PanAm preride - no results yet, but a very very long story

["Steph Teeter" <step@fsr.com>]

I managed to leave camp without getting the official results
from Myna - sorry! Hopefully Myna will get back on the net
soon and post them. I do know that Lari Shea won on Avante
(I think her ride time was 9:18!) . Tais ridden by Christy
Jantzen took BC. 38 started, 25 finished.

At any rate, here's how it went for us...

The great horse swap... I had been planning on doing this
ride with Kruschev, my big black Orlov/Arab gelding. We
did everything right all season, diligent conditioning, even
hauled several times (3 hour drive) to work him on a real
sandy/dune course. Did a 50 mile ride in April - tied for 1st - 
looking good... did a 75 mile ride in May - had problems with
the heat, but worked through it and finished in good shape- 
plus gained new respect for hot and humid conditions. Then
we entered a 100 miler at Sunriver in June and pulled at 35 miles - lame
on RF. sigh. I suspected a stone bruise, and 2 days later
hauled him over to the vet school for a lameness exam - he
went sound with a foot block - diagnosis was a bruised foot.
Ok, so rather than haul 1200 miles and take a chance on
Kruschev, John said I could ride his horse, Sukaro, who did 
complete the Sunriver 100. John had planned to ride Sukaro on the 
3-day 150, but said he'd ride Bunchuk the Orlov who was 
not as fit, but sound, and we'd leave Kruschev home. right.
Saturday morning (we were scheduled to leave on Monday)
I went out to feed and Bunchuk was 3-legged lame! Wouldn't
put any weight on his right hind. ...oh great.. turned out to
be an abcess in his frog ... So back to plan A, 
sort of, except John would ride Kruschev and just see 
how it went with the bruise. (btw it went fine - he rode Kruschev
all 3 days, even finished 1st and BC the second day! John is
having a very good year :)

So, John and I and our 12 yr old son finally hit the road Tuesday
afternoon with Sukaro, Kruschev and my friend
Carol and her wonder Appy (3/4 arab) 'Thundering Heart.' Carol
planned to crew for me on Saturday, and ride 50's Fri and Sun. 
We had a good (uneventful) trip over, drove through Montana
and North Dakota, then north into Canada. btw our new truck
was terrific - very stable, lots of power, a pleasure to drive - but!!
if you're looking for good mileage, the Ford 550 is not the truck to get 
unless you're happy driving at 55 mph. The  gear ratio (4:88)
is too low for cruising at 70 to 80 mph. We got between 7 and 9
miles per gallon - not very impressive.... but it sure has a lot of
power!

We got to camp late Thursday morning after a somewhat eventful
border crossing (had to do last minute fax/fedex of neg coggins and
health papers for Kruschev - and the vet at the border wanted to
do an inspection as well) , but we made it. Camp was a big grassy
meadow, tons of room, really pretty spot. Plenty of water, lots of
good grass. Well organized camp. We pre-rode the last 11 mile
loop to stretch the horses out, and familiarize Sukaro with the
last (maybe in the dark) part of the 100. Nice course, a few steep
dunes, 2 track sandy trail. Well marked. Looked pretty good. John
and Carol rode the 50 on Friday and I spent a nice relaxed day
getting organized and visiting with friends.

We signed in with Gail Ecker and her veterinary team from
U. of Guelph - they had a blood analysis machine on site and were
set up to do real time analysis of horses during the ride. What an
incredible opportunity to see what's really going on metabolically
with your horse during a 100 mile ride. They drew blood for a
pre-rided analysis, and took pre-ride body weight also. ...more
on that later.

The 100 started at 5 AM - plenty of light to see the trail (this is
pretty far north!). My plan was to try to finish in the top 20. I had only
ridden Sukaro in competition once before, so didn't really know 
him very well, and didn't want to take any chances. He's done a 
lot of miles but we've never really conditioned him for speed. The
first loop was 24 miles - it was beautiful!! Rolling hills, some 
sandy track, but the horses didn't seem to notice it. We hit 
the flats along the river and rode in and out of the mist, it really
was exquisite and Sukaro felt great. I rode with my friend Harriet
and her horse Raptor - the horses were well paced and really
enjoying themselves. We finished the 1st loop in 2 1/2 hours - 
Carol was suprised to see us so soon and had to scramble to
get stuff ready. The first hold was 40 minutes, plenty of time 
for the horses to eat and drink. Sukaro pulsed down right away,
but I was so paranoid of the 30 minute penalty that I lost quite
a bit of time on our time out. (FEI - at some point when your
horse is down you 'cross the line' into the P&R area - after this
point there is no more crewing/sponging/whatever. At this ride,
if the horse's pulse was not at 64 criteria when you presented,
there was a mandatory  30 minute penalty - you go 
back to the crewing area and try
again in 30 minutes.) So I waited until he was REALLY down,
and presented at 52. He passed the check with flying colors,
all A's, looking good. Gail and her team drew blood and took
it back for immediate analysis to see how the electrolyte balance
was. Looked good. We weighed in, no weight loss. Great! He
ate and drank fine, Carol picked a bunch of fresh tall grass 
which he devoured. We left in 12th place, feeling pretty good. 

Next loop was 22 miles - this was the 'killer loop' - 2 track
sandy trails, rolling hills, and 2 miles of very tough dunes - 
up and down some steep, deep sand. It was too deep to 
get off and walk, and Sukaro still felt good, so we pretty
much cruised through. I rode this loop with Ridecamper
Shirley Dennis and her Trahkaener gelding, Faust. Very
nice horse - good attitude, big stride, very capable. It was
fun talking about all the Ridecamp stuff. We did this in about
2 1/2 hours - came in feeling good, pulsed down, vetted with
all A's, blood and weight analysis looked great. He ate pretty
well, though seemed to prefer the dry alfalfa to anything
else - not too interested in the bran mash and wet hay. Sort
of surprising. Carol offered some more fresh grass, which
he ate. Another 40 minute hold. I left by myself in 11th place,
Faust was slightly off in a right hind, so Shirley wanted to give him a 
little more time - he was  tight from all the sand.

The next loop was 19 miles - and it was miserable! The nice
rolling 2-track sandy road had turned into *deep* sand from
all of the horses for the past 2 days. It was very hard work,
with no place to really move out. Very rolling with deep sand
at the top of each rise. Sukaro got into a pattern of gaining
speed going down - going from a walk to a trot and into a
canter at the bottom and cantering part way up the next rise,
until the deep and steep slowed him down. Not exactly the
nice steady pace one wants on a 100 miler! But it seemed
to be what he preferred...so I let him do it. He's a great horse
with a lot of heart, and didn't seem to mind being alone at all.
We hit flat dirt/mud trail about 4 miles from the hold and he
felt *tired* was still trotting willingly but felt heavy and was
forging some, unusual for him. We got to the hold, pulsed down
ok, and still vetted through with all A's. Gail's team pulled
blood, we weighed in (still no significal weight loss) and settled
in for a 60 minute hold. He was starving and ate and drank well, *but*
the results of the blood analysis showed that his glucose 
level was very low - 3.8 - bordering on hypoglycemic. Hydration
and electrolyte balance was still very good, so we decided to
take blood again at the end of the hold and see how the glucose
level looked then. He ate well the entire hold, and I gave him
a dose of carbo's at the beginning and end of the hold. The
second blood analysis looked good - back up to 5.6 which
is in the normal range.

I left for the 4th loop in 9th and 10th place 
with Harriet and Raptor. This was a repeat
of the blue (1st) loop - 24 miles - and we both thought, great,
this will be a nice easy loop. Wrong!! I swear Myna must have
changed the ribbons, this was nothing like the loop we did first
thing in the morning. It's amazing what you don't notice when
the air is cool and the horses are fresh :) The nice sandy roads
had deteriorated into deep deep sand and there was hill after
hill after hill. Both horses were less than enthusiastic. Raptor
seemed quite unhappy about the whole state of affairs, so 
we pretty much just slogged through this loop. Sukaro felt
pretty good, but I stayed back with Harriet - he was tired 
enough that I knew I'd better conserve him - the sand and
heat were taking a lot out of him, and I didn't know how much
energy he'd have to finish the course. There's nothing less
satisfying than dragging your buddy through the last miles
of a 100! About 15 miles into the loop we finally got some
good footing. I got off to get some stuff out of my fanny pack
and 3 riders went galloping by - Jan Worthington and two others
took advantage of the good footing and made their move - and
it looked like they had plenty of horse left! So at that point I
figured I was out of the top ten, and had just better set my
sights on a good clean finish. It was almost a relief to not
feel the need to push... 

And as it turned out, it was a good decision to back off the
pace. We got into the last check at 89 miles, with a 60 minute
hold in front of us. Sukaro felt tired. He vetted in fine - mostly
A's, *but* his CRI was 60/68. The vet didn't seem concerned,
but I found this very alarming - he'd had great CRI's all day.
This was not normal. Gail's group didn't draw blood at this
hold, they just wanted to leave the horses alone to eat and
drink, so I don't know what his problem was - but I suspect
it was low blood glucose again - just plain old out of gas.
Carol hand grazed him during the hold - he drank well and
was eating pretty good, so I decided to give him an extra
45 minutes to make sure he got refueled. The last loop was
11 miles, and it had some pretty good dunes and I didn't
want to risk exhausting him.  So we just relaxed. 

When we left on the last loop he was looking better - bright
eyed, trot felt pretty good. He wasn't happy about going
past his buddies at the trailer one more time, but once we
got on the trail he gave a great big sigh, and away we went.
We walked/jogged the first 4 miles, then I led him through 
the dunes (forgot to put the breast collar back on my saddle
before I left so I sort of *had* to lead him!!) and after the 
dunes we cruised in the last 6 miles. He felt great, galloped
in the last 1/2 mile - and looked good at the final trot out. We
finished at 9:30 - (still plenty of light) - in 16th place with a
ride time of 13 1/2 hours. Not bad.... but probably could
have been faster if I had paced it better- the sand really 
took a lot out of the horses, and I probably should have
ridden slower in the beginning. The beauty of hindsight :)

...lots more to say about electrolytes, carbos, the incredible
job Gail and her group did with the real-time analysis of the
horses, but I think I'd better go clean the trailer.... to be
continued...

Many thanks to Myna Cryderman and her helpers - they 
did a great job in every respect!  

Steph