I rode a bunch of the last loop with the nicest young gentleman from California, Jeremy Procopio. In his early 20s, and is a farrier doing mostly composite shoes. He was so kind to me and anyone else he was riding with in the hours I observed him and an excellent horsemen who looked out for other people's horses too so long as it doesn't interfere with taking the best care of his own mount. It was good for this old fart to observe true endurance spirit in some young people.
Tuesday I was still recovering from the ride and the drive to and back from Shell. I am not feeling too bad physically, a bit of delayed stiffness from the ride and then the long drive is all and I'm managing to do some work on the computer. However I was in tired and crabby mode emotionally. I can't imagine the wreck I would be if Becca had not come along to crew for me. I have no experience doing 100s so I didn't have a list of what I needed, all I did was prepare baggies of mash for Tanza so only water had to be added. Becca, being an experienced endurance rider took care of having a cooler for Tanza, and having his mash and water ready; plus snacks and water for me and she took care of of his vet check ins, it was so wonderful. Towards evening I just had to share, so went and got Tanza's portrait out of the trailer so I could scan it and put it on FB.
When I started riding endurance 30 some years ago one of the first rides I went to one of the 50 miler entrants had a BH 100 top 10 blanket on her horse. So finishing this awesome adventure some day became one of my endurance goals. But I had sweet horses that were staying in MY pasture, but were not 100 mile athletes, just horses capable of finishing, not competing, in most 50s. As I aged I figured I just never would have a BH 100 mile horse as I was not going to become a horse collector or sell my sweeties chasing after a prospect. Then Sadie, who was supposed to be the racing background, good bloodlines for endurance horse turned out to have not great legs and I was not getting to ride as much low level LDs, or 50s as I wanted so I went shopping for a second horse on Craigslist.
None of the Colorado horses I was seeing intrigued me and I'm less than 100 miles from WY border so I started looking at those listings and there was Kenlyn Tanzaknight, just in Cheyenne. When I looked up his breeding and saw that he was out of Devosion as well as Kenlyn Awesome Knight I knew I really wanted him unless the test ride was a complete disaster. He had an allergy issue, unknown to me at the time, and I had to wait to try him and I told the owner I would pay her original CL price after she had dropped it in case I was in a bidding war and didn't know it. The test ride went well, Tnaza passed the pre-vet fine with the vet making a note about his temperament being a 7 or 8; I of course just went "DUH, he is an arabian."
The first year or so that I had Tanza I did have times of wondering if I should just try to find a high level rider that was interested in him because he was a Lot of power and while he was usually good, any spooks were a much bigger deal than on little Sadie, plus I felt like I was on a coiled spring most of the ride. But like him, I am a stubborn redhead and I really wanted to keep the good athlete and see if we could become a team.
Cindy Collins had agreed to manage the BH but for only 2 years through the 50th anniversary and Tanza would be 10 in 2020 so I decided that I needed to enter this year, because it was possible that no one else would take on the huge work of doing the ride and I didn't want to regret having missed at least taking a shot at this beautiful but tough ride. I mentioned my thinking to a few people and I think I inadvertently started the rumor that this was the last BigHorn that would be put on as I started hearing it was the last one from other folks this summer. Oops.
Then the COVID-19 bug and the way overblown response to it by the media and many state governors hit. I didn't try to go to Mt Carmel because it was quite limited and I figured it was already filled up with loyal XP riders. I was riding quite a bit with Mike and Jeanine Phillips and Becca Chisholm at Indian Creek so Tanza was getting good hill training at a good pace this spring and then Tenney bravely decided to put on the Spanish Peaks ride with 60 entrants and including a 75 mile distance in mid June. A 75 seemed like a perfect springboard before doing a tough 100 so with very little specific planning for it, but knowing that Tenney and her vets, volunteers and parents are super supportive to riders I entered that 75. Sue Basham and Dana Cernak, who had ridden a shorter distance that day jumped in and crewed for me at the final VC and then Jesse and Kelly and Cassy bailed me out when I had helmet light issues and they had wound up behind me instead of way in front as they would have normally been because of Jesse's horse galloping back to camp on loop 2 when something went wonky as Jesse was getting off to get a gate or I would have been lost in the dark but we made it, I could ride in the dark with no nausea or anything. So I bought a light just for my helmet and added velcro so it would stay on before BH and figured I was ready to go. Becca volunteered to crew for me so I knew I'd have great crew support without having had to write out detailed directions in advance. My sister had volunteered to crew also and came down to Shell from ND but she ended up being one of the trailers for pulled horses.
The ride itself: I had gotten into the habit of carrying hardly anything on me doing 50s, but for a 100 decided I needed to have some supplies. My old english saddle cantle bag will NOT go on my Synergist but I found some western saddle pommel bags we had worked fine and then I added the many pocket vest I used to wear with Cindy and Grey Moun when I was first doing endurance and I have gained enough heat tolerance working at home instead of the icebox office this year that I was ok with wearing the vest. We started off at about 4:10 and before long I was passing a few folks because Tanza was wanting to do a faster trot then their horses and I was certainly wanting to make fairly good time on the first stretch before we hit the big climb into the Big Horn mountains. He did not drink good right away at the 20 mile VC but after we had vetted through and I had given him some electrolytes I took him back to the water tanks and he did drink pretty good before we headed out on the loop. Tanza drank well at the creek shortly before the trail starts the big climb and then did his awesome power walk up most of the steep climbing on the rocky 2-tracks up the mountain.
When we hit the canyons we trotted the nice footing sections and walked where the fist sized rocks were thick. I knew that this was the slow stretch and there was mostly good footing the last few miles to the 2nd vet check and then the 20 miles to the 3rd vet check so no sense risking a stumble or hoof bruise trying to hurry through the rocks. Tanza dove into his mash at VC2 and I had some taco salad that Becca had made and brought. Then we were off down the road towards hwy 14. Tanza is blessed with awesome legs so I know I can take advantage of downhills and let him make decent time with a good trot pace and little stress on the heart and lungs when the trail is not too rocky. Off of Hunt road and up the big climb to the fence and gate to drop down to the highway 14 crossing. We made the 3 pm cut-off and then Holly Ulyate helped me keep focus by telling me I had to keep on pace, I had only made the cut-off by 10 minutes. She is so awesome at distilling essential info into a short statement.
The trail to Antelope Butte and then to the ranger station were nice this ride. I had remembered hitting some rocky climbing for maybe a mile out of Antelope Butte 4 years ago riding the 50, but we were on a newly cleared trail and it was quite nice. Tanza had good energy to the ranger station. I was worried he would think he was done at that point since it had been the finish for the 50s the year we did the BH 50, but someone was offering water and he had a good drink and then did his power walk where we were climbing up a single track trail and a couple of riders whose horses were walking a bit slower were very thoughtful and got off trail to let us around. When we hit VC3 my back was screaming at me and I was thinking "well if the horse is good I do want to see this lollypop loop section but maybe we won't do the leg down the mountain." I got some arnica on my back and some Desitin where I felt I was getting chafed and took some turmeric and ibuprofen, plus swapped out my LS shirt for a soft fuzzy sweatshirt and then felt chilly so added my fleece jacket. Tanza had pulsed at 57 at the check but then was trying to eat and was 68 when Becca went to vet him so it was a question if he needed to pull or the high pulse was just because he had been still grabbing grass. Multiple horses at this stop had hanging pulses. We took Tanza to Lyle 15 minutes later and he was 56/56 for pulse and CRI and good on everything else so I was off to see the new 'Shag Nasty' loop. I'm not sure how new this is but the original BH course had a section through an area that was named Shag Nasty on the map I guess.
So we were off on the loop. I ended up riding with some nice California riders including Jeremy P mentioned above and a Molly who is a super talented young rider who did 6 100s last year and 'rode quite a bit with Heather and Jeremy Reynolds last year.' I am amazed by the young prodigy riders with achievements like that and not even 18 yet. We got through the boulder field? or whatever they called it section of the ride before it got dark out which was nice. They had marked the trail super well, with duck tape arrows in a few places to direct the safe way around some of the huge boulders.
Got to VC4 and my back felt much better than at VC3, trailers could no longer get in farther than the ranger station so even if one was going to be OT might was well go the 14 miles back to base camp than the 8 miles back to the ranger station and we had enough time we should be back in time anyway and Tanza vetted through fine and was still eating like a pro. So I went off for the final leg, and found that my helmet light battery was used up. Oh well there was some moon and I lucked out and Jeremy's horse had been reluctant to pee which kept his pulse raised so he caught up to me and I had both light and an agile person to get gates and easily hop back on his horse. We caught up with Molly and her mentor and rode to the slick rock with them. I would very gladly skip the slick rock section if I ever do the ride in the future. Molly's horse went down on its side and we were all trying to be extra careful after that, but then Tanza hit a section and thought he could just slide down like a reining horse. Only his back feet went forward so fast he was sitting like a dog and I went off over his tail and onto my well padded rump. Tanza seemed fine, I led him quite a bit afterwards though and they went on ahead to make sure they finished in time. Eventually I got through the slick rock, had another rider catch up and I drafted on her headlamp to the finish and I believe she and I were the last 2 to finish in the 24 hours. With the new WDRA org I think all the folks that rode the distance but were just a bit OT will get WDRA credit for the ride. A very nice thing IMO. Tanza vetted through fine. After a few hours of sleep, when we got up Becca noticed he was acting like a back leg was hurting and I found he did have a nasty scrape on his hock. I put some arnica on it and later some triple antibiotic ointment and today it seems fine so I think it was luckily just skin and some stinging from air on the scrape was what Tanza was reacting to.
