Endurance.Net Ridecamp Archives

Hello Kathy,

I tried the Swanton 75 in 2004 but got pulled at Vet 4 (55 mi). At that
time I was using Old Macs on my barefoot horse and he had completed about
15-50's with them but he came up a little off that day and when I pulled
the boots there were 4-5 small rocks inside. After cleaning the boots he
was still off....bummer. I have attached 3 items, the official 2004 Ride
Map, the official 75 Trail Profile and a TOPO! Map I made based on my GPS
and 60 waypoints from a large map at Base Camp.

The area was beautiful, big trees, mostly gravel logging roads (60-70%)
and the rest single track trails by the time I got to Vet 4. The rest of
my map I used waypoints from ?? and the roads shown on my USGS maps in
TOPO! and the official map.

I highly recommend lots of hoof concussion protection and don't forget to
break up the pace on all those long stretches of nice looking (deceiving)
roads. I did the Malibu 55 this year and IMHO Swanton is a longer version
of Malibu with long uphills and long downhills on those logging roads but
very pretty winding thru the trees with cool ocean breezes.

Don Huston


At 12:33 PM 7/21/2008 Monday, sherman wrote:
> I hope I?m not
> being too optimistic here, but I am hoping to go to the Swanton Pacific
> ride. Sonny seems to have maintained his fitness, despite the longer than
> expected layoff due to smoke. 
>  
> What I?d like to know from those who have done Swanton is ?everything?
> that you can share that would help us get thru the ride. I?ve been told
> it is as difficult as Tevis, with different challenges, but I wasn?t
> given any details. So if you?d like to share, privately or publicly, I?m
> waiting to hear. I love details?what to watch out for, where we?ll be
> able to make better time, where we?d better take it easy, etc. 
>  
> Thanks,
> Kathy

Don Huston
donhuston @ cox .net
SanDiego, Calif