Endurance.Net Ridecamp Archives

From: RDCARRIE@xxxxxxx
Subject: [RC]   Louisiana Gumbo Ride

Those of you who didn't make it to this ride missed a
good time!!  
-----------------------------------------------------

Dawn,  You are right the Gumbo ride this past weekend
was a great time.  I see you post on RC frequently and
maybe I'll get a chance to meet you in person.

The 35 mile ride was set up as an elevator ride were
you could move up to a 55 if you felt like you still
had plenty of horse left.  With this in mind I signed
up for the 35 thinking to elevate to 55.

We were about 1 1/2 miles into the first loop when I
hear "Hey Pete!" from the road. I look over to see a
friend and her stallion on a flat bed roll-away tow
truck headed into camp. Mind you this is a straight
flat bed truck, no sides, no tail gate, no nothing!
Just the stallion standing there in full tack and her
holding his reins. No thats one calm cool collected
gentleman!

I met up with a mixed group of 35's and 55's and we
formed a group of five riders each taking a turn in
the lead. The first loop was supposed to be the
longest at 20 miles. A four mile ride out with a
12 mile loop and 4 miles back to camp. Well the story
of my life, we got cross tracked and started to do the
12 mile loop a 2nd time. With the tall pines and the
overcast sky it was impossible to tell direction.
Finally we crossed a gas-line right away and I saw the
sun. We were headed North and Camp was back South.
Knowing now we were headed the wrong way the guy with
the GPS navigated us back to the return side of the
loop. When we got back to the trail, who was
there but my friends stallion who had started an hour
after us! They led us back to camp and we all vetted
through into a 1 hr hold. The guy with the GPS said
we'd done over 28 miles on a 20 mile loop, Ouch!

I gave up on the elevator idea, 63 miles was asking a
lot of my mare so we decided to settle for a 35. On
the last loop we joined back with the "lost souls"
crew from the first loop and headed out at a brisk
pace. My mare felt real good and since we only had 15
miles to go I didn't hold her back. We did the entire
loop at her fastest run walk/cantor pace. An 9 mile/hr
average including water stops. From all the
frustration of getting lost in the morning this was a
blast. I kept an eye on the HRM and when we slowed her
HR recovered quickly so everything was OK. About half
way into the loop we started catching people. First
two, then a couple more and then a couple more. We had
no idea were we were in placing it was just fun to be
moving in the RIGHT direction. At the
elevator decision point all four of us opted to finish
rather than do the 55. Coming into camp I was a little
worried about my mares pulsing down after being ridden
so fast but she was fine. The four
of us went into the vet check and the guy ahead of me
wasn't down yet so we were moved up a place. As we
were vetting in for completion the vet asked us to
stay for BC. I said, "What are you kidding? We were
lost for over an hour this morning!" It turns out
that the four "lost souls" were 4-7th place,
unbelievable! Ladyhawk did great at the trot out for
BC practically runing over me. "A" for impulsion.  We
didn't have a prayer at BC with the winner finishing
almost 2 hours earlier but it was still cool to stand
for BC for the first time.

My wife and daughter did the 15 mile fun ride on their
two 4 year old walkers. They had a great ride as well
doing the same 15 mile loop we did on the 35. On the
way home my daughter was asking what she'd have
to do to get her gelding Blackjack ready for a 25. Who
knows I might have a buddy on the next ride. 

The 25 was a terrific story as well. There is a mother
daughter team who do a lot of the 25ld rides in the
central region. The 8 year old daughter Jordan rides a
one eyed arab gelding. We road with them for a while
on the Ft Worth ride. That gelding takes great care of
that little girl, they make a terrific team. Well
guess what? Jordan and her one eyed gelding won BC in
the 25!

I'd like to say Thank You to Fred Meyers and Lucky
Duffy for hosting a great ride.

Cheers, Pete in TX





               
__________________________________ 
Do you Yahoo!? 
Yahoo! Sports - Sign up for Fantasy Baseball. 
http://baseball.fantasysports.yahoo.com/

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Ridecamp is a service of Endurance Net, http://www.endurance.net.
Information, Policy, Disclaimer: http://www.endurance.net/Ridecamp
Subscribe/Unsubscribe http://www.endurance.net/ridecamp/logon.asp

Ride Long and Ride Safe!!

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=