by, I re-tack my horse.  I grab my fanny pack, look 
inside to make sure my "lucky" spur is in there (yea, it's coming), and get 
ready to check out with Nancy.  We leave right at our out time, which is a 
first for me.

Princess gives me a bit of a problem trying to get out of the area.  Some 
horses are leaving and some are coming back in, it's a two way trail at the 
start for a while.  She keeps wanting to turn around and follow some of the 
horses who are coming in from their respective loop.  I wait her out, no need 
to stress her.  Eventually she takes off in the right direction.  BOING.

We get behind this very large, black horse a lady is riding.  She's, also, in 
the 25 (you can tell cause they have letters instead of numbers on the 
horse's backside).  We follow her along the dirt road, sometimes pass, but 
she keeps right up with us and passes us back.  You can feel the ground shake 
as this woman's horse approaches us from behind.  Princess's ears pin back as 
they overtake us.  She looks so tiny next to this creature in black.

I ask the woman if she knows how much her Quarter horse weighs.  She tells me 
1300 lbs, and I believe her.  I think Princess is about 850, maybe, 900.  Her 
horse canters; mine does her extended trot.  What a contrast the four us make 
as we go down the road, side by side. Black next to white; massive along side 
mini.

Eventually, we kick it up a notch and go through this trail that is a knee 
knocker, only wide enough for one horse at a time.  Blacky is right behind us 
and I end up pulling off the trail to let them pass.  The large horse is 
bothering my mare when he's behind us bigtime.

We get to the Princess Whitewater rapids area.  Princess does not follow 
Blacky, which does not surprise me.  She starts acting up on me, just like 
she did at rehearsal.  I have a hard time getting the slip on spur out of my 
fanny pack since she won't sit still.  My horse keeps heading for the trees 
by the side of the trail, I think she wants to scrape my off of her back. 
Other riders continue to pass us by, some look at me and I just say, "Young 
horse, first ride."  I should probably add, "and trained by me," but I don't. 
 And here comes my pal, Bernie.

His Walking horse goes right through the creek, no problem.  Bernie waits for 
me on the other side.  I tell him to go on, it's going to be a while.  He 
does, and I slip on the spur on my left boot.  This will be one interesting 
experiment.

I tap her with it, lightly, and she flips out.  Starts bucking, then rearing. 
 I smack her flank, with my crop, on her right and tap her left with the 
spur.  Who says you can't have a rodeo here out on the trail?  The bucking 
bronc show has just begun!

I give her a rest, after stopping her from bucking and rearing.  I put my 
hand on her neck to prevent any future rearing and am glad I put that tie 
down on her.  I count to ten, keeping her head pointed towards the creek at 
all times, and then I let her have it.  I plan on calling this experiment the 
"Irresistible force meets the Immovable Object."

I smack her hard with the crop and keep kicking with my left spur.  She 
springs up high in the air, with a little forward movement.  We're close to 
the edge now, where it drops off.  I don't let up on her, kicking and tapping 
with the crop.  And, man, she just leaps the entire thing, a long jump any 
Olympic athlete would be proud of.  BOING is not a strong enough word to 
describe what we just did, but we're over the creek, literally.

And she's in a gallop.  I slow her down cause we're still in the land of knee 
knocker trees, making turns and taking out twigs and branches everywhere.  
She stays in a canter, and it's a fast one.

I slow her to a trot and reach down to take off my lucky spur to put it back 
in my fanny pack.  But it's not there.  It's gone and I don't know where I 
lost it; probably, by the creek area where Princess just made her leap of 
faith.  I'm glad we don't have to cross that creek again, one of the benefits 
of only doing the 25, since the 50 milers have to cross it twice.  Too bad 
the ride photographer wasn't there; what a picture getting Princess across 
that creek what have made.  Sort of like Evil Kneivel jumping the Snake River 
Canyon, except we didn't have a parachute.