Northeast Challenge 50 mile Endurance Ride

Photos of me on Luke and crossing the finish line by Wanda Clowater

I decided to enter the 50 mile distance at the Northeast Challenge ride. When I got the notice from ECTRA that the Maine Ride in October was being changed from a 2 day 50 mile ride to a 3 day 80 mile ride, I now had a chance to earn the versatility award if I could complete the 50 mile endurance ride. So, the 50 mile ride it was! I had packed for the ride early in the week so there was no last minute rush to get ready. I worked at Upper Pond Stables in the morning then went home, fed and cleaned my barn and went inside to have some lunch and relax while checking to make sure I had the directions to the ride camp. Once I was all set with that, I loaded up Luke and headed out, leaving my directions sitting on the dining room table..... thankfully, it was an easy route to remember and I got to ride camp with no problem.

When I got to the ride camp, it was very neatly organized in a large field with camp sites marked out with numbered stakes and camp perimeters marked with a mowed path around each site. That was nice and the spaces were generously sized. I was parked right next to the vet judges camper who were Art King and Larry Buggia. The first thing I did was unload Luke and put him on my Spring Tie to see how he did on it. He was very good. He tested his space in his quiet, easy Luke like way but seemed quite content. I decided to set up my portable corral anyway as the campsite allowed for plenty of space and I figured he'd be more comfortable in the long run. Or more like, I'd sleep better as I know how he is in the corral overnight, I didn't know how he'd be on the Spring Tie overnight.

Once Luke was settled in, I set up camp. My friend Margaret was coming to crew for me and she was staying in my trailer so I set up a cot for her also. Then I took Luke to be vetted in. That went well and he did a reasonable trot out for which he got lots of praise and treats. I settled him back in his corral with lots of hay which he was eating a LOT of. I prepared some beet pulp for his supper to go along with his regular ration of grain. Karen, the owner of Upper Pond Stable where I work part time, had given me some sweet grain to mix with the beet pulp, or as Luke considers it, beet puke..... to make it more palatable for him. Though he is not fond of beet pulp, he sure loves sweet feed! I also added some regular salt to this mix of beet pulp and sweet feed. Luke likes the taste of the salt and it's good for him. I then set up everything I'd need for the holds in the hold area. All the holds would be in camp so that would make things easier for Margaret. Once I'd taken care of everything I could think of that needed to be done, I sat and visited with Peg Dockham for a while. She was camped right next to me. Poor Luke was a little unhappy that he was not seeing any of his special friends. There were horses all around in sight of him but none of the ones he's come to know. So, he bellowed quite a lot but was not acting nervous or upset. Just feeling a bit sorry for himself. I was hoping he would not do that all night. Margaret arrived and I showed her where everything was and she made sure to get the pit crew instructions for the "fly by" crew stops out on trail. The riders meeting was at 5:00 pm in the hold area of the field. This was followed by a FABULOUS meal. Everything was home made. There was pulled pork, corn muffins, many kinds of baked beans and chili. (yuck....beans are not fit for human consumption) cole slaw, local corn on the cob and the home made deserts, all I can say is WOW! I pigged out. Margaret and I sat with Stephanie and Sarah Buckley and visited with them. And we also talked with Louise Lester for a while. After our supper, I fed Luke. He ate the beet pulp-sweet feed mix but chose to leave his regular ration in favor of eating more hay. Margaret and I strolled around the camp in the evening and chatted with various others then sat and relaxed at my trailer for a while watching the night sky as there have recently been a lot of meteor showers. Clouds rolled in and ended that activity but it was time for bed anyway. I checked Luke one last time to make sure he had plenty of hay and water. 

I slept quite well. I did wake up a few times. There was a stallion in camp and he was bellowing very loudly. I had no need to worry about Luke keeping everyone awake. Even Luke is not as loud as the stallion was. Though he sounded a lot like a mule so I was hoping no one would blame Luke for the noise. Luke was quiet all night as far as I was aware. I was up at 4:30 am. I fed Luke more of the beet pulp-sweet grain mix which he ate most of, once again leaving his regular grain untouched. I went and had a doughnut and banana and coffee for breakfast. Then had 1/2 a bagel a little later. Not quite the breakfast of champions. The 75 mile riders went out at 5:00 am. It was still dark so the first part of the trail had been marked with glow sticks for them to follow. The 50 mile ride would start at 6:00. We had 12 hrs. to complete the ride. This would include the time for the two 45 minute holds. I groomed and saddled up Luke at 5:30. I mounted up at 5:45 to give him time to warm up. I checked in with the timer and then walked Luke around. He was excited but behaving very well. Endurance rides have a mass start. Luke has never done a mass start before as I've been doing CTR's with him that have controlled start. The one endurance ride I did try with him in June, I and the two women I was riding with had stayed away from the start and let everyone go out ahead of us as one of my friends was afraid her horse would get too excited by a mass start. I was not worried about Luke as he's pretty laid back and doesn't feed off the excitement of other horses much. Soon, we heard the shout of, "The trail is open" and we were off. We had just a short, short section of tractor road from the field we were camped in going into another field. When we came into that field, apparently Luke thought it was the Kentucky Derby! He took off like a shot! He completely took me by surprise and I quickly pulled his head around for a one rein stop. This did slow him down but he was dancing across the field now going sideways. As I went by riders I heard comments of, "Wow, isn't he gorgeous!", and "Wow, look at that lateral work." Everyone I had passed was now stopped and just watching me. ACK, I managed to get Luke turned and headed back in the direction of camp which slowed him considerably. I then tucked in behind Steve Rojek's and Kyle's horses who said they didn't mind Luke being there and had some semblance of control of Luke again. I didn't think Luke had it in him to make a move like that. I was kind of impressed myself once I was fairly certain I wasn't going to die. Kelley Bentley was also in our group at the start but she dropped back from Steve and Kyle and I dropped back with her. But, Luke was really fighting wanting to stay up with Steve and Kyle. He wasn't being bad or out of control, I just had to constantly keep checking him back. The first loop was 17 miles long and a lot of it was on dirt roads so I finally just let Luke catch up with Steve and Kyle as they were not setting a pace that was too fast for Luke. Luke was very happy and it was a very pleasant 17 miles.

A lot of this trail was familiar to me as it was a lot of the same trails I've done many times at the Boo CTR. About a mile from the first hold, Steve and Kyle did get ahead of us and Luke was now willing to let them go. He was getting his head together and starting to pace himself. So, we came into the hold alone. Luke immediately started dragging me around trying to find the food. He knows a hold means food and he wanted some NOW! I managed to get him led over to his own food which he scoffed down quickly. When you come into a hold at an endurance ride, your "in" time is recorded. You then have 30 minutes to present your equine to the vet for the pulse and trot out. Once you have your equines pulse taken and it's under 64, THAT is when your hold time starts. The 2 holds on this ride were 45 minutes each. So, the quicker you present to the vet, the sooner your hold time starts. It is up to the vet judges to decided if removing tack is mandatory or not. Usually on a hot day they will make it mandatory. For this ride it was not. I decided I was not going to rush to present to the vet. So, when I got into the hold and got my "in" time. I stripped Luke's tack, let him eat while Margaret sponged him off and then I took him for his pulse and trot out. His pulse was 56 (his CRI was 56/64, not great but not bad) and he did a reasonable trot out. He got all A's on his vet card. YEAH! We passed the first vet check.

Margaret looked after Luke while I went to my trailer to dig out Luke's fly mask as the black flies were being a nuisance. I put that on Luke and he was much happier. We just relaxed and let Luke eat what he wanted, well, not anything he wanted as he always wants to sample everyone else's food. He nibbled on hay, dengie, apples, carrots, grass. And he was drinking extremely well. He was drinking at every chance on the trail and at all the buckets at the water stops. 

Our next loop was 20 miles. Steve and Kyle must have left the hold a little late as they were leaving the hold the same time I was though they had gotten in before me. I followed them a short distance but let them go ahead of me at the first hills. They are from VT and ride hard hills all the time. Luke and I don't get a lot of hill work and I knew if I pushed Luke too hard on the hills, we would never complete the ride. Not too far into the ride, we came to the first really hard climb. It was long and very steep. I got off Luke and led him up this. I'll mention here that I have less hill conditioning than Luke.......... When we were close to the top, Kelley Bently and two other riders passed me. I mounted up, caught up with them and rode with them through the 2nd loop. 

The 2nd loop was quite hard with a lot of technical trail. There were also some nice stretches of dirt road but a lot of it was woods trails. As on the first loop, Kelley and her group got ahead of me just before the 2nd hold and Luke and I came in alone. I did the same routine at the 2nd hold as at the first with stripping Luke's tack and letting him eat and relax a little before presenting him to the vet. His pulse was 60 and his CRI was 60/56. So, actually an improvement from the first hold. He was not willing to trot and I had to have Margaret haze him into it. So, he received a B on his score card for impulsion but all A's otherwise. I put Luke in his corral to relax while I took a moment to sit in the shade and have some water and a sandwich. Unfortunately, this made Luke think he was done. After all, he's never had to go out after a 2nd vet check. When it was time, I saddled him up and I could see he wasn't looking too happy. And then we had to head out of camp alone. Luke was NOT impressed AT ALL.

The 3rd loop was 13 miles and the hardest of all the loops. Luke did go out of camp but was poking along as slow as he could. A big change from the mule that charged out of the start at the beginning of the ride. I finally encouraged him into a trot and he did his best imitation of the slowest western jog EVER! And I could hear him thinking, yep, I'll trot for you but just watch how slow I can do it....... LUKE!!!!! I think I saw a snail pass us! We got to a big puddle and he drank, and drank, and when I asked him to move on, he drank some more, and then he kept drinking. Now, while I'm sure he may have been a little thirsty, it was far more a ploy to get me to let him stand there and not move on. Everytime I put my legs on him, he dropped his head to the water. His head would come up, I'd apply legs, down would drop the head, repeatedly. Finally, with the help of my mule persuader, I got him moving again. This is the time when all sorts of stuff goes though your head. Was I pushing Luke too hard. Is 50 miles too much for him. He is after all, a Percheron and Percherons don't do this sport. And so on it went in my head. We started out on the same trail as we did for the 2nd 20 mile loop. Luke poked along and sulked until we came to a spot where the 3rd loop split off from the way the 2nd loop had gone. Luke perked up a bit then though he still didn't over exerting himself. We were trotting along down a dirt road when I saw a double ribbon signifying a turn in the trail. I looked and watched but did not see any turn. Hummm! The last thing I needed was to get lost and add any extra miles. I went about 1/2 mile and just about the time I was going to turn around and go back I came to the end of the dirt road at an intersection with a tar road. NO trail markers anywhere. So, I HAD missed a turn somewhere. I headed back and just past where I'd seen the double marker, Kelley Jack, Sarah Buckley and another rider were coming down the road. I told them there was a turn we had all missed. After looking around we finally found it. There was a trail marker missing. Thankfully, though I did add close to an extra mile, it was not more than that. Luke knows Sarah's little Welsh pony mare and was happy to see her. He perked up even more at having some company to share in his misery and I had my good old Luke back. This loop was super challenging with many, many steep climbs and descents. When we came to one very steep climb, I got a horrible leg cramp in the back of my left leg. I have never been prone to leg cramps and wow it hurts! Luke must have though I'd gone nuts the way I was twisting and turning and wiggling around in the saddle. Hard to tell what he was thinking though as he completely ignored it all. I tried everything I could to relieve it from the saddle but finally had to get off. Since it was such a steep climb this was good for Luke anyway. Walking did relieve the cramp in the back of my leg but the climbing gave me a horrible cramp in the front of my leg. I was hanging onto Luke and hobbling up the hill. We stopped part way up the hill to give the horses and Luke a break. Or maybe the others were just feeling sorry for me. I had water with me but Kelley had me drink some of her Gatorade to see if that helped with the leg cramp. It did finally ease by the time we got to the top of the hill and I mounted up and we kept on going. We moved along as fast as we could but on this loop, that was not fast with the steep climbs and descents. And much of the flatter sections of the trail were too soft or muddy to go very fast. We simply moved out where we could.  I was behind the others as we came to a turn in the trail going up one of the many steep hills. The others broke into a trot/cantered as soon as they turned the corner so got just out of sight. Just as I turned the corner, Luke suddenly scooted forward then spun around startling the heck out of me. A dog had charged up behind us but it didn't bark so I never heard it coming. Luke faced it down and finally scared it off. GOOD MULE! And all the moves Luke made were so smooth that I never moved in the saddle at all. The last pit crew stop was 4 miles from the finish. I was happy to see Margaret and know I was nearing the end of the ride. Margaret fed Luke some carrots and apples and doused him with cool water and we were off on the  last miles of our ride. We went though some fields on these last miles and we galloped though them. I was pleased with how good Luke felt, he just kept feelign strong and better as we rode this loop. Though I did worry we were traveling too fast to get his pulse down at the end. But, since I was not pushing him I let him pick his pace. And I'm sure it must have been quite a sight seeing one small white Welsh pony leading a large black Percheron mule. Luke was so happy following that pony. As we neared the end, we discussed all finishing in a tie. I decided I'd drop back and finish a minute behind the others in our group and secure the turtle award for Luke and myself. I was so happy when I crosssed the finish line I nearly cried!

At the finish I kept to the same routine of stripping tack and letting Luke eat first. I then presented to the vet and had my fingers crossed his pulse would not be too high. He was hot and Margaret and I had put as much water on him as we could. There was nothing to worry about, Luke pulsed at 56 and his CRI was 56/48. The best yet all day! I was thrilled. He, of course, did not want to trot out, and even ignored hazing from Margaret. I mean this woman had been pampering him all day so surely there was nothing to fear from her! In a last ditch effort I started him out lunging, though I didn't need to do any circles. He suddenly broke into a lovely lofty trot and I pushed him into a straight line towards the vets and half way back to the vets he broke into a canter dragging me along behind him. That was just fine with me, I've never been so happy to be dragged by a mule! And it provided some comic relief for the vets as well as earning him straight A's at the finish on his vet card! Woohooo!! We had completed a very hard 50 mile endurance ride! Luke was now officially an endurance mule! I was so happy I wanted to cry...... again.... It really was a very, very tough ride. It was a great ride. I love technical trail and I was so proud of Luke for finishing. He's such an unlikely breed to do an endurance ride with his mom being a Percheron.

Once Margaret and I took care of Luke and got him settled in his corral we went up and had dinner which was another absolutely delicious meal. After the meal, they did the awards for the 30 mile LD riders. Then the 75 mile riders started to come in for the finish of their ride. So, the 50 mile awards were after the vets judged those horses. I did indeed earn the turtle award with a ride time of 9 hrs. 28 minutes. My good friend Mindy on her wonderful horse Movette, was 5th place and got high vet score with a ride time of 6 hrs. 44 minutes.   Peter Seams won the ride and got the BC award but I don't remember what his ride time was. After awards, Margaret and I packed everything up. When I went to get Luke to tie him to the trailer so we could take down the corral, he locked his feet and didn't want to go with me. He thought I was going to saddle him up and head out again and he was having no part of it! LOL. I assured him we were done for the day. It was a great day and a great accomplishment for one big black Percheron mule to finish such a hard ride.