Endurance.Net: World News

Saturday, September 12, 2020

Mongol Derby Diary #3

…and they’re off!

Start camp survived, training rides tested, the riders line up on Day 1 of racing not knowing what the next ten days may bring. Some will crash and burn; some will persevere through hardships previously unimaginable; but each and every rider will come away with memories that will sustain them for the rest of their lives.

Leslie Wylie ~ “If post time at the Kentucky Derby were a polite tea party, the start of the Mongol Derby would be a stein-smashing bar brawl. All around me, mayhem: 42 white-knuckled, steel-faced riders mounted up on tiny horses with steam blowing out their ears, the most civilized among them skittering around like popcorn while others spun like tops or flat bolted through the crowd.

These were the descendants of Mongolian warhorses and for all they knew we were charging off into battle, having missed the memo that Chinggis Khan’s mighty empire fell several centuries ago. In the final moments before the race a couple riders were still endeavoring just to climb in the saddle, their mounts issuing a buck-spin the moment they put their foot in the stirrup despite the herders trying to hold them down.

We’d been randomly issued horses for the first leg of the 28-leg race. Mine was midnight black and moved with a cocky mob-boss swagger, and I wanted desperately to stay on his good side. Ed Fernon, an Australian Olympic pentathlete whom I’d gotten to know on the six-hour bus ride to start camp, pointed out that I’d drawn the winner of the Naadam children’s race that had been our afternoon entertainment the day before. So he was basically a kid’s pony, right? Surely I could handle that. As the countdown began I lingered near the back, hoping to avoid fallout from the frontline and just run with the pack for a while...

Thursday, September 10, 2020

'Excited but nervous': Zoe, 26, to take on world's toughest horse race

Shropshirestar.com - Full Article

By Charlotte Bentley | Bishop's Castle | News | Published: Sep 9, 2020

People from all over the world apply for a place in the Mongol Derby, the world's longest and toughest horse race, and a 26 year-old from Shropshire is one of the chosen few.

Zoe Geddes, who lives in Lydbury North in south Shropshire, never thought she'd get a place in the infamous horse race, which only has 40 places.

She said she has had to work hard for everything in her life and this will be no different, as alongside the gruelling training, Zoe must raise £11,000 to take part.

After raising two children, and coming out of a toxic relationship only this year, Zoe wanted something to set her mind to, and thought of nothing better than achieving her lifelong dream of competing in the 1,000km race on the other side of the world...

Tuesday, September 01, 2020

Great Britain: Red Dragon ‘Lite’ gets green light!

EGB.myclubhouse.co.uk - Full Article

31 August 2020

Green light for Endurance GB’s British Horse Feeds and The Golden Paste Company’s Red Dragon ‘Lite’ Festival of Endurance

Organisers announce traditional end of season ride will go ahead 3-4 October at Royal Welsh Showground, Builth Wells, thanks to generosity of sponsors and with strict changes in format to comply with Covid 19 regulations

British Horse Feeds and The Golden Paste Company have announced their continued support for the sport with title sponsorship of this year’s "Lite" Red Dragon Festival of Endurance.

Endurance GB and the organising team have stressed their gratitude for the support of both sponsors and the hosts and underlined that the event will be run with strict changes to the format to ensure compliance with Welsh Covid 19 regulations with the focus this year being on individual sport.

The Red Dragon Festival of Endurance at Builth Wells in mid-Wales is traditionally the last big event of the endurance riding season, with competitors travelling from across the UK to the Royal Welsh Showground for the unique atmosphere and challenging riding through the Cambrian mountains.

To enable the 2020 event to go ahead, classes for this year’s "Lite" version of Red Dragon have been revised to ensure that groups of people do not meet. The classes will run over two days instead of the usual three, with distances of 25km, 36km, 42km and 48km and various combinations of these for riders wishing to take part over two days. The 22 classes will include Graded Endurance Rides and Pleasure Rides but no Competitive Endurance Rides this year.

Graded Endurance Rides are ideally suited to social distancing because they are a solitary competition where the horse and rider head out over the course on their own or in pairs and are then given a grade at the end of the ride based on the fitness of their horse. The organisers intend to make full use of the enormous 150-acre Royal Welsh Showground site to also keep groups of people apart back at the venue...

Sunday, August 30, 2020

Mongol Derby Diary #2

Ian Haggerty photo
TheAdventurists.com - Full Story

August 4 2020

Training Camp Trials and Tribulations: the Guts and the Glory

The Derby proper begins when the start gun fires on Day 1 of the race, but there’s an entire universe of events leading up to that moment. Once the riders have made it to Mongolia, with or without their gear, Start camp is the next stop and the first exposure to the realities of this race for the majority of these brave souls. Start camp is where you first get on a horse. Start camp is where you test your kit, test your mettle, and where the steppe tests you in return.

Outlaw Kate (Katherine Friedley) ~ “It was the first day of on-the-steppe rider training and I was both excited and extremely nervous about what was to come. I’d met up with a few of the riders back in UB and I was suffering from the worst case of imposter syndrome imaginable: there were the race-horse-riding girls from Dubai, the polo-playing rich-looking dudes from the UK, and horse trainers and horse traders from all corners of the globe, all of whom seemed more nonchalant about the coming race than me. I was 47 years old and on the upper end of the age scale in comparison to the majority of the riders and definitely feeling out of my league. What was I doing here? But there was literally nothing I could do about my misgivings at that point except to cowboy-up and put on my game face.

I will forever remember my first training ride and settling on my first horse – a cooperative-looking dun with a dorsal stripe. I will also forever remember hitting the ground an hour later, doing around 20km/hr across the steppe in a race mock-up with Julie Youngblood...

Saturday, August 29, 2020

Australia: Tom Quilty gets the go-ahead for 2021

FarmWeekly.au - Full Article

Amanda Rayner
29 Aug 2020

NO matter how carefully a project is planned, something may still go wrong with it.

It is with great disappointment and regret that the Tom Quilty endurance horse ride, due to be held in Collie in September, is to be postponed due to the repercussions of COVID-19.

The good news is that following two months of negotiation, the ride will be held on October 1-3, 2021, at Collie.

New South Wales was due to hold the event next and had had significant preparations in place - that event will now be held in 2022...

Tuesday, August 25, 2020

First time endurance races in Chlumec nad Cidlinou, Czech Republic

Endurance-world.com - Full Article

25 August 2020
Race Report made with the assistance of Zuzana Zezulkova

Chlumec nad Cidlinou, Czech Republic. Friday 7 and Saturday 8 August 2020.

Chlumec nad Cidlinou, is a small old city in lowlands close to the highway between Prague and Hradec Kralove, almost in the centre of Czech Republic. Close to it is a 200 years old stud “Ostrov”, home of the Kinsky horses, and host of the very first endurance event in history. All surroundings are still owned by the Kinsky dal Borgo family and thanks to their kindness it was possible to organise an endurance ride in cooperation with the Czech equestrian federation and several sponsors.

Despite the short time for preparation of the event due to the Covid pandemic, the organiser managed to make a comfortable base for all participants. Luckily the Covid situation in Czech Republic was not too bad and with some hygiene measures green light was given for this event...

Friday, August 21, 2020

Mongol Derby Diary #1

TheAdventurists.com - Full Story

August 3, 2020

Welcome to our recap of some of the best/worst/most memorable moments of the Derby over the past decade. We’ll get into the nitty-gritty of this mind-blowing race with stories from many years, many riders, and many angles. What happens when a rider turns up in Mongolia but their carefully curated-and-tested-to-oblivion gear doesn’t? What really goes on at start camp? What goes on behind the scenes? What’s this all about? Stay tuned over the coming days to find out the answers to these questions and much, much more.

Where it all started, way, way back when:

Ever heard the term “Packing the Mail”?

The mighty Mongol Derby is a recreation of Chinggis Khan’s empire hustling supply routes. Örtöös (check points) were manned by nomadic families who lived along these routes and provided food, shelter, and fresh horses for the Mongolian army messengers. The Mongolian army was famous for traveling at high speeds atop their tough-as-nails horses, so these messengers needed to be faster. Urgent messages were known to travel at speeds of 200–300 kilometers (120–190 mi) per day...