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[RC] LBL 25 Part 2 of 3 (long) - April(continued from part 1) About an hour later, the skies opened up and pelted the camp with hard rain and possibly hail. It continued with wave after wave. Thunder, lightning and that hard, heavy rain. I kept waiting for it to quit, but it just kept on. I figured Tanna was ok because he had that sheet on, but I'd forgotten that it wasn't waterproof! Finally at a quarter to 5, I decided to go take a shower. I figured I wouldn't have much competition for the showers at that time in the morning. As I went outside, I decided to check on Tanna first. Poor thing was wet through and shivering. I threw my shower stuff in the dressing room of my trailer. I stripped the wet sheet off and replaced it with Tanna's nice waterproof, lined blanket. Then I walked him around for 15 minutes in the rain to get his blood flowing and generate some warmth. The whole time berating myself for forgetting the sheet wasn't waterproof. Diamond was tied to Laura's trailer nice and cozy in his waterproof sheet and called to us as we walked around. I put Tanna back on his picket line and continued on to take a shower. The shower was heavenly! Warm water and a nice spray and an area to put my stuff where it wouldn't get wet and to get dressed. Very nice indeed! And like I figured, no competition for the showers at that time in the morning! On the way back to my trailer, I banged on Laura's tack room door to wake them up. It was 5:15 and we had an hour and 45 minutes to get ready, if we were going to even go with the rain. They called for me to come in and I climbed in and dripped on their floor while we discussed. Finally I said I would try to find out the weather forecast and went to call my dad in SC. I had him get on the internet and check the radar. He said it would probably rain more, but that the bad stuff was probably behind us. So I reported back to Laura. Dan had his laptop out and connected to the internet via his cell phone and was also looking at the weather. After me giving him the wrong zip code at first, we got a look at the radar. Just what my dad had said. So after a few more minutes of discussion, we decided we were going to ride anyway. At that point, we had an hour before start. So I rushed back to my trailer and spent a soggy 50 minutes saddling and shoving a bit of food down my mouth, entirely envious of Laura and Diamond, getting ready in her slant load trailer out of the rain. I was thankful that Tanna was dry and warm under his blanket. Well, at least he was dry until I stripped it off to saddle. The rain finally stopped before I was done. Laura and I mounted up and headed off to the start line. There were lots of 50 milers around. Their start had been pushed back to 7 and we were to leave at 7:30. Now we had plenty of time! Dan and Daniel showed up a few minutes later and we hung out by the concrete water trough and let the horses play with the water. Tanna drank just a few sips, but enjoyed sticking his nose in the water and making lots of splashes. At 7:15 we remounted and walked around. I kept an eye out for Kara and her gelding. We were supposed to ride with them to try to help keep her gelding calm for the start. I didn't see her anywhere. At 7:30, Nancy (timer extraordinaire) declared the trail open for 25 milers. Laura and I hung back and let the pack go for a few minutes, then followed along with the stragglers. I still didn't see Kara. Maybe she had decided the weather was just too miserable like we almost had. Our first obstacle was quite scary to me. The small trickle to cross to get to the trails had been transformed into a raging creek. Tanna plunged right in behind Diamond. I focused on the other side of the creek (per Laura's instructions) and just tried to keep Tanna headed in the right direction. For a scary moment, we were being swept along with the water and then Tanna got his feet grounded again and we made it across. Then I noticed the photographer. Great. I can't wait to see my panicked face in THAT picture. Then we got to the road and Laura and I pulled up for a minute to let even more riders pass us. We thanked the forestry personnel that were present keeping the traffic stopped (there was no traffic that I saw) for the start. Finally we hit the trails. Tanna was pulling quite fiercely to be allowed to catch the riders in front of us. I refused, but was glad to have my pulling partner back. I had been worried about him becoming too mellow, but he was his own self and I was thrilled, even though my arm and back muscles were definitely getting a workout! We trotted up the small hills and walked down them. To say there was water on the trail is an understatement. To say there was mud on the trail was quite accurate. To say the trails were sloppy is quite accurate as well. However, it really wasn't all that bad. There is a trail here in Nashville that will turn to 18 inches of mud with less water than was dumped on LBL. That is a gross and nasty trail. Here the mud was nowhere near that deep. There was a LOT of standing water on the trail, though. Certainly no shortage of drinking water, though. :-) Of course, neither one of our horses were interested in drinking. The worst part of trail was a quarter mile stretch that was completely covered in deep, flowing water and we had to traverse that section twice (once each loop) going against the current. After a couple miles, Kara caught up with us. Guess she had started after all. She passed on and we only saw her briefly at the vet check. We came into the timers almost 2 hours after the start. In 5 minutes, we had our pulse time. As soon as we got up to the pulse takers, Tanna stretched out and peed. The pulse taker took the pulse while he was peeing. Didn't disturb him in the least. Hehee. Tanna vetted through with a B on Jugular Refill and As elsewhere. We hadn't stripped his tack since it was rider option and I didn't want to bother removing the saddle for a 40 minute hold. Daniel trotted him out and he looked good to me. It's really nice to be able to watch him move when I usually just feel him. No CRI this time. I rather like CRIs and was disappointed that the vets were only doing CRIs when they felt it was warranted and not across the board. I might should have asked for a CRI though. I didn't think about that. (to be continued) April Nashville, TN ===========================================================Of course things aren't perfect, perfect doesn't exist on this earth. Doesn't mean we won't go on trying to get better at what we do. Besides, if everything was perfect today, what would you do tomorrow? Slamming each other doesn't get anything done. ~ Dot Wiggins ridecamp.net information: http://www.endurance.net/ridecamp/ ===========================================================
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