Paul Sidio graciously decided to try and endurance event on the Katy trail at Sedalia Mo not far from Kansas City.  The Katy trail was a “rails to trails” project and promised a flat and fast event.

We had a very long haul to get there from Southern IL.  The event was well attended and pulled from Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas and Missouri.  It was a one day event. The 50 miler had over 20 riders and the Ld had over 50 riders.

As it was a one day event, I was not able to crew for Sandy. Unfortunately, the ride was an out and back, which meant that our vet stops would be away from camp.  Riding gaited horses is a challenge as our horses are so different from the standard Arabians that are used in endurance. It seems that every ride provides a new challenge and having to pack for an unsupported away from ridecamp vet check would just be another challenge. I would have two of those vet stops in the 50 miler with Blues.

As we got into the ridecamp late and had to get up very early to prepare and feed the horses, I did not get much sleep. I woke up tired and a little nervous. Blues is often a bundle of nerves even if he is not at an event. If you add 75 horses in a new place and Blues can be more than bit on edge. He warmed up just fine and I spent several minutes just trying to get his attention during warm up. His running walk was solid and his easy rack was spot on. I had started using both a Gps watch and a wireless heartrate monitor this season. Sandy also had a gps watch.

The ride had a controlled start, which I appreciated.  One mile into the ride the lead rider let us know “the trail was open” and the Arabians all around us broke into a trot at the same time. I do not know if Blues freaked out just because of that or if he read my nervousness or whether it was a combination of both of those things but his rack fell apart and he invented a new way of moving. Whatever it was, it was disjointed and rough. It was very rough.  I pulled him back and slowed him down. He reared. I immediately did a one reign stop and spun him around. We spun around a time or two and started out again.

We repeated this series of moves several times. We pulled off the course. We went back words on the course. He would not settle down. So, I did the only thing I knew to do. I turned him away from the race and the disappearing Arabians. I got off the horse and prayed for him. I also told him to get his mind right.  The drag rider was approaching us.

We were now in last place. Make that dead last place. We started in the running walk. I monitored his gait. It was perfect. I watched the heart rate monitor and the GPS and concentrated on the feeling of the gait. We went to the easy rack and skipped the foxtrot. It was 4 beat and smooth. After a few minutes, I asked Blues to “come up” and he hit 10 mph. At this speed, Blues heart rate is usually only about 105-110 beats per minute. Arabians started to appear on the horizon and we started by them while asking permission to pass on the left.

I had taken off his new sport boots when we stopped to pray as I wondered if they could be the problem.  When I got back up I tied the sport boots onto my english saddle. From 100 yards behind us I heard someone yelling. We stopped and turned around and went back up the course. One of the boots had fallen off. What else could happen?

I varied Blues speed from 10 to 12 miles an hour and watched his heart rate carefully. By mile 12, Blues had gone from last to first. I could not believe it. At mile 14 we came across a police officer on a very small gravel road that the trail intersected. As we were in the lead we were the first horse he had seen.  He hit his microphone to tell us to come on across the small gravel road. Unfortunately, the speaker was turned all the way up. It screached like an eagle on steroids. Blues jumped straight up in the air and did a 180 degree spin. I sat as deep as I could on my synthetic english saddle. I asked the officer not to repeat his greeting at that volume for the other riders.

We went into the first vet check on foot and in the lead.  Blues came down fine but I had to repeat the “trot out” several times. It seems the vet knew of gaited horses but had not seen one at an endurance event one  before.

The second and third place riders got started out of the vet check just before us but we caught them in the next mile. They slowed as we caught them and we went on and were back in the lead up to the 25 mile mark.  Blues, like all horses, likes company.  We settled in with the other top three  horses. It did not take long for them to start asking about Blues way of going. I showed them his rack and his foxtrot while they trotted. Then we all took canter breaks together.

At the 32 mile vet check I noticed Blues was not exactly himself. I talked to the vet about my concern.  He had come down acceptably but then his heart rate had gone up slightly. The vet suggested I hang around longer than required to make sure Blues was okay. I whole heartedly agreed to do just that.

With 18 miles to go, cold weather,wind and a very hard trail surface Blues and I both got lonely. I decided to pull off the trail after 9 miles and wait for the next Arabian. Blue buddied up to Chal Taleem ridden by Molly Wilson. I think we all four enjoyed and appreciated the company.  It is a challenge for a gaited horse to ride with a trotting horse. Blues could not match speeds perfectly with Taleem unless we were all cantering at the same time. His run walk was slower than the Arabian’s trot but Blue’s rack was faster than the trot. So, Blue’s used an in between gait I call a “cantellope.” Don’t bother googling it.

We crossed the line in a dead tie, which was fine with us. We tied for 5th and I was honored to ride with Molly and Taleem.

Unfortunately, Sandy was pulled for Lady’s heart rate at the 18 mark in the LD. Lady came down fine but then went up a bit when it was checked again. She had been in 4rth place at the time. I decided that she need her own on board heart rate monitor.

Paul did a great job at his ride. You should take into account the hard surface of the trail before attending.

Keith
Shawnee Sunrise Farm

I took one year from my first ride to my second ride. I received some interesting help and encouragement along the way. Truman Prevatt from Florida was a big help with advice. I received an interesting and gracious email from Julie Suhr the grand lady of endurance. She told me that she had started on a gaited horse but it just was not the right horse. She said she always knew that the right horse trained the right way would bring results. She encouraged me to be that person and not to give up.

I talked to my gaited riding buddies for a  full year. We live by the Shawnee National Forrest and it is the most wonderful place to ride and train. While on rides, I kept talking about how much fun it was to do endurance and how I knew all of them could do it on their horses.  Two of them took me up on the idea. Kelly Powell decided to try an Ld on his twh Buddy and much to my delight, my wife Sandy agreed to try an LD on one of her MFT mares Lady.

Lady came to us in a strange way. Sandy had a MFT gelding named Jubilation that was her first gaited horse and started to give her some problems. He would flop down in water without warning. Sandy decided that this was a bad habit she did not want to try and train through. A trainer from the deep south had told Sandy that friend of us wanted the horse and she should call him if Sandy ever decided to sell the horse. Sandy called him. The two MFT lovers drove 9 hours each way with two pregnant mares hoping Sandy would trade Jubilation. They used MFT to hunt squirrels with rifles from horseback.

Sandy traded for Country’s Shady Lady.  Lady was beautiful but out of shape. Her gaits were elephant walk, stumble and pace.  Sandy rode Lady until she got her in trail riding shape but we neither one knew how to solve the pace issue at that time. We turned to Rick Hayes of Creal Springs IL. He did a good job. Sandy took her a show in Kentucky and placed at her first time showing.

Sandy loved Lady and even took jumping lessons on her from a three day event.

I also got a new horse as a back up to Blues. This horse was a handful. His papered name was Rebel’s Master and he was a 16.1 TWH.  He had been allowed to get barn sour and mare sour. He had also been allowed to get extremely out of shape and over weight. He was ridden once or twice a year and all Rebel wanted to do was go back to the barn. He preferred the most direct route back and preferred to go back by himself.

I bought the horse as a 7 year old and started him over as a colt who had never seen a saddle. Like the training I used for marathoning and triathloning, I kept records of the number of rides and the mileage we trained. Rebel came to us a very out of shape horse in October of 06.

As I trained both Blues and Rebel for the 2007 Dead Dog Creak Ride in   Salem IL, Sandy started to get a vision for trying endurance on Lady. We had other gaited horses for her to use. She choose Lady simply because she loved her.  Sandy was very apprehensive about the event.  I took her and our entire gaited riding group to the course 2 weeks before and pre rode the course. Sandy was largely non committal. One other friend named Kelly Powell agreed to try endurance. Everyone else said “no thanks” but several of the women volunteered to crew. The announced they would crew for Sandy and cheer her on to victory. That would be victory over me by the way.

Blues rode the 50 on the first day of the ride and we had a good ride. He finished top ten.

We were warmly treated and received by management and vet staff. When I showed up with our horses for the pre ride vet in the vet greeted me with “You’re the one whose horses don’t trot!”

I talked with the vets and the ride management. Sandy had finally agreed to ride the 30 mile LD on the second ride day.  I asked them to help her in any way they could and if we were together at the end of the 2nd 15 mile loop to secretly help her finish in front of me if they could.  My plan was to ride near the front with Rebel on the first loop as I knew the course knew where you could get penned in behind other riders because of several narrow sections.

The ride started and I went towards the front. I had asked Sandy to put that mare’s nose on Rebel south end and follow me. Shortly into the race, I discovered she was not behind me. This saddened me as I very much wanted Sandy to have a good and safe time at her first ride. I prayed that she would be safe and I asked the Lord to care for her. I told him I knew he loved her more than I did, but that I was not waiting for her.

Two miles later I heard a noise to my left and looked up to see my little Sandy passing me on Lady.  She was giving me the  “Lance Armstrong look”. She was also giggling.  She was also laughing. She was doing this all at the same time. I almost fell off of Rebel with surprise and delight. She pulled in front of and we came to the first creek.  We were only 2 miles into the ride and their was no way our horses would drink after only 2 miles. Sandy came to the creek, gave a small heel to Lady who jumped the creek, hit the other side and they were both off in a clowd of dust.  Those english jumping lessons had worked.

I saw them at the vet check and they were fine. They were also ahead of us. We were both in the top 5. Her team of volunteer crew swarmed Lady with cold water, sponges and affection. I remembered what I had asked the ride management to do to help my wife and almost laughed out loud. Who was this woman?  You think you get to know your mate after 26 years of marriage.

We caught Sandy and Lady about a mile from the finish line. We pulled even as we crossed the line. Now the race was on to get our horses heart rates down. The day was warm.  Sandy’s crew worked together as a team. I had one cowboy friend to lend me a hand. All the vets and the ride management were helping Sandy and Lady. I wanted to tell them to forget what I had said, but could not bring myself to shout that out.

Rebel’s heart rate came down just before Lady’s heart rate. Sandy swears it was because everyone knows a grey horse cools quicker than a black horse. That is her story and she is sticking to it. Rebel was 3rd and Lady was 4th.

Sandy was now bitten by the endurance bug and looking forward to going to another ride.