Nick Warhol and Warpaint, 1999

Warpaint with Judy Long

Tevis 1999- The All Alone Ride

You can’t miss this horse. He stands out like a porcupine in a nudist colony, or a 90 pound fresh salmon on the floor of a donut shop. He doesn’t look like many of the horses at Tevis, in fact he looked like only one other that was there. He’s Warpaint, the Endurance Appaloosa. My wife Judy let me ride the spotted wonder at Tevis this year for a couple of reasons. My horse Shatta’s suspensory is still mending- he can’t do any rides until next year. Here I was, bummed to the max without a horse, when Judy decided to take pity on me and let me give him a try at the castle Rock 50. I finished the ride and had a great time, so I did the Oakland Hills 50 a few weeks later. I finished that one after a slight detour down the side of a mountain, but hey, not even plunging down a mountain can stop that horse. (Not even Gary Fend’s multiple attempts to make SURE I got lost on his trail could stop me!) The kicker was winning a free entry to Tevis at the AERC convention. Wouldn’t you know it, those entries aren’t transferable, not even to a spouse. Since I had been having so much fun on the horse doing conditioning rides she decided to give me a shot at my third Tevis. I finished the first one on Zion but got pulled at the finish, last year I finished really strongly on Shatta’s first Tevis and got my first buckle, and I wanted another one this year. For some reason this ride seems to posses me: there’s something very special about it. I’m not sure how to describe the attraction except to say that the ride is a challenge, and I really like what head vet Mitch Benson says about this particular ride: It’s 30% horse, 30% rider, and 40% luck. I was really depressed when I found I couldn’t ride on Shatta, and became just as excited when I realized I was able to do it again.

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