In a group finish, the California rider shares her 100-mile endurance ride victory with family and friends.

Most riders wouldn’t consider a 100-mile jaunt in one day the ideal family vacation, but the Sousa family does. And when Joyce Sousa and her daughter Jennifer Niehaus traveled to the Owyhee Fandango Endurance Ride and finished first and third in the featured 100-mile ride, their results simply added to the fun they were already having.

Sousa, aboard LV Integrity, and Niehaus, who rode MC Gallantly, were the consistent frontrunners throughout the ride, along with their fellow Californian, Cheryl Dell on TR Reason To Believe. The three riders all crossed the finish line together, clocking in just 1 second apart. Dell finished second, while Niehaus placed third and earned the best condition title.

From a distance, the Owyhee Fandango seemed to merely be “a three-day endurance ride,” but like a mirage set in the high desert of southern Idaho, the competition, held May 23-25, turned out to be something entirely different upon closer inspection.

Big rigs descended from every direction upon the base camp at the Teeter Ranch near Oreana beginning on the Wednesday before the competition began, as West Coast endurance enthusiasts flocked to training sessions with U.S. Equestrian Federation officials and 20 separate rides for competitors of all ages, from 7 to 79.

All rides were American Endurance Ride Conference-sanctioned, and all but the limited distances were also offered as Fédération Equestre Internationale rides. In addition, the Fandango was also a Pioneer ride—a point system for riders completing all days of a multi-day event—and the Region IV Arabian Horse Association 100-mile Championship.

But none of those qualifications and acronyms mattered much to Sousa, 62, Hydesville, Calif., who finished right in step with her daughter after 9:48:59 on the trail. Sousa and LV Integrity also earned the Region IV AHA 100-mile Championship. “Ritzy,” a 16-year-old gelding, has had only two pulls in 90 starts over 11 seasons.

“To me, a win is to finish with a horse you can look at and be so proud of,” Sousa said. “This is a sport that takes advantage of horses. And when a vet tells me, ‘You finished, and you finished very well,’ that’s the real prize to me.”

Dell and “Reason,” who clocked in at 9:49:00, were the top FEI pair in the 100-miler. They were members of the U.S. team at the World Endurance Championship in Malaysia in November, but they had rotten luck there, as Dell was stricken with an intestinal virus after the second loop and had to withdraw, ending up in the hospital on intravenous fluids. Reason had the winter off and was back in training for this ride for 10 weeks. He won the 50-mile American River Classic (Calif.) in April in preparation for the Owyhee Fandango.

Ups And Downs

Elevation for most of the ride is 3,200 feet, and temperatures were in the low 80s for much of the weekend—not too extreme for endurance horses. It wasn’t a technically difficult ride, though Dell noted, “The trail wasn’t super-conducive to a lot of cantering, with the little twists and turns and ups and downs in many places.

“I didn’t care about coming in first,” she added. “I wasn’t going to race for the win. My goals are to pace well, get my [certificate of completion] and move up the ranking list. I’m gunning for [the Alltech FEI World Equestrian Games in] Kentucky 2010.”

Although she hadn’t ridden him in two years and the horse hadn’t done a 100-miler in the same amount of time, Niehaus, 37, chose to compete with her father Dennis’ horse, MC Gallantly, at the Owyhee Fandango. The gelding, affectionately known as “Gallo,” has logged more than 4,000 AERC miles and now has eight 100-mile completions. Together, Ritzy and Gallo have almost 10,000 AERC miles between them.

“I was pacing [Gallo] to get him through the hundred,” said Sousa. “That was our plan.”

A bit of unplanned excitement happened mid-day when two 100-mile riders lost their horses in the desert for a while. Visiting Japanese rider Yurika Tachibana, riding Tracy and David Kaden’s FLF Federalee, was unseated on the third loop out of the ranch when a passing horse kicked at her mount and he shied. He took off at a gallop out of sight, blowing by several other riders along the way.

Jeanette Mero, riding Triassic, dismounted to try to catch Federalee when he knocked into them, but then her horse got away from her, creating a two-horse runaway team across the desert. They raced by a few more riders, and Mero’s mount eventually began circling back toward the ranch. There he stopped, like a good endurance horse, and drank from the water trough and was caught.

But FLF Federalee was long gone. It took time to locate the unhurt riders, and it took several hours of searching by half a dozen people before Federalee was spotted grazing not far from a highway. Both horses had only minor wounds, but it was quite a disappointment for the riders.

A Full Docket

On Thursday and Friday, U.S. Chef d’Equipe Becky Grand Hart and team veterinarian Jim Bryant Jr. conducted USEF training sessions, covering everything from pacing, training for speed and terrain, how to feed, balanced riding, trotting out a horse and crewing in a vet gate.

“The clinics went well,” said Hart. “[During the competition] I could see many of the riders practicing what they learned from the days before, trotting out and crewing.”

Hart was especially pleased with the FEI portions of the ride.

“It was a good course with no surprises,” she said. “Most of the riders did well, although a few of the pulls were disappointing, especially the two at the finishes [one in the 75 and one in the 100]. Riders have an idea of what is expected, in crewing and training. It was a good ride.”

Of the nine riders on the Friday 75-mile ride, Mero, of Mariposa, Calif., led from the beginning with Maksymilian to win by an hour (7:23:35) over Laurie Birch and Scudd Run.

The 11-year-old Maksymilian has completed 18 of 20 rides in his four-season career, finishing 10th in the Tevis Cup (Calif.) in 2007 and winning first place and best condition in the Californios 100 and the Swanton 100 (Calif.) in 2008.

“I was going for the win because of what he did last year,” Mero said.

Mero used to show horses, but she grew tired of the subjective aspect of the sport.

“You’re spending a lot of money for somebody’s opinion,” she said. “Endurance is so objective. It’s just you and your horse, and if you screw up, it’s your fault! I love endurance, because you can combine your love of horses with athletic events.”

Day 2 included 59 riders in four distances. Two of the vet checks were out at the Sierra del Rio Ranch, taking riders on a scenic loop beside the Snake River and around Wild Horse Butte.

In Saturday’s 75-miler, Gail Jewel won with a time of 8:33:21.

Jewel, Kelowna, B.C., was an endurance veterinarian for many years before she realized the riders were having more fun than the vets. She took up “serious” endurance three years ago, and she now has a unique partner in Apache Eclypse.

“He’s very vain; very self-absorbed,” she admitted. “If he were human, he’d stop and look at himself in every mirror he passed.”

“Apache” was a bit wild at the beginning of the ride, “doing the ‘tranter,’ ” and tossing his head. “But he found his little bubble on the second loop and was going very well,” Jewell said. “His CRI was 44/44 most of the day.”

Jewell is focusing on building Apache’s resume for the 2010 WEG.

Only two FEI riders started the 75-miler on Sunday, and after Tracy Kaden was eliminated after Loop 2, Christoph Schork and DWA Express were left to complete the ride and win best condition.

From their Global Endurance Training center in Moab, Utah, Schork and partner Dian Woodward hauled nine horses to the Fandango. Six ultimately started, and five completed.

Schork and Woodward have more than 27,000 AERC endurance miles between them, and they currently have about 35 endurance horses in various states of training that keep them quite busy.