Mom asked me to tell you about our Tevis
experience. I know she has talked with most of you but we thought it would be
nice to write it all down. That way if we ever get the chance at it again she
won?t make the same mistakes.
It all started Friday morning at home. (Well,
really it started in 1998 when I went from being a pasture ornament to my new
mom.) I got a bath! And a haircut! Then mom put on my easyboots with the help of
Cynthia and Viola. Shortly after, we left for Robie Park, and after a short
drive of 1-½ hours we were there. We found mom?s friends from Arizona and parked
next to them. Despite ALL the horses and commotion and trailers and everything,
I came out of the trailer as calm as can be. I had mom worried because at the
last race I couldn?t settle down and was overly excited. I got my beet pulp soup
and started slobbering all over everybody and the trailer. Yum! I noticed the
trailer door open and walked over to take a look and found myself in the mirror.
I had to spend some time admiring myself. Wow, what a handsome fellow am
I!
Down to the vet check we went. After seeing how
handsome I was I got a little confused and thought I was at a horse show. When mom told me to stand still for the
vets I figured I should stand square and stretch my lovely neck. The vets must
have liked me cause I got all A?s!
After this mom should have went to the first time
riders meeting but she had too much to do and those boys of hers would have made
it hard to listen anyway. But I wonder if something would have been said there
to get it in her head how important it would be to make time. Doubt it. She has
read about every book and asked every question she could think of about the
Tevis for the last 2 years. Everyone just kept commenting on how you needed to
average 5 mph, and you could easily finish. Mom was just worried about all the
vet stories she had heard. How horses get pulled for minor stuff, or for being
undetectably lame. She was worried most about that and wanted me to look GOOD
all day, and all night.
Nightfall came, gram came and got the boys and mom
and the crew settled down to sleep. It was nice that those boys were with gram
and mom didn?t have anything to worry about except getting me to Auburn. I got a
bit upset when mom went into the tack compartment and shut the door. Luckily all
my fussing disturbed her and she opened the door so that I could put my nuzzle
in and bump her head and know that I wasn?t alone. She sleep and I ate and drank
all night.
We tacked up in the dark the next morning.
And headed down to find the start. There were a lot of horses. Things were going
well and then we hit a roadblock. We waited there quite a while. Many of the
horses were misbehaving and really excited. I stood still and my did my
stretching exercises. Finally we were allowed to go through and then walked
until again we were roadblocked by a sea of horses. Everyone was very excited
and I was starting to get that way to. I was getting annoyed at all the
jostling, though. Then a very pretty bay girl came by with a loudmouthed rider
and a horse behind. Things got really crazy after that as the pushed his way
straight through the wall of horses. I was getting pushed from all sides. Even
though I have never kicked in my life mom seemed to be riding pretty defensively
so I thought I?d be defensive too. So I kicked at the horses pushing and
crowding me. Suddenly we were all moving. It was crazy. And I had to keep
kicking at all those horses pushing me! I really wanted to RUN and even thought
about bucking mom off. Some of the other horses must have had the same idea
because we passed 3 riders on the ground. They had people with them and looked
ok thank goodness because mom always feels that she has to stop and help
everyone. Soon the jeep road turned into a single track and we were quite far in
the back of the pack. I fought mom to push ahead not realizing there was nowhere
to pass. SO she rode me in collection like I was in the arena. That wasn?t
fun.
