Warner Springs Endurance Ride (Redo)

Monday January 20 2011

The Warner Springs endurance ride took place in the oak forests in the rolling foothills of Palomar Mountain in southern California. The bonus of the ride was the swimming pool-sized hot springs. Ahhhhhh......

Here are some photos from the ride:

That photo up top is Vicky and her mustang Lakota - I have a thing for mustangs, and I love this horse!





















The winner of the 25 miler, and Best Condition, on her Thoroughbred ex-racehorse.




















Many more photos on endurance.net:
http://www.endurance.net/international/USA/2011WarnerSprings/index.html

'Toons: Resolution Endurance Ride

Thursday January 6 2010

Resolution Ride Day 3 - A Golden Day

Wednesday January 5 2011

It was so cold this morning, that the water tank that Steve hauled all the way to the top of the climb on loop 1 was frozen. Fortunately there was a large puddle of ice - thick ice that took some serious beating to break apart - that yielded enough water for some of the 38 horses on the 55 miler to drink from. It was chilly, but the sun burned golden and bright for the third and last day of the Resolution Ride.


Dennis Summers and "Lola" (OMR Tsunami) were the first up the hill, Dennis running on foot leading her. Dennis is a runner, having done marathons and Ride N Ties. For those people thinking that hot horses shouldn't drink copious amounts of ice water, Lola proved that theory wrong. She tanked up in big gulps before Dennis ran on with her, up and over and down the next hill before hopping on her to trot on down the trail back toward camp.


Christoph Schork on DWA Powerball, and his gang of three were close on Dennis and Lola's heels, with Dana Weary and Maximum Heat next.


Bringing up the rear at the top of the canyon was Kandace French and her lovely blond Tennessee Walker, Duke of Shadow Canyon. It was only their fourth endurance ride - their third being yesterday - and after finishing this one today and having a great time, you'll surely see more of them on the endurance trails.


Laura Hayes, who flew in from New York, finally got to ride today. Somewhat coincidentally, she got to ride a Rushcreek horse owned by Jim and Cindy Brown. She is somewhat obsessed with them, having ridden many of them (including Rushcreek Nerf to a Tevis finish last year), owning several of them, and having visited Rushcreek Ranch in Nebraska many times. You know how a mother will pull out a wallet with dozens of photos of her child for you to see? Laura will open up her computer with folders and folders of eye-candy-Rushcreek horses from Rushcreek Arabians for you to look at.

This Rushcreek Thor happened to be one that Laura had bought 6 raffle tickets on, to try to win him at last year's AERC National Championship raffle. Jim and Cindy Brown won him, and Laura was the one who happened to drive him to the Browns. Today she and Thor finished his second 50 mile ride.


Bruce Burhham of Manti, Utah finished his third day in a row on "Hotsie". Accompanying him on days 1 and 2 was a neighbor Sierra Cox on her first endurance rides on Bruce's horse "Libby." Sierra had been invited here by another Utah rider who'd backed out at the last minute, so Bruce offered her one of his horses. "Sierra grew up on horses, ran barrels, worked on a dude ranch, she breaks horses. I asked her, 'How'd you like to come and sit on a horse for 50 miles?' and she sat on one for 100 miles. Now she's hooked!"

"I'll be back!" Sierra said.


Dennis Summers and Lola won the 55 again today. When I asked Sue Summers about the mare's breeding, she said "Do you want my story, or Dennis'? Dennis says she's 3/4 Arabian and 1/4 Thoroughbred, but she's 3/4 Arabian and 1/4 Appaloosa, but Dennis won't fess up to the Appy." Lola was a little too much for her previous owners when Dennis and Sue got her as an unbroke 4-year-old four years ago, but she's turned into "a nice little horse." This was her fourth win in a row, and she also got Best Condition, her third one in her last four races.

All 20 riders finished the 25 miler, with Aileen Baca winning the 25, and her husband Leonard finishing second. All but two horses finished the 55.


Four horses and riders finished all 155 miles of the endurance ride, with Bruce Burnham winning the overall 3-day, and Jennifer Redmon winning overall Best Condition with her 8-year-old Appaloosa Chelsea Costar.

And so concluded the first 3-day Resolution Ride in sunny, hot chilly Arizona. There was plenty of weather to choose from, the trails were in excellent condition, the Sonoran desert scenery unique and spectacular - it was a great way to welcome in the New Year.



Many more photos can be seen here!
http://www.endurance.net/international/USA/2010ResolutionRide/index.html

Resolution Ride Day 2 - A Cool Day

Sunday January 2 2011

In the early morning, long before you can see any horses and riders, from far across the desert comes the sound of cantering hooves. You can hear this when the wind isn't gusting to 30 mph like the day before, and your teeth aren't chattering loud enough to drown the wind out, while waiting to direct 40 riders in the 50 miler at crossroads.

Ice half an inch thick coated water buckets in camp and water puddles on the trails, ("what is up with this weather!?"), and didn't start to thaw until 10 AM, but the absence of wind made for great conditions for the horses. Some riders were stripped down to 2 layers for their last loop - while I kept three and four on all day, even in the sunshine.


Head vet Stacey Sickler - a vet who plays polo and sews completely severed tendons back together, (resulting in Kevin Myers' horse Far acheiving a (so far) 4-season, 1700+ miles, 29 for 29 record, including Tevis and four other hundreds) - still hadn't quite thawed out from the Friday vet-in's rain, but she kept her hands wrapped around a cup of Starbucks coffee, and she kept a great sense of humor all weekend.


A fast group of 6 horses and riders stuck together through the first 20 miles of loop 1, but it was Sue Summers and Tani Bates who eventually pulled away to win the 50 miler by 13 minutes. "We had to work at it!" Sue said. Tani rode the Summers' 19-year-old "Rosie", (SHA Ebony Rose), an 11-season, 2600-mile horse, one with 17 (!!) best conditions in her 44-start career. Tani and her husband Mark had flown down from Washington. Tani had two other local horses lined up to ride, but because one horse (owned by Clydea Hastie) met a gate he didn't like, and the other horse (owned by Carol Giles) met a cactus he didn't like, Rosie was Tani's only ride over the weekend, but an exciting one it turned out to be.

Sue rode Mags Motivator, a 9-season, 1800+ mile horse, who's finished 31 of his 33 starts, including 8 of 8 100-milers, with 7 first places and 3 Best Conditions.

You couldn't do much better being a Summers endurance horse - the Summers have had some outstanding ones throughout their long-mileage careers (14,000 miles for Dennis, 15,000 for Sue). They do prefer riding fast, but they race the horses sparingly - hence the many years of competition and number of top ten finishes that many of their horses consistently produce. The Summers currently have about half a dozen retired 20+-year-old horses at their home, living the good life.


Pat Murray was another who came from the Pacific Northwest to ride. She rode Clydea Hastie's horse Frozen Assets - a Tevis finisher last year. Clydea and Ashquar's Dream (who finished the Big Horn 100 in 5th in 2010) finished 10th and Pat and Frozen Assets finished 11th. Both ladies sat out the wicked weather on day 1 - not because they are wimps (9600-mile and 12,800-mile riders like Clydea and Pat are not wimps), but because they didn't feel like riding in the wicked weather.

12 of 13 riders finished the 25, with Lawrence Serrano winning on his 12-year-old Thoroughbred Tess. The 6th place finisher was Peter Hommertzheim. Peter (of the healing broken bones) was in some kind of agony after yesterday's finish in the 50, but he still got on his mule Big Kate and rode and finished the 25 today.



Many, many more photos can be seen here!
http://www.endurance.net/international/USA/2010ResolutionRide/index.html

Resolution Ride Day 1 - What the Hail!

Thursday December 30 2010

It's not for the faint of heart, this endurance riding. When night comes and you're wet and chilled to the bone after vetting in your horse in the chilly down-pouring rain, and in the dead of night the spitting rain lashes your windows and the hurricane wind shakes the horse trailer you're sleeping in, your horse's tail is clamped to his butt and he shivers under his wet blankets, you entertain the thought... "I don't have to ride in the morning if I don't want to..."


But, when you get up in the dark morning, and it's just finger-freezing cold and the desert rain has abated to icy showers, and the howling wind has diminished to occasional tail-raising gusts, and the storm clouds hang low but hold back... you reason the weather's improved 100% and you're saddling up to hit the trail.


Mother Nature threw every kind of weather she had at the 42 riders (half of what had signed up before the ride) on Day 1. Rain! Wind! Hail! Snow! Sleet! Snowballs! Gusts! It kept all riders guessing all day, though every redesign still required multiple layers of clothing. Ride manager Rusty was somewhat aghast at the snowballs falling on his ride in the desert, when it was 75 degrees just a few days ago. In the late afternoon, just after he'd mentioned that he could see more blue sky, and that the waves of clouds weren't quite as dark, and the snow balls weren't quite as big last time, it snowballed so hard and heavily that you couldn't see across basecamp and the ground was briefly saturated in white.



Dennis Summers on OMR Tsunami set the pace on the 50 and finished in front just over 4 hours of ride time later. Not surprising. It's Tsunami's 8th win in 23 starts. It's Dennis and Sue Summers' first Arizona winter in their new house down the road. Sue rode her half Arabian, half American Bashkir Curly horse AM Humvee to fifth place. Humvee has over 3000 miles and has only 2 pulls in 52 starts over 11 seasons (he's 8 for 8 in hundred milers).


Christoph Schork and DWA Powerball finished second, and his partner Dian Woodward and HL Vanhelsing finished third and got Best Condition. Dian and Christoph came to Arizona to escape the Utah winter. Dian didn't think she'd need her winter riding tights and rain pants, so she didn't bring them. "It's Phoenix for crying out loud!" It was only Vanhelsing's fifth ride


Sandra Fretelliere flew down from New York (also expecting hot weather) and rode ride manager Rusty's horse Ripper. Ripper dumped Sandra on Wednesday and ran home without her. Today he tried a few "nasty spooks", and some near bucks when her riding partner Bill's jacket started flapping in the hefty breeze, and he had a brief runaway session when Bill's horse Cheymas bolted off on a run. The hail was a bit challenging too... but they stuck together and finished 6th.


Peter Hommertzheim - riding his big mule Big Kate - should have gotten the Resolution Tough Sucker award. He was riding with a healing torn rotator cuff and torn breastbone cartilage, and broken ribs from an accident 6 weeks ago. Not to mention he was riding in shorts (Rusty said "He's the Dave Rabe of Colorado!")

27 of 30 starters finished the 50 miler, and 10 of 12 starters finished the 25 miler, with Ron Bowers winning the 25.

Nothing but clear skies in the forecast for days 2 and 3, just what you expect for an Arizona winter. Except for the minor details of fleece and down riding gear.



(Lots more photos at http://www.endurance.net/international/USA/2010ResolutionRide/index.html )

A Soup Kinda Day

Wednesday December 29 2010

Red skies at morning...

The predicted rain began around noon. Hesitantly at first, then casually, then boldly. A desert winter rain: steady, persistent, protracted (some might say: interminable). A gray, heavy, wet, soupy day. A good one to sit around the fire curled up around a hot cup of coffee and a hot bowl of soup.


Into the evening, little puddles became little lakes; little trickles became little streams down the washes and roads. Soggy horses, and a few stunned people who expected the sunny warm skies ("It's Phoenix for crying out loud!") and didn't bring rain gear or winter tights. Some people from New York and the Northwest and Utah thought they'd escape the snow and rain for the warm and dry Southwest.


But plenty of smiles and large doses of humor lit the faces of the 40-some intrepid endurance riders vetting their horses in, that didn't cancel (down from 90-some pre-entries), and who planned to mount their horses at 7:30 tomorrow morning for Day 1 of the Resolution Endurance Ride.


Ride manager Rusty roamed base camp with his hands wrapped around a cup of hot chocolate and a laugh on his lips. Trails are marked, everything is ready, and there's nothing to be done about the weather but saddle up and ride!