Having entered the 100km ER on the Saturday all the packing of trailer, truck and camper van was carried
out on Friday morning with myself and Dougal setting off at midday and Steve following on down after work. We arrived in good time,
checked into the stables, handed in my ride card to the secretary and checked the route for course changes.
To allow Dougal to work out any kinks in his legs from travelling I took him for half an hours grazing, passed our pre ride vetting,
requiring one shoe to be refitted where he had just caught an edge and then settled him into his stable.
Steve arrived at about 7.00 and I fed Dougal his evening feed and left him with his feed ball over night while I had my
customary pre ride dinner of Spaghetti Bolognaise.
Saturday morning dawned sharp and slightly misty. I popped over to the stables and gave Dougal his morning feed containing electrolytes,
noticing that he had done some loose droppings over night. When he had finished eating I put on his boots, saddle and breast plate then walked him down to the crewing area by the start. Steve drove the truck
down to here so I could finish tacking up after I attended the pre ride briefing while Steve grazed Dougal in hand. Margaret did warn us that the ride may
be longer than the stated distance and that if several of us were slower than the minimum speed limit of 12kph then this may be reviewed.
After this I finished tacking up Dougal and started to warm him up. As the starter was counting down the last minute
I pre-sloshed Dougal and then we were off with
Dougal in his favourite position, up front with Ken Mapp along side. We followed the pace car driven by Heather
till past the main road crossing then carried on trotting until we came to the beginning of the first ascent where
there was a gate to be opened. Everybody was taking a sensible pace of about 15 kph and the lead was being swapped till
the first four riders took a wrong turning. Ken Mapp tracked back to the last marker, one of us investigated one branch
and two others investigated another branch. The group of three of us turned back and retraced to our last marker. Dougal
and I soon after this took a small lead over the other two horses, and were approaching checkpoint 2 where I made a rider
error and turned right having seen a marker instead of passing by the checkpoint car. I realised that despite seeing
several markers I must have taken a wrong turn when I had not seen any one for several minutes despite being in open
country so tracked my steps back to check point 2 and picked up the correct course. While cantering at one point Dougal
slipped and I thought we were going over, however he recovered. I debated pulling up at this point in case we had done
some damage but he was keen to carry on. When I next met up with Steve he told me I was about 15 minutes behind the next
rider. We carried on to the first vet gate and presented to vet in five minutes. Dougal was eating and drinking well
and I was happy with the way we were going at this stage.
After our prescribed 30 minute hold we were off again by ourselves, Dougal set off keenly cantering on the grassy
stretches but did not seem to be attacking the down hills with his usual gusto as well as not appreciating the amount of
road work. However his ears were pricked and he was eating and drinking well at all crewing points. He appeared to have switched off from
competing and be treating it as a gentle hack. I was not too worried at this point as I was only after the completion. We carried on at
Dougal's pace till vet gate 2 where we took 10 minutes to trot up and our 2nd pulse on both the initial present and represent was elevated.
This worried me and I debated retiring at this stage but decided if I took it at his pace we should be able to complete the remaining 36 km.
So we set off on the 3rd loop hoping to meet somebody else for the first time in 4 hours. Again Dougal was keen
to be out on the trail but within 10km was starting to slow down. We increased the rate at which we were crewing in an effort to help Dougal
recoup whatever he needed. However after a further 8km he was telling me he only wanted to walk up hills. Shortly after this I decided to
retire on course having ridden for eight hours, six and a half of which had been on our own having covered 90km of the total of 110km.
On Sunday morning Steve took Dougal for a walk while I mucked out then we popped down to see the vet to be passed fit for
travelling home. We duly passed, I handed in my bib and collected our paperwork then we set off home. A somewhat disappointing
weekend
considering I just wanted the completion, leaving me with a lot to mull over to ascertain what
went wrong.
Below are my heart rate monitor and GPS readings from this ride.
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