After a while a large rock was looming on the
horizon. Mom didn?t think it was as big as she had thought. But when started up
and she realized the big ledge I would have to jump and at such a steep pitch I
felt a twinge of fear in her. That is something I have never felt from my mom,
so I stopped. Well then she wanted me to go on! No way, not if she was afraid!
What seemed like eternity to mom but really was just a few seconds she convinced
me to head up. I think she was surprised caused I just all of a sudden lunged up
and boy did she bounce. Hopefully the picture is decent because mom says next
time we?ll just go around (and not wast energy!). And on we went following those
3 horses.
We must have pulled into Red Star Ridge at about
1050. I had some water (I do my job -drink and eat and go as fast as she wants!)
My pulse was 60 within minutes so we went over to wait in line at the vet. There
were quite a few horses here and many did not look good. They looked really
tired and thirsty. I guess they forgot their job is to eat and drink! We vetted
in and I was at 60, the vet said we could go. We left alone. It was 1100; we had
60 minutes to go 7 miles. Luckily this section was all road and we trotted and
cantered. Pretty soon those 3 riders caught up with us. They seemed to be
feeling the pressure to go faster too as they kept up with us easily. Before
long I could see the commotion of horses and trailers and then my friends;
Viola, Cynthia, Kim and Donnal (Oh yea, baby Jedediah was there too). They
greeted us and they looked nervous. We made it in with 2 minutes to spare. Mom
got off and went to sit down. Kim immediately gave her food and said in a very
motherly way, ?eat!? Good thing because she never eats and then gets very tired
and punchy later in the day. Viola took me to a beet pulp soup. Boy I stuck my
head in that and slurped, and slurped, and slurped. My job is to eat and drink
and I do it well. Sooner than I would have liked it, though, I got led away from
my food and down to the vet. I looked around for things to eat but the pickings
were sparse down there at the vet check. No fair, my job is to eat and drink
now! Met a nice vet from Montana, mom liked him too. He figured since mom used
to be a smokejumper this race was a piece of cake for her. Yeah, right. Well
maybe. If she didn?t spend so much time worrying about me. And more time going
faster. The vet must have thought I was lovely cause I got mostly A?s with some
B?s for the hydration parameters (Duh, I needed that beet pulp soup!) This was
the first time that we have had a crew and boy was it nice. I liked all the
attention everybody was giving me, except for the water all over me. That annoys
me, but I put up with it. I suppose in the long run it does feel good to be
cool. And everyone was talking about how hot it was. Mom and I really didn?t
notice. We run 3 days a week together at lunchtime so it seemed pretty normal.
And it has been awfully hot the last few weeks. Even with all the help and mom
being able to sit down and drink and eat, the hour hold seemed to go by fast.
Soon we were off again, alone.
After a few miles though those 3 horses caught up
with us and we, again, followed them for a while. By now they were really
traveling at about the same speed as we were. We came upon a stream and all
stopped. Again I did my job, drank, and ugh mom poured lots of cold water on me.
We left alone and wouldn?t see anyone else along the trail except at vet checks
for the rest of the ride.
