We left for Ft Howes on Monday morning at 5 am.  The four horses we took were Stirgess, Turbo, Bey and Kutt.  Bey was a late edition as Tevis was postponed and Bey was primed for a 100 mile attempt. 

We drove about 20 mins before we lost a trailer tire.  Damn!  Any how we were able to get that changed pretty quickly but our spare , the one that came with the trailer, looked a bit haggard.  We decided to drive until we would be in an area around the time of morning that businesses open and then find a tire place.  We found a Les Schwab near Elk Grove.  It was just our luck that there was a Starbucks in the parking lot next door.  We hung out and were on the road in no time.

The rest of our drive was uneventful to Wells NV where we unloaded the horses into a large arena.  The trailer lights decided to not work all of the sudden so Jeremy got on his bike and rode to a gas station to get some fuses.  After inspecting it Jeremy found the spot that was shorting out and fixed it and replaced the fuse.  We then tried to take a little nap. Jeremy's last words before laying his head on his pillow were,"If I can't fall asleep in an hour we are going to start driving again."

I had almost fallen asleep when Jeremy announced he could not sleep and we were leaving.  It had been 20 mins!!!  Crazy crack-head driver.  I fell asleep shortly after we started driving.  It was raining really hard.  A couple of times we had to pull over to mess with the trailer lights, Jeremy was able to make them work and away we would go.

I woke up around 5 am, we were in Idaho somewhere.  Jeremy handed me a coffee and told me to start waking up as he was "done".  I woke up and started my driving about an hour later.  Jeremy hit the hay and I drove for the next 4 hours. 

Sometime around 2 pm we made it to Ft Howes.  Hurrayy!!  It was already better than last year as we left home with 4 horses and arrived at the ride with 4 horses. 

There were a few rigs already there.  We parked next to Valerie and set up camp.  The horses all looked fine.  Later we went for a walking ride. 

Wednesday we rode our 4 horses and hung out around camp.  Valerie's crew, Wade, was selling these really cool electric corrals.  The corrals work sort of like the things that are used to rope off lines, like at the movie theaters.  The kind that you pull the line out and hook it to another stand and when you unhook it, it recoils back into itself.  Pretty slick.  We bought  a set and our horses were happy with it.

On Thursday we went to Sheridan Wyoming to see the sites.  There is a large Western Museum there.  It is pretty cool, there are hundreds of western saddles with notes on each ones history.  We rode when we got back to camp.  After our ride Turbo had a large muscle cramp in his right hind.  I could see the muscle contracting.  He was super lame.  It was a big problem.  When we walked them later that night Turbo was practically dragging his right hind.  I figured that I would not be riding him when seeing that!

We gave him a lot of electrolytes, magnesium, vitamin E and potassium and went to bed.

Friday I rode Turbo on two light rides and the a third time with my friend Chris Long.  I was planning on riding with her and her sister Kelsey.  He looked fine so I decided to give it a try.  Later we vetted in Stirgess for his first FEI 75 and Turbo for his first FEI 50.  That night we went to the ride briefing and the great BB-Q that the race has. 

So far the weather had been pretty darn good for Montana in June.  Saturday morning Jeremy started before us and was gone when I got up.  Chris, Kelsey and I started late, almost too late by FEI standards.  We made it to the start in time to not be D'Qed. 

Our day was fun and the three horses had a nice relaxing ride.  I was very paranoid about Turbo's hind end but it never was a problem.  It was noted at one check that he had a funky HR (we probably caused this from all of the extra electrolytes we had given for the hind end cramp.)   Michelle Roush was near and gave us a hand with this, Thank you Michelle. 

 In the afternoon there was a VERY deep bog that we had to cross.  It was about hock deep and you had to drop off a bank to get into it.  It was the texture of peanut butter.  I don't know about you but I like to be the first one through something hazardous so that I don't know just how bad it is going to be.  This time I was second.  I crossed my fingers and sent Turbo into it.  Luckily all three made it just fine.

At the end of the day all three of our group of horses finished the 50, with Turbo doing the FEI. 

Stirgess came in 3rd on his 75.  He looked really good too.  Jeremy had sponsored Valerie's junior/Young Rider also named Kelsey.  The two of them had fun plotting out and planning how they would beat the other juniors.  It worked.

Jeremy was getting ready to show Stirgess for BC when "The Storm" came.  The wind picked up suddenly and then the skies opened up and torrential rain came down.  All of the pop up shade tents in the vet gate were in danger as well as any horses that happened to be near the loose tents.  There is also a large red and white circus type tent that belongs to the race for holding meetings and such, that was being anchored by about 40 people!  It was chaos.  Stirgess wasn't able to show for BC as the weather Gods prevented it. We ran for cover after ripping down our crew area.  It went on for about an hour.  I later found out that a Montana man had been riding his horse in that storm, not at the race, and had been killed by lightening, horse and all.  What a shame.

After the rain we pre-rode our Sunday horses that would be doing the 100.  Kutt was doing the FEI 100 while Bey would do the open 100.  They both felt great.

Saturday morning was nice and both horses warmed up well.  The ride started and Kutt & Bey split up.  Kutt was rolling along nicely.  He was climbing well and cantering easily.  We got to an area where there were some cows and one horse in our group shied violently and his rider came off.  We stopped to help and when we did I looked my horse over as I always do.  I noticed that Kutt's stifles were quivering slightly.  I thought that was a really bad sign, we had only gone 7 miles.  I asked him to jog and looked back at him and his tail was just slightly funky.  Dammit.  I walked from that point on into the check.  Jeremy caught up with me and I told him that my horse was tying up. 

Bey went on and at the second vet gate he came in looking great.  When he trotted he was lame.  He had stepped on himself and was sore.  He was pulled too.  Bey was sound about an hour later.

In looking back the only thing we had done differently on this trip was 5 weeks earlier we had changed grain to a new product.  We had been happy with it putting weight on everyone and with the coat quality etc. But since the grain we had had one tie up at home and then the muscle cramp on Turbo and the tie up with Kutt.  To hell with that grain. 

The rest of Saturday we crewed for Chris who was riding for a second day on another one of her own horses.  She was on Bugsy, he did well.  Chris had a great weekend with three starts on her horses and three finishes.  We also crewed for Valerie and her rider as well as Jan Worthington.

The finish was exciting Val and her rider sprinted in with Val winning, her rider second and Meg Sleeper third. 

I trotted Val's two horses for BC as well as Jan's.  Val won BC and Jan got high vet.  Pretty cool for them.

On Monday we stayed for the Chef interviews.  The four candidates, Mark Dial, Michelle Roush, Flavia Ferrera & Emmett Ross were great choices each in their own right.

Right as we were leaving we did a temporary trade of horses with Valerie.  She generously offered us an FEI 100 mile horse that both Jeremy and I could try to get qualified on and we gave her Stirgess who will go do the Young Riders Championship in KY with one of her riders.  Pretty cool.

We left Ft Howes around 1 pm on Monday with Bey, Kutt, Turbo and Dee and headed to Big Sky Montana so Jeremy could shoe Terri Rashid's herd. We saw Rick Rashid briefly as he had to head out of town for business.  We went to dinner with Terri and Robin and went to sleep.

Tuesday we woke up and Jeremy started shoeing the 8 horses that he needed to get done.  I went riding with Terri.  It is absolutely beautiful scenery up there!  I rode our old horse Blondie ( not that she is literally old).  After all of Terri's were done we headed over to where Robin's horses are kept and did them too.  That night we went to a very nice dinner with Terri, Robin and Terri's two boys, Tieran and Kylan.  We also went for a drive to see the views after dinner. 

We went back to Terri's place and fell asleep for a semi early start on Wednesday for home.

We made it to Fernley NV on Wednesday night and went the rest on Thursday. We are now home.  Yay!!  Our next ride will be the Lake Almanor FEI ride July 30th.

We loaded up 6 horses Friday morning, after bathing them all.  There were three trailers from our ranch heading up to Grant Ranch with 9 total horses.  6 of them were ours, the other three belonged to Scott, Rebecca and Joan.

Jeremy was looking forward to riding Stirgess on his first FEI 50 and the first time we were going to let Stirgess move out a bit.  I would ride Bey on the open 75, a rider from the UK named Sam would ride Roof on his first FEI 50, Dom Freeman would ride Razin on the open 50, our good friend Chris from South Dakota would ride Nixon on the open 50 and a rider from Sweden named Caroline would ride our new horse Turbo (this horse arrived from Colorado the previous Friday from Garrett Ford) on the open 50.

The three other horses were Scott on his horse Marvel on the open 75, Rebecca on her horse Sid on the LD helping Joan on her horse Kongo.

The drive up the road to that race is REALLY tight especially when you have a very long LQ trailer like ours.  My friend Maddy and I drove ahead in her orange KIA with or hazzards on, to flag down oncoming traffic and possibly save a bicyclist from a head on collision with our truck.  We made it up safely.

Maddy and her dad Jesse had come up to help out and crew.  When we arrived we set to work getting the horses taken care of.  It was simple with so many hands.  After checking in, Jeremy and I pre rode as did Dom and Sam, separately.

A bit later Jeremy saddled up Nixon for a pre ride with Caroline on Turbo and Hillorie on Sandy.  Right when they were mounting Chris arrived fresh from the airport and quickly hopped on instead of Jeremy.

Rebecca and Joan were also going for a pre ride.  During their pre ride something had gone wrong and Joan's back and foot hurt so she decided to call it safe and not ride.

Saturday morning my cute husband fed all of the horses in the wee hours.  I had the earliest start time of 5:30 so I tried to get ready quietly.  Bey was happy to see me and we saddled and left the warmth of camp.  I had dressed with the idea it would get warmer as we went.  That was faulty, the weather actually got colder until about noon, then was stable and fluctuated from chilly to really cold to cool to freezing etc.  super crazy for trying to stay comfortable.

Scott and I were using this ride as a Tevis training ride and had a plan that we were riding to.  Both horses were going really steady.  It was both horses first 75.

Maddy and her dad were awesome and meet us at the vet checks.  At the second vet check they had just made bacon and eggs that we enjoyed.

I really didn't see any of our other riders for the majority of the day as we kept missing each other.  When I reached the 60 mile mark I found out that Stirgess was looking terrific and that he had a really big lead.

It was at the 60 mile point that Marvel stayed longer at the hold to eat more.  Scott decided to let him eat for an extra half an hour as he wasn't eating like he should.  I went out of that vet gate and shortly after caught the leaders.  Bey felt great and was super happy.  I had 15 miles left.  As we got closer to the end it was just myself and Nicole Smith.  We decided that the horses were well matched and rather than run them in we would tie.  They were both slated to go to Tevis so who wants to risk it if you can be safe?  Nicole won the FEI 75 and we tied for the AERC ride.

When I finished the ride Stirgess was already their and had won by almost 2 hours.  He also won BC.  He is truely Smitty's little brother:)

After that Razin and Roof completed a long while later followed by Nixon and Turbo.  Everyone looked pretty good and all 6 finished. 

Sid also finished with Rebecca.  (Scott went back to get Marvel looked at after the extra eating and Marvel looked fine but then he had become a bit stiff from standing around.  Next time.)

We were going to stay Saturday night and drive home Sunday morning but the weather looked horrible so we packed up and drove the 45 min drive home.  I am so glad we did, on Sunday's ride the tail end riders got snowed on at the last vet check!

In all it was a successful weekend.  Our next ride will be Ft Howes in Montana on June 11-12.

Heather

On April 22 Liger turned the big "1" !  Hurray.  On his birthday we measured him on level ground with a real stick that had a level on it.  He is officially taller than my first endurance champion, HBC Tyler Too.  Liger is 14.1 and 1/4.

 He is really fun to be around.  We gave him some grain and brushed him, then we took pictures and video of him.  (I still need to load the pictures)  You can see video of him on our video area of this site. 

We look forward to watching him grow.  We are currently trying to get Autumn N Motion in foal to Sam Tiki.  Autumn is a full sister to Master Motion, aka Split.  Split won Tevis for us and the Haggin Cup and was the 5th horse in 50 years to ever do that.  Autumn also is out of the same dam as Crystals Charm, aka Red.  Red won the Pan American Championship with BC in 2001 as well as multiple other championships.  Keep your fingers crossed, we are breeding her tomorrow.
Heather 

So we were starting to have race with drawl syndrome.  We hadn't raced since Feb and that is a really LONG time for us!  We were well over due for a race, well slow ride I should say. 

I picked up Jeremy from the SF airport Friday morning and we went to the barn and booted up the two horses we would ride at the Shine and Shine 50.  Later we vetted in Nixon and Bey on Friday afternoon.  The weather looked like it was going to be perfect for Saturdays ride.  Both horses looked great.  It was to be "An Honest Crook" aka Nixon's first race and Bey's first ride back from an injury that happened right before Tevis last year. 

After vetting we headed back to the barn and dropped off the horses. Bey seemed genuinely disappointed to not be camping out.  Oh well.

After we left the barn Jeremy had been wanting to get a massage as he had just returned from the East Coast where he had been shoeing and trimming.  We hit up our local $20 an hour place and had a great massage followed by a movie, Soul Surfer.  This is how every Friday night before a race should be spent!  We headed to bed right after this.

Saturday we woke up and drove to the barn.  I called Bey and he literally galloped down from his pasture to greet me at the gate, bringing Nixon with him.  We grained them both and they ate everything, we saddled, then we loaded them up.  Bey jumped into the trailer and slide to his hay bag.  He is so enthusiastic, it is really cute. ( A side note on Bey:  we have had Bey for 8 years, he is our oldest horse and he was an orphan.  He is a people horse to say the least and he gets frustrated with trying to constantly try to prove his worth to us, a definite over achiever)  We headed over to the ride around 6:15.  The ride is only 10 min away and that is a stretch, it is even shorter really.  The start time would be 7 am.

When we arrived we let the horses eat from their hay bags and just waited for the start.  I said hi to a few friends and took the crew bag to where it needed to go.

We started a couple of minutes late.  Both Bey and Nixon were relaxed and ready for a long slow day.  In the first half of the race Bey was out walking Nixon by a long shot.  He was walking about 3.5-4 mph and Nixon kept jogging.  Jeremy was prepared to run a lot of the trail on foot as Nixon is just 5 and it was his first 50.  This race is all up or down.  By the end of the day Jeremy would run 25+ miles.

Nixon and Bey did a great job and ate really well at the first vet check, 22 miles in.  It was uneventful to lunch where they ate well again. 

When we left lunch it was great, all of the sudden Nixon knew what his job was and his relaxed easy manner turned into a determined focused forwardness.  He was out walking Bey from then on.  Bey hadn't slowed his pace any, but Nixon sure had increased his.  It was as if he now knew what he was out here to do.  Pretty neat horse, very cool.

When we reached the last vet check at 40+ miles Bey thought he was going to starve to death.  I had to let him eat before vetting or he would have drug me to food while trying to be examined.  After a full bucket of mash he finally lifted his head and we vetted.  Both horses looked great and had good heart rates.

The finish line was a nice site.  It turns out that the trail was so challenging and there were a couple of pulls, that by going so conservative we ended up coming in 3rd and 4th.  There were 19 starters and 14 finishers.

Bey and Nixon both had a 52/48 CRI.  We were happy.  I decided to show Bey for BC even though he was over an hour behind the winner.  I am glad I did as he got High Vet score!  It was a great day over all. 

It is now Sunday and Jeremy is pretty darn sore.  Well I hope you all had at least half as much fun as we did this weekend.  I think our next race will be the next Shine & Shine at Grant Ranch.  We will hopefully both be doing the FEI 75.
Heather

Finally another blog... Hurray!  We drove down to the 20 Mule Team ride on Thursday.  We had A Kutt Above for Jeremy to ride on the 100 & Kingley Bey for myself to do the 65 on.  We also had Carole Kraft Edward's new horse Kings Gold aka Elvis with us.  They would be doing the 35. (Both Kingley and Elvis were horses that Jeremy and I fell in love with last summer while we were riding at Jan and Grace's during our WEG preparations.)

The drive was uneventful.  We arrived at the ride around 2 pm and set up our camp.  We had decided to rent paddocks with stalls as the weather was supposed to get pretty bad.    After getting everything all set we went out for dinner with our friends the Donleys.  We went to our usual spot in town with them.  We must eat there more frequently than I realized as the hostess actually recognized me and knew that I would need a sushi menu! 

After dinner we decided that we would go and buy a beanie and some goggles as the wind was SO fierce.  Jeremy's eyes are really sensitive to the wind since he had corrective eye surgery. 

When we got back to camp we went and hung out with Dennis Summers in his RV for a while and then headed to bed. 

Friday morning we went to town with Dennis and bought some grass hay from the local feed store.  The wind was crazy while we were there.  After running a few errands we went back to camp.  We packed our crew bags and then waited for Carole and Megan Robinson to get to arrive.  When they arrived we went for a pre-ride then played a few hands of cards.  It was nice in the trailer out of the wind.

Carole, Megan, Jeremy and I went to Casey's BB-Q with our friends Nicole Chappel and her friend Minnelle.  My advice is don't go to Casey's.  We got back to camp just in time for the ride meeting. 

All night as we slept the weather was really crazy.  I think it blew, sleeted, rained and snowed all through the night, again I was glad to have the stalls for the horses.

Jeremy started the 100 at 6 am.  Megan and I saddled up as did Carole, in case Elvis got anxious after we all left.  As Megan and I were warming up at the starting line Kingley spotted a mule.  He locked on and became fixated on it instantly.  He made a bee line over to it and marched up and put his face right in the mules face.  They sniffed noses and then Kingley wanted to follow it around.  It was too funny, maybe he had a mule friend from the past, who knows.

Kingley was really great.  He is so calm and relaxed to ride.  He is getting better with his fear of people.  I actually thought that I could ride up to the out timer at vet check one to hand my card off...WRONG.  After running sideways I dismounted and handed off my card.  He is improving and probably by summer I will be able to do this easy task.

The weather on ride day was really perfect.  It had been horrible all night but it was clear in the morning and the rest of Saturday.  Nothing fell from the sky on us and there was no wind, as we rode over the mountains the snow was beautiful.  It was still cold enough that the plants had snow stuck to them and it was reflecting in the sunlight.

Kingley was in the lead all day with Ann's horse Envy.  When we left the last vet check I decided to ask him to move on.  He did an easy canter pretty much the whole way in.  He looked really great at the end and bright eyed. He won by a few minutes.

As I walked back to camp Jeremy and Dennis were on their way out onto their last loop.  Kutt looked great.

 I got my completion vetting, out of the way and then cleaned Kingley up for BC.  He looked great for BC and was really fresh looking.  After BC I mudded and wrapped him and then hit the showers. 

Megan came in 7th on Kongo and they had, had a fun time.

Carole had ridden with the Donley's and they were all in the lead group on the 35.  (My Mamselle is doing great with the Donley's, they say she gets better and better.)  All of their horses could have done more miles and they had a nice training ride from it.

I was told Jeremy would be at the finish any time, I think the radio guys got confused as to where Jeremy was because I hustled out to the finish line and then waited for well over an hour.  Dennis and Jeremy arrived together and had decided to tie as they had helped each other with various things back and forth throughout the ride.  Kutt looked great.

After getting his completion we got him ready for BC as well. After BC and getting Kutt taken care of we went to town with Dennis to get a hot meal.  The day had been a big success for all.

Sunday morning were the awards as well as breakfast cooked by the multi-talented Rene Baylor, who was also the ride photographer.  Kingley won BC and high Vet Score.  Kutt lost BC by 3.5 point to the 5th place horse Maximum Heat.  Darn.   Melissa and Robert did another great job of putting on a really nice, fun race.

Ssamiam has been doing great in the UAE.  His new name is One-0-Six (that was his number at the WEG)  He has done a 50 that he averaged around 22 KPH and he was 4th.  He also just won the Qatar International Cup 75 and averaged around 26KPH (16+ MPH!!).  He had to sprint for the win, that is the beauty of an ex-racehorse!

Cal Flaming Emit, aka Gem will be joining the Belesemo Arabians herd as a broodmare.  We wish them all the best with her breeding career.

Jeremy and I finally got to use our new truck with the new trailer!  Hurray!!  We took two trucks and trailers actually.  On Thanksgiving we loaded up 6 horses and drove the 1:30 drive to the ride.  We arrived early afternoon.  It was simple to set up the camp.  We had one portable corral and 4 High Ties. 

We had with us: Kingley, Tiran, Stirgess, Fuego, Roof and Smitty.  Smitty was only here to train, no racing.

After we had set up camp Jeremy pre rode Fuego and Tiran and then took off with Smitty in the trailer for the beach for a long ride.  Tim and I vetted in all three horses for day one.  The day one team was Kingley with myself riding him, Tiran with Jeremy and Stirgess with Tim.  After vetting we got our food ready for the potluck.

The potluck was great, there were all of the usual side dishes plus a plate of amazing venison that Dom Freeman had prepared.  It was awesome, with chestnuts and all.  I made Jeremy a plate as he was still at the beach.

On Friday morning we got up bright and early as the start time was 6:30 for all 3 days.  The temp was 28, for us out here in CA that is practically sub-Arctic status!

Tim and I rode together while Jeremy went ahead.  We later learned that Tiran was a little off and would not be finishing the course that day. 

Before lunch Tim and I were riding when all of the sudden  we came upon Judy Reens who had come off of her horse.  Cassandra DiMaggio, Tim and myself stayed with Judy until the emergency vehicles arrived.  It was later announced that she had broken her femur and had head trauma and was in critical condition.  At this moment in time she has had surgery on her leg and is no longer in critical condition.

After lunch we had an uneventful ride in.  Cassandra rode with us the rest of the day.  We had good conversation the whole ride.

Kingley is making great head way.  He is getting so much better with people on the ground and his fear is getting less and less.  He gave me a little trouble on day one with the electrolytes but by day two he was willing to let me do it without much of a fuss.  He also feels good around the vets now and always gets a comment or two on how low his heart rates are.  Kingley and Stirgess finished day one.

That night we went to dinner with Roxi, Cody and Megan Robinson.  It was fun having good company.

On Saturday we saddled up and it was calling for rain.  We all dressed accordingly.  Jeremy was now riding Fuego on the two day FEI 2*.  I was still on Kingley and was doing his FEI 1* and Tim was still on Stirgess.

Early in the ride a rider made a snide comment "Wow, you're really prepared for the rain".  That rider was not wearing rain gear.  Guess who was smiling when the sky opened up?  I wish I could have seen that rider then.

All three horses finished.  It was crummy weather but we were dressed for it so it didn't matter.  The trail did get a bit slick though and that slowed us down.

Kingley now has his 1* and can do an FEI 75 next. Woohoo!

Our friend Megan Robinson had ridden her horse, Kongo on Saturday as well.  She was going home after the ride so she took Tiran back for us.

I decided that Kingley had done enough so I was not going to ride on Sunday but Tim wanted to bow out as he has not been training and his body was feeling it. 

Sunday morning Tim loaded up the corrals, Smitty and Kingley in the second trailer and headed home.

Jeremy saddled up Fuego, I rode Stirgess and our friend Melody Blittersdorf was visiting from VT and she rode Roof.

The three of us were really taking it easy!  It was funny to have three riders that were in the top ten in the USA for WEG hopefuls, riding in the very back of the race.  In fact a friend of ours, Dave Rabe kept reminding me each day when I finished "another 50 that took you longer than the WEG 100!"  It is so funny, but true, to look at it like that.

At lunch Stirgess was at 40 for his heart rate.  I thought that was low until I heard that Roof was 32!  These 5 year olds are pretty cool.

Stirgess was a bit off so we stopped there.  Roof and Fuego went on.

Jeff, Melody's husband, was a great help.  He had camp pretty much clean by the time I had pulled and continued to keep it clean after the horses went through lunch.

Jeff and the rest of Melody's family and I waited for Jeremy and Mel to finish.  The ride was harder than the ride manager wanted it to be.  There had been some trail sabotage and when the ride help went to fix it it wasn't correct and had the ride going in reverse so all of the long hills we were now going up instead of down.  Oh well. 

Both horses finished and looked good.  Fuego now has his 2* and can do an FEI 100!  After the ride we let the horses rest and then headed home.  It was a long weekend with that many horses!  Did I mention that Jeremy rode Smitty each day after riding in the race?  He was using it as conditioning as the footing is sandy and nice down at the ride.

In all we had 9 starts for our horses and 7 finishes, not bad but not perfect.  At least we got the two FEI completions. (Kingley even won his FEI ride.) That was most important to us this weekend. 

It will be a while until the next race.  We are going to spend New Years in Austin TX visiting Holly, my sister.  Happy Holidays!
Heather

We drove to the ride on Friday.  It rained a vast majority of the drive.  The ride is up in the mountains with a lot of evergreens and large meadows with streams running through them.  The cool part is that even though you have the mountain atmosphere the trail was very flat.

It rained very little once were in in camp on Friday, it was more just spitting from time to time.  We unloaded the three horses and got camp set up.

Jeremy would ride A Kutt Above on the FEI 100, I was riding Kingley Bay on his first 50 (Kingley is very skeptical and frightened of new humans) and our friend Carol Edwards would arrive later to ride Strut with me on the 50.

After vetting in we went for a pre ride with our friend and client Terri Rashid who was riding her mare Keen Sweep.  Carol hadn't arrived yet so I rode Kingley with Terri and Jeremy and then rode for a second time solo on Strut.

Friday was pretty peaceful and relaxing.  Carol arrived around 5 and then we went to the ride meeting.  Cassandra and Centella, the ride managers did a great job I have to say.  Cassandra is so dedicated that she was out marking trail until 1 AM on Thursday!

Saturday morning the 100 started at 7 AM so that there would be a little light.  It was actually still dark for a little while.  The 50 went out at 7:30.  I was wearing my full length rain coat and carefully mounted Kingley knowing he may not like it.  I made it onto his back but my right foot hadn't made it into the stirrup yet, he froze and curved his body slightly to the right and as he was trying to decide if he should be really scared or not a person came around the corner with a headlamp on.  That was it, he jumped and spun and I came off.  I still had my foot in the left stirrup so it was like a forced dismount.  I landed on my feet, sort of but the force had me falling down on my side immediately following.  Kingley stood there and stared at me.  He let me walk right up to him and get right back on.  After that he was totally fine.  He was really good at the start actually.

Carol and I had a lot of fun.  The trail was beautiful.  Strut and Kingley did their jobs and trotted down the trail.  When we were headed out on the second loop (loop one on the 100 was 25 miles, loop two was also 25) we saw the leader on the 100, Roxy riding Autumn coming into camp.  Shortly after that we saw Terri, Becky Hart and Jeremy.  They had all done  50 miles while we had done 20 (the first loop on the 50 was only 20), granted they started 30 min sooner but still.

On the second loop around 30 miles into the ride Strut all of the sudden was not sound.  We walked a bit and then checked him again and he was still not sound.  We couldn't see any obvious reason for it.  Right when we were trying to decide what to do we reached the out check point and a trailer pulled up.  It was random and magical all at the same time.  We put Strut in the trailer and saved it for another day.  This of course made Kingley sad as he was on his first 50 and was now alone.  He neighed a few times.  I have never heard his voice, he has a deep voice.  Entertaining.

We got into camp after the second loop and Kingley ate well.  Kutt was leaving shortly after we arrived.  Kingley thought he was done for sure as he has only done LD's before this.  I saddled him up for our final 5 mile loop.  He was happy to go.  He is a very cheerful horse.  He was a little tired but very happy and willing.  We went really easy all day and he finished happy and sound.  We completed around 4:30.

I took care of Kingley and got Kutt's stuff ready for him.  Jeremy got in right when I had finished what I needed to do with Kingley and Strut.

Roxy and Autumn pulled at the 85 mile mark.  Becky pulled at the 75 mile mark. Now Terri and Jeremy were the two left in the lead group.  Both Kutt and Keen looked good.  They had a 5 mile loop and then a 10 to the finish.  Jeremy and Terri rode the rest of the way together.  They decided that Kutt could have gone faster so he would come in first and Keen would be second.  Both horses came in to camp at 7 pm, they had done the course in 8:45.  It was Kutt's first 100 and Keen's second.  Great horses.

BC was an hour after completion.  Keen and Kutt were moving freely and trotted with good impulsion.  You could be proud of both for their great rides. 

After the ride we were talking with Roxy about Autumn.  A little background: Autumn is Master Motion's full sister.  Master Motion, aka Split was the horse that I won and BC'd at Tevis.  He was the 5th horse in 50 years to win both cups in a single year.  Autumn is also 3/4 sister to Crystals Charm, aka Red.  Red is the horse that I did a lot of winning on, including a Gold Medal at the 2001 Pan Am's with BC.

So we have been talking to Roxy about breeding Autumn at some point as she is the last of the line so to speak.  Roxy has been riding Autumn so she wasn't sure when we might be able to breed her.  After the race I half way jokingly reminded her that she could put her in our trailer and we would take her to breed her.  Roxy thought about it and this time, said we could take her to breed her.  I am super happy about it.   I am thankful to Roxy and Cody for the opportunity.

On Sunday we went to the awards.  The caterer's did a great job and made us a wonderful breakfast.  Kutt got BC and Jeremy got the award for failed costume.  He had a glowing mask that he was going to wear as he finished but it totally fell apart, he also had glowing gloves.  Cassandra won best costume, she was a purple haired goblin .  At one point in the day Mike Foss had on a button down shirt, an American tie and an Obama mask on.  It was funny.

In all it was a great ride that was really well managed.  The scenery was wonderful and the trail was well marked with plenty of water.  Mark it on your calendar for next July 30th.  The date is moving up and it should be spectacular that time of year. For those of you who wimped out due to weather you should have been there.

Heather

Jeremy and I just returned from a fun weekend down in Inyokern.  Callie and Daniel put on another great ride.  Jeremy rode his 3/4, younger brother to Smitty, Stirgess.  I rode Stratagem.

The weather was really hot, as in 90's.  I clipped both horses on Friday afternoon after we arrived.  When we were all done getting set for the ride we went to dinner with our friends, the Donley's.  It was a lot of fun to see them and catch up.  As usual we went to Tokyo House, that is one of the best places in Ridgecrest.

We all got back to camp just in time for the ride meeting.  At the end of the meeting there was usual representative from the BLM that did the Tortoise talk.

Saturday it was very hot.  Strut and Stirgess did a steady pace and tied for 5th.  Stirgess got high vet score. Christoph won and Diane Woodard was 2nd and got BC.  Karen and JJ Donley were 3rd and 4th.  After the race JJ, Jeremy, the dogs and I went to a spring and Jeremy and the dogs swam.  JJ and I were too cold because all of the sudden the clouds were there and there was a breeze.  After the dip we stopped at the one gas station and bought ice and ice cream.

Dinner that night was excellent.  The ride made wonderful BB-Q Tri-Tip with all of the fixings.  It was delicious.  There is also a trophy for this ride each day to honor a true Bill Thorburgh spirit of family riding.  On day one JJ and his family won the honor.

On Sunday, we again rode at a very steady pace. We tied for 4th this time.  Christoph and Diane rode fresh horses and tied for 1st.  Christoph took BC this time.  Stirgess had high vet score again.  It was really hot all day, but it was slightly cooler than Saturday.  Right after the ride there was some thunder and lightening with a quick burst of cold rain.

I took care of the horses while Jeremy went to the crew area to gather our stuff.  We stayed for dinner and awards.  Dinner was great again.  After the awards we got on the road.  It was going to be a long night, we would get home around 1 am.

In all it was a great time.  You should mark it down on your calendar if you need something to do next year at that time.

Heather

Well I am about one week late on posting this.  When we returned from KY we arrived at our barn at 7 am on Friday the 1st.  After driving for way too long we got out of the truck and Jeremy decided to do our horse's feet for the race that was happening the next day.

We went home and took a nap and then went to Calero to vet our horses in for the 50.  I vetted in Tin Roof and Jeremy was to ride Stirgess and the final 5 year old for our 5 year old trio was Kongo with Megan Robinson aboard.  Lori Olson was on Strut.

The next morning we woke up and I didn't know where I was or why I had to wake up so early.  Then I realized that I was in my own bed and that we were going to do a local 50.

We went to the ranch and picked up the horses and then drove the 5 minutes over to the ride.

The ride was very surreal.  It turns out that there was a crazy amount of ground bees and everyone was having a really bad time because of them  Many people fell off that day and a few were badly hurt.  I wont go into other people's misfortunes but it was a mess.

At the end of the day the race was rerouted and we made it.  All three 5 year olds had another great outing and had little mishap with the bees.

Hopefully the next time this ride happens it goes better for everyone that had a bad ride this time.

Heather

I am currently in New Mexico.  Yesterday we were going up a hill and lost power and then Jeremy saw something smoking from behind us.  Our trailer bearing melted and then melted the brakes on the rear right.  After calling US rider and figuring out the details we unloaded the horses on the highway and Jeremy started to take the wheel off when we realized that Smitty was choking.

Smitty probably had been choking for a while as Sam had green slimy spit on his side that was nearest to Smitty.  We gave Smitty some water and he was able to drink a bit but he was still not right.  After some magnesium being syringed to him and not letting him eat he came around.

Jeremy went back to removing the tire and then we limped our three tired trailer to the town behind us.  They had all of the parts except for one, of course!  The part was ordered and would be there in the morning.

We got directions to an arena on the edge of town.  We unloaded the boys and as we were getting settled it became clear that Wednesday nights in Santa Rosa NM were the team roping night at this arena.

There were only about 6 riders.  They loaded the steers into the shoots and chased them down.  Jeremy decided to saddle up Kingley and play around a bit.  Kingley was great.  He ran out of the shoot and chased the steer that weren't going to be roped.  Kingley was fast to chase them down, he would even snake his head down at them.  Jeremy and I also rode one of the cowboys quarter horses, good times.

We are off to get the repair done and hit the road. 

PS Sam looks great!!

Heather