Re: [RC] Riding in the dark and riding in balance - Truman Prevatt
My first night ride was on my first 100. I was riding a black horse.
The night was overcast and black. We were in a forest. I got sick as a
dog and did barf from motion sickness. When I finally got to the 90
mile check, I found a glo stick and put it on the back of my saddle so
there was some visual reference.
The next 100, also dark so I though I would put a glow stick on the
breast collar. In about 20 minutes I was getting motion sickness from
watched this light move back and forth accross the path of my horse. I
took it off. I rode that ride in complete darkness, except for a
flashlight at turns and had no problem at all.
I never had any problems after that. After awhile your eyes will
acclimate (but it could take 15 minutes to 1/2 an hour of total
darkness) and it will not be quite as dark.
However, on all my night rides my horse had no problem no matter how
dark it was. She just went on her merry way sometimes galloping through
the eerie still of the black night with the passenger in seat 1A. Talk
about a rush ;-).
I had a really hard time the first time I started out in the
complete dark and had vertigo for about ten minutes. I wanted to throw
up. My horse could care less and just trotted along while I hung onto
his neck - really great balance and form that night :) After a bit it
cleared and the night riding was wonderful. I only have that problem
when I start out on a pitch dark night (or early morning) and only for
the first few minutes.
Lee
".......and God sought to bestow upon man a supreme mark of his
blessing. God created the horse. The horse could run faster than the
deer, jump higher than the goat, and endure longer than the wolf. Man,
being encompassed by elements that sought to destroy him, would have
been a slave, had the horse not made him king."
-- “Fragile as reason is and limited as law is as the
institutionalised
medium of reason, that's all we have between us and the t
“Fragile as reason is and limited as law is as the
institutionalised medium of reason, that's all we have between us and
the
tyranny of mere will and the cruelty of unbridled, undisciplined
feelings.”Felix Frankfurter
