The End of the Season

Last weekend was the Howard County-Iron Bridge Race Meet, held at our farm (Pleasant Prospect) in the rain and sleet. It was wonderful -- like a 19th century country festival in the mud. We had ten races, a big tent, and the relay race at the end between three of the mid-Maryland hunt clubs (Howard County, Greenspring, Elkridge-Harford).

I was the Clerk of Scales again which meant I got to weigh in all the jockeys to make sure they weighed enough to race in the steeplechase. In our races, they have to be more than a minimum weight, set for each race, and if they are too light they have to sit there and add iron to their saddles until their are heavy enough. So I get to sit there with tiny leprechaun-like Irish jockeys who weigh nothing and watch them pack their saddles up with lead all the while saying to me in Irish "madam Clerk, am I heavy enough yet?" "Nay I say, not heavy enough yet." One jockey, Tom Foley who races flat races at Charleston most of the time, was so far off weight I asked him, "How much do you actually weigh, you know, naked?" He said, "117 pounds but that's just this morning ma'am because I ate breakfast." He put 50 pounds of lead in his tack to make the minimum which was 165 (I actually let him in at only 164 but don't tell anyone).

I sponsor a race (the Waterford) and it was a two horse race this year but believe it or not, it was a photo finish. Amazing! Roger came running over to me with a big bear hug and said, "how much more exciting can you get for a two horse race!" Then there was another photo finish later in the day and then the relay race. Ah, the relay race. Three times around the race course handing off a hunt whip as the baton to a team-mate each time around. Robbie was the lead leg on Beckett -- he came in first and handed off to Amanda Reilly on Godiva but Beckett didn't realize he was done and went half way around the race course again side by side with Godiva until Robbie managed to pull him off. I have never seen Robbie have to pull back on a horse so hard -- Robbie is not a weakling. Amanda somehow managed to lose ground and handed off to Jonathan with the team in second place. Jonathan cruised gently around the course, 10 strides off the lead. We thought it was over -- that Greenspring would win. People started to walk away. And then, he came down over the causeway from Waterford and around the last barrel and OUT OF NOWHERE blew past the leader (who was already standing up in his stirrups thinking he was done) and Jonathan won the whole dang thing for HOWARD COUNTY! HOORAY! Nobody could believe it. Mayhem ensued. Screaming and jumping up and down and Roger running around everywhere hugging everyone and Marianne Ridgely (Madam Maryland Racing) practically beside herself. Jonathan later claimed that he was coming down the causeway and Robbie (who had only recently managed to get back near the start with Beckett the Horse Who Wouldn't Stop) was in the infield and said, in a voice as if from God, "Jonathan! Go to the Whip! Go to the Whip!" And that was that. And it was Jonathan's first race. Thrilling. Don and Dale and Jonathan and I sat in the lodge at the farm all night rejoicing and got sufficiently carried away with ourselves that we ended up agreeing to syndicate a race horse so now I guess I technically have three horses. Hmm.

Then today was our last day of hunting for the season. So sad. It was a small little group and we met two hours earlier than usual so that people could make it up to the Greenspring Hunt Races that were also today. It was chilly so we had good sport. Roger decided that his field had become sufficiently competent that he took us over two large jumps that we didn't even know were in our territory -- a brand new three foot or more railroad tie jump (made out of railroad ties, one on top of another, very solid, generally speaking scary) through a fenced in field and out over a coop at the top. Everybody managed. I got popped out of my tack by Mr. Burton over both jumps which was a little unexpected. One of us jumped a bigger jump than the other one did but I'm not sure who did what exactly. I was airborne over my steed for a few seconds but landed in the saddle at almost the same time that Burton landed on the ground, but not quite. My friend Rebecca behind me said, "hmm, I saw air." I kind of hurt my face because my face made contact with Burton's neck before the rest of me landed. Then we viewed the ragged brown fox across the soy bean field, we ran fiercely down a hill, and then called it quits until September. Yummy fried chicken in the clubhouse.

But we are not too sad because April is hunter pace month and tomorrow we are off to the Potomac Hunter Paces which is held at the Potomac kennels. There are two exciting things about this -- the first is that Jonathan is taking Kona which is a miracle because Kona, as some of you may recall, is terrified of nature. Kona's winter vacation ended a few weeks ago and now he is in full-time Pleasant Prospect school which is just such a wonderful thing because Dale can make any horse into a perfect beast and someone else does all the hard work and I just get back on him when he graduates. Dale plans to take Kona on the entire hunter pace circuit and seems to think he might even be jumping the low course by the end. I'm somewhat stunned that she thinks all this will actually happen. So I'm very excited because both my horses will be on the trailer tomorrow which is something I never thought would happen.

The second exciting thing is that the most impressive lady in our club (in my humble opinion), Marianne Ridgely, who is the grand dame of Maryland racing and sort of the Katharine Hepburn of Howard County, is going to be my team-mate over the high course. She is taking her spotted horse Scout and she asked me to be her lead over everything which is shocking honor (she respects Burton). Last season I was scared to death to ride anywhere near Marianne in the field because she's so perfect and has been hunting all her life, etc. She has beautiful gray hair and is skinny as a rail and long long legs and looks fabulous on pretty much any horse. She is always the first person behind the master. She raced at Foxhall a few weeks ago on her horse Wilson and jumped a 4.5 foot fence. That's higher than an Olympic level fence. It's very high. She came over to me at the clubhouse after hunting and said, "I would be delighted to be your team-mate! Come get some food and sit down with me over here and let's talk about the hunter paces! What fun we will have!"

So it's another early morning tomorrow but I'm sure it will be fun.

And the final bit of news is that due to all this activity in Howard County these days and the fact that I spend most of my time out there, Don is renting me the apartment in the lodge at the farm to be a weekend spot and hunt box during the season. Which will cut about 3 hours of driving time out each weekend and will improve my social life dramatically.