2025 Old Selam Part III: Willie the Rocket Ship

August 31 2025 

So I trotted out for the vet Dick in the morning, and he said Willie looked fine. So, off Willie and I went on the day two 25-mile LD ride.

I had the plan of just ambling along on a pleasant trail ride LD for the day, because, you know, Willie ought to be a little tired from yesterday, right? 

And it started out that way. There were around 22 riders, and Willie was calm while we warmed up walking around camp. I always look for a little pocket where I might get a little Bubble, usually up near the front, not behind the fastest riders, but not where I’ll be tailed/chased closely by other riders.

And as the trail was announced open, three or four riders started walking out, which I thought was great. We fell in behind them, and walked out, and then they started trotting, but suddenly the front ones balked, and we got bunched up, and after they got going, they took off like a shot, and unfortunately, so did we. 

Oh heck no Willie was not tired. Or relaxed. Those riders up front were blasting down the trail and I was blasting after them on a rocket ship. I tried to convince him just to slow down a bit already, working hard on not just pulling but using strong seat and leg and *suggesting* with my hands on the reins to slow down… but it became more of a pullfest.

He pulled and pulled and at some point you have to decide, you’re both wasting so much energy pulling on each other, is it just better to let Willie go fast and stay with the fast horses, because that’s just how things work out sometimes.

At least the weather was nice and cool, and Willie felt perfectly sound. 

I was able to drop him back for a while, with another horse following me, but my hands would start to go to sleep trying to hold Willie back. He’s not always like this, but today he certainly was. 

So as you’d expect, the first 15 mile loop flew by really fast. Willie finally caught up with and rode with three others, (another lady had left everybody in the dust far ahead). And finally the last 5 miles or so, our group slowed down a bit, even walked up some hills, which was nice. I didn’t want to pass anybody, but their horses really started slowing down, so at the last water trough, Willie just went on ahead, much calmer, and on a loose rein, back into camp. 

He pulsed down right away, and I checked the out timer sheet later, and hooray, we were going to have our own lovely little Bubble on loop 2! We were about 10 minutes behind the first horse, and there was about eight minutes to the next horses behind us.

So I put on his jaquima halter for the last 9 mile loop, and OMG we had the best ride, cruising easily and comfortably, not fast and not slow, trotting along the winding soft logging roads in the forest, the trails to ourselves. This is what I hoped the first loop would have been like, but that’s okay, because loop 2 was so awesome!

Willie ended up finishing second, and I never felt a single bad step, so I said we would show for best condition.

At his 10 minute CRI Willie was 44-44 !!!!! The vet Robert said, “*Clearly* you overrode this horse.” 🤣

(For those who don’t know, the vet takes a pulse, the horse trots out 20 yards or so and back, he waits a minute, and takes the second pulse. A pulse that jumps from, say, 56 to 70 shows the horse is a bit fatigued. A low pulse rate, particularly the second pulse, is awesome. Willie usually vets in before the ride at 40.)

But, OMG, when Willie trotted out, Robert said he saw a couple of odd steps again! Just slight and only a couple, not consistent. OMG! I had felt nothing again all day. 

But we still came back to do the BC showing an hour later with the vet Dick, a thorough exam and a trot-out, and Willie looked perfect!

When he finished his exam on Willie, Dick said, “I’m gonna tell you two things about your horse.” I thought, uh oh, what’s wrong! Tell me, I always want to learn. 

He said, “First of all, you still have a knot in his tail.” (oh yeah, I gotta get that out with some cowboy magic). “And second," Dick grinned, "I think he’s way too small for you.” My 16.2 or 17 hand horse. Lol!

And later in the evening at the awards, Willie not only got high vet score (!!!!) but Best Condition!!!!!  I love my Standardbred!!

I decided not to do an LD on day three, because I think there was something going on with this feet, possibly the pads that I squirted in when he had soft soles from two days of rain. We’d leave it on a great note. What a great weekend at Old Selam, still one of our most favorite rides!

Also, that rooster chicken was still hanging around ride camp, having dinner with everybody and planting himself front and center stage while a guy named Sam from the Idaho State Penitentiary - where the story of Old Selam the prison horse began in 1900 - told a mesmerizing story about Old Selam and the prison escapees he carried to freedom or almost-freedom, and while the ride awards were going on. 

A few people had tried to catch the rooster, and they got close, but they couldn’t quite get him. Someone said that if someone caught it, someone would take him home. You know how those “someone” rumors start. He’d obviously wandered away from some homes or been dumped there, and he looked quite at home around people and also must have been pretty adept at hiding in the forest.

 

Note The Raven on Willie's back, of course The Raven rode along with us this weekend. It's over 9000 miles for The Raven! 

and top photo by Steve Bradley! 

2025 Old Salem Part II: Cruising the 50 on Day One

August 30 2025

Hillie Willie and I would be riding Day 1's 50-miler with his BF (Best Frenemy) DWA Papillon. Pappy and Connie were entered in the AHA Arabian championship 50, so her goal was to top 10 in that division. She was going to let Pappy move out faster than he usually does, and Willie is long-strided enough and fit enough now that he he and Pappy should easily be able to cruise along together at that speed. It turned out to be Willie’s very comfortable moving-out pace.

Pappy got to lead because he gets really wound up if Willie trots beside him or too close behind him, and Pappy was really wound up at the start anyway because he thinks he’s a racehorse, which he never was, but he could’ve been, and he was out to conquer everybody in front of him. 

But after the first couple of miles, we ended up in this beautiful Bubble (nobody close in front or behind us) that lasted almost the entire first 25 mile loop. It was glorious. The day was glorious. The footing glorious. It was a cool morning, not smoky, the trails were perfect from Wednesday’s rains, and our horses ate up those two-track winding logging roads. We had a blast and got the 25-mile loop done in three hours.

Willie felt fabulous and strong the whole loop. But strangely, when we trotted out for Dick the vet, I thought I saw a slight bobble or two of his head as I glanced sideways, and Dick said there was something going on and he waved Joe the vet over to watch him trot out again. Oh dear! So I trotted Willie out again, and this time he was better, and Dick and Joe could not pinpoint what or where the "something" was, and it wasn’t consistent. Connie saw it, and she said she didn't know what that was. Never seen it before. Dick asked me to come back before we went out on the second loop and I said absolutely, I wouldn’t take my horse back out on a 25 mile loop if he was at all questionable. 

During the vet check I purposely didn’t try to find any stiff muscles, and I didn’t walk him around at all, just let him eat and rest and drink, because if there was anything going on, I wanted it to show up when I trotted him out again. When we went back for a trot out before we left on the second loop, Dick and the vet Robert watched him trot out, and said maybe they saw something and maybe not, but it was much much better, if it was even there at all. Dick said I could go out. I said I’d start out and if I felt anything I’d turn right around.

Well. I tried for 10 miles to find any kind of bad step or anything, and I couldn’t find one. So then I just quit worrying about it, and we had another great loop. We had a Bubble for a while, then lost it when four riders caught up with us and we played leapfrog for a while, and Pappy got all wound up again, and Willie got a bit wound up. I'd switched him to his jaquima halter for this loop, but he wasn’t uncontrollable, so that was good. We kept moving along at a good pace, and finally got a comfortable Bubble again ahead of the riders for the last part of the loop.

I still couldn't feel a single bad step, and Willie felt so strong and powerful. I am so amazed at this horse at how easily he just cruises along, and how he really seems to like it.

We finished that loop in 3 1/2 hours, and because there was a kerfuffle with trail markings, quite a few people ahead of us missed the correct trail unfortunately. We almost did, but we figured it out right away, fortunately. So that’s how we ended up in fifth and sixth places. And honestly, I couldn’t give a hoot about where I finish, I just want to complete my rides with a sound and healthy horse. In the end, nobody remembers where you finish, it doesn’t matter. The healthy sound horse matters.

I was holding my breath for the trot out, but Willie looked perfect. Another 50-mile finish for Hillbillie Willie. 

Go Standardbred!!!

So, during the ride when I thought my horse might end up lame, I thought, just let us get a completion on this ride, and we won’t do anymore this weekend. But on the second loop when my horse felt so strong, and didn’t take a single bad step, I thought we might do an LD on day two and/or day two and three. I would trot out for the vet in the morning and see if he could see anything. And of course if I started and felt anything at all, I'd just turn around back to camp.

Also, there was still that rooster chicken hanging around ridecamp. He made himself right at home front and center stage during the ride meeting and dinner.

**top photo by Steve Bradley** 
We let Pappy get a ways ahead of us before I let Willie go by Steve. He shifted to High Gear Pace to catch Pappy, so yeah that's his racing pace in the photo!

2025 Old Selam Part I: Before the Ride

Friday August 29 2025

I learned a lot!

Originally my lofty goal was to ride three days of 50s at Old Selam. This is one of my favorite rides ever, mostly along soft-footing old logging roads, gentle ups and downs with just a few climbs/downhills, ample water, and the lovely Boise National Forest, with the occasional wildlife sightings. More to come on that!

Willie was fit, from rides and from spending several weeks at the DWA Arabians spa in Bellevue with Helen, where I got to go up and ride him a couple times on some really good training rides. So he was ready. The question was me in the heat, and as the ride got closer, and the forecast showed it was going to get hotter each day, I decided to do a 50 on day one and then play the rest by ear. I just can’t handle the heat this year.

The three days of the ride would be Friday, Saturday and Sunday. We arrived on Wednesday. Wednesday afternoon ride manager Debbie asked me if I could go out with her and help mark a little bit of trail on foot that was left to mark on one of the loops (I'm always up for hiking and marking trail). 

We went out on the ATV and checked some things, but ran out of daylight, so Thursday morning we went back out. She dropped me off at a spot and I had about a 2-mile hike of marking trail, and then I would meet her back on the road.

I ambled along the lovely, cool forest, which smelled so great because we’d had a great downpour the day and night before. It was so misty riding on the ATV that my glasses stayed fogged up. I hiked along hanging ribbons, keeping my eyes out for moose, and while I was hiking along a creek thick with willows, I came around the corner and WHOA, there on the hillside was the biggest moose I have ever seen.

It wasn’t just huge, it was HYUGE, a big bull moose, up the hill about 40 yards away, and he turned to look at me. (Of course I'm on foot so it looked even bigger, but. it was HYUGE.) OMG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I needed the moose to leave because my trail went below him, and I couldn’t hike all the way back to where I started. but how the heck do you move a HYUGE bull moose?? 

So, I crept forward to behind a lodgepole pine that had a trunk about a foot wide, and I started yelling and whistling at Mr. Moose. I hollered and I whistled myself blue in the face, and all he did was look my way and tried to zero in on me. I figured if he moved anywhere, he was going to move down to the trail and on into the willows. At least I *hoped* he would. 

But instead, he started moving towards me! OMG. My heart started thumping really hard. I made myself very very small behind this tree and I shut up. He knew something was behind the tree. 

And then he moved closer!!! OMG!!! I looked up this tree to see if I might be able to climb it if I had to, and believe me I could have if I had to. He moved even closer to within about 20 yards of me and I stopped breathing. And I prayed a couple of times. Keep moving to the creek. Keep moving to the creek.

I was trying to rack my brain as to what I knew about moose. I knew they hated dogs. I thought they didn’t like people, but I wasn’t sure. Later, Robert Ribley told me a scary story about nearly being attacked by a moose, and then Anne told me about a moose encounter she had where (long story) she suddenly found herself in front of a moose in her driveway, and she did the only thing that came to mind, which was to drop down and curl up and play dead like you do for a grizzly bear (turns out this instinct is a good choice). The moose actually came and sniffed her face while her eyes were watching its hooves before it wandered off.

I had an idea that moose couldn’t see very well, but that couldn’t stop him from getting irritated at whatever was spying on him from behind the tree. He crept a few feet closer, and I would inch around the tree trunk, trying to stay very skinny.

Finally, thank the Lord, he turned down to the creek and trotted on into the thick willows. I waited a little bit and got back to breathing normally, then I made a big wide swerve up the hill and around where he had been. OMG!!!!!!!!!

So then, Debbie picked me up on the ATV and we continued on with her driving and me hanging the ribbons, and we came to a creek crossing, which we drove into just fine and out of, but going up the other side was a short steep, super soft few lengths of sand. I saw that and said I’m skeered, and I jumped off! (I am afraid of ATVs if the road is not completely flat .) 

Debbie tried to gun it up, but the sand was too soft and the four wheeler just dug four deep holes. So we were stuck, and stuck good. But. Debbie was smart enough to have had a winch installed on that ATV, so I got to learn about winching an ATV! 

We tried one tree and then had to get a different angle and used another tree, and then had to move the winch hook to a third tree, but the winch was two inches too short, but Debbie had two belts for padding the tree and connected them together with a steel carabiner. I stayed far away in case something snapped and broke, but by golly Mighty Red the ATV got winched up that little hill with Deb nursing/steering it along and out of that sand and we hopped back on and kept on marking trail! I may never have to winch an ATV out of a spot again, but I know how now!

But we weren’t quite done with adventure. We had one more creek to cross, but it was more like a dammed up beaver pond, and with all the rain we had, the water was quite high, so it wasn’t even possible to lift your feet high enough and keep them dry because the ATV was like halfway under water, but Deb just gunned it, and Mighty Red swam and got through there, but coming out of the pond, OMG, the wheels grasped for traction in the mud, and there was a little hill, and the ATV did a wheelie, and I thought I was going to die, but before I could get too skeered and bail off we were out. Booya!!!! I hate ATVs but I love Mighty Red!

The rest of the day was pretty much boring, just the usual, vetting in my horse and getting ready for riding the next day!

Also, there was a semi tame rooster chicken hanging around ride camp central.