38 – Tigger’s Novice 80s
We decided it would be really good if we could get Tigger through his two novice 80km before the end of the season, so first up Waimiha, traditionally the end of the season ride.
Waimiha is a special venue. The base is at the local sports ground and there is a club house with a spacious lounge area complete with log fire, pool table, a great kitchen and flush toilets! On Saturday nights the locals are there and the bar is open! Just south of base is an abandoned sawmill and associated derelict cottages, it looks like everyone simply up and left one day.
There was no one else available to accompany Tigs and Lisa, so it was decided that Lace and I would do a novice 80. Now it was only a bit over two weeks since the Nationals, back then there were no real stand-downs as they referred only to further FEI rides. I would not do this again, two weeks was too soon.
As usual for an 80km ride we got there the day before, pre-ride vet check and then a short ride. I had noticed on previous rides that although Tigger was generally pretty good on the actual ride day, he was generally diabolical the day before. This time was no exception and Lisa had her work cut out to simply get him to go through the gate past A PUDDLE! Sigh…
Lace was fine for the vast majority of the ride though, and we had a lovely time. The most memorable moment was early on in the second loop. It had been really cold when we started out in the morning, and I had been busy during the hold looking after Lace and eating myself – we had no crew – so before I knew it, it was time to saddle up and head out on the second loop, not having had a chance to take off the black thermal I had on under my black T-shirt. Within 10 minutes I was too hot. So I let Lace trot along with the reins on her neck, took off my number and handed it to Lisa, trotting beside me on Tigger. Next the T-Shirt followed by the offending thermal. Luckily Daryl wasn’t there with her camera as I rode no hands with only my bra on the top half! And my helmet of course, I had managed to get all layers off without removing it! Lisa then passed back my T-shirt and then my number. By this stage Lace was getting a bit fed up – the rider only has one, maybe two, uses…
1) KEEP THE REINS OUT OF THE WAY… is that too much to ask? Really! And 2) occasional help to know which loop to do, and perhaps to follow the markers… but only on the first loop! I was failing majorly at my primary purpose!
It was only near the end of the ride that the ride two weeks ago caught up with her, she started getting a bit vague and did actually need steering. The tank was on empty. She was fine and they both vetted through no problems, but no, I would not do it again. She was really hungry too.
So now Tigs had just one 80km ride to go to be open… but it was the middle of May normally the end of the season. But what is the point of being on the committee of a club if you can’t organise things to suit yourself sometimes? So on June 5 we held a ride at Whakamaru. Another four weeks away, Lace had plenty of time to recover.
Now the Whakamaru course ought to have been really boring. It was straight out along the road, into the forest for a bit then turn around and go back the way you’ve come. Then do it again, then again but a bit shorter. But it isn’t boring, in fgact most people seemed to really enjoy it. The verges were really nice and being all two way track it’s very social, greeting everyone going the other way. Furthermore, instead of the normal distance markers every 10km (maybe) it was always distance marked every kilometre, which was great you could count your way out to the turn around point at 15km then count down back to 1 with 1km to go. It was especially good that day as Lace was going to get her 4000km! So all the way I was counting down… 70km to go, 60km, 40, 20, 10, 5…. 4000!… now just 2km and a vet check to make it official!
Lace was completely recovered and needed to be persuaded to stop and eat in order to stay with Tigger who was of course riding novice… and we ended up 3rd in spite of that.
Tigger qualified – Open pony.
Another busy season completed. Time for a break.
