The Tale of Two Sisters, Part I
   |
This month’s grueling Tevis Cup endurance horse race is more than just an athletic challenge for Montana City resident, Bobbie Pomroy. By riding in the 100-mile competitive trail ride, she will fulfill a promise she made four years ago to her dying sister and closest friend, Wanda Miller.
Miller, 55, formerly of Fairfield, was training her horse, Hopper, for the Tevis Cup when she was diagnosed with cancer. The last week of her life, hospice caretakers gave the sisters, who grew up in Dillon, a book to write down their special memories. Miller became distraught as she talked about her horse and her dream of racing in the Tevis Cup.
“I’m going to cry when I talk about this,” Pomroy said. “But that was the one thing she wanted to do in her lifetime. And she knew she wasn’t going to get to do it.”
So she said she made her sister a promise.
“I’ll get your horse to the Tevis Cup. Don’t worry.”
Her promise lightened the mood for a moment and made her sister laugh. “She reminded me of what a horrible rider I was,” Pomroy said. “She thought it was funny. I didn’t know anything about horses. She was always the rider and I was always the runner.”
A LEG UP
Pomroy, 58, is no stranger to endurance sports. She and her husband, Jim Pomroy, have competed in ultra-marathons all over the country. In 1989, they founded one of Montana’s main ultra-marathons, the Elkhorn Mountain Endurance Run.
Miller was often Pomroy’s support crew during her ultra-marathons, including the 100-mile Western States Endurance Run.
“In 1984 when I was running my first Western States 100, my sister and family crewed for me,” Pomroy explained. “That’s where Wanda learned about the Tevis Cup. The horse race covers the exact same trail we run on. The Tevis became her dream.”
After that, Miller started riding her quarter horses in endurance events. She could complete the rides but was unable to compete. Arabian horses dominate in the sport. She and her husband, Bill Miller, eventually bought a gray yearling Arab from a horse farm in Hamilton. At the time, they were managing a ranch near Emigrant. They brought the mare home and began training her. This horse was to be her ticket to the Tevis Cup.
“Wanda named her Hopper for a reason,” Pomroy said. “She would do these incredible jumps and unpredictable leaps to the side and about dump you. You could hardly ride her at 4 years old.”
Miller completed one 50-mile endurance ride on Hopper before she was diagnosed in the summer of 2000 with adenocarcinoma, a lung cancer that can occur in nonsmokers. She died five months later at their home in Fairfield.
“My sister was always doing things for me and helping me,” Pomroy said. “She was just 18 months older than me and we did everything together. She always said the right things during crisis times and we had many of those. I wanted to do something for her.”
So Pomroy brought Hopper back to her home in the Elkhorn Mountains to tackle the first stage of getting to the Tevis Cup - learning to ride a horse.
Bill Miller supported his sister-in-law’s desire to keep her Tevis Cup promise. “I was pretty nervous though,” he said. “Hopper was powerful and spirited and Bobbie was just an amateur.”
Wanda’s youngest son, Jack Mitchell, a veterinarian now living in Florida, was also supportive. But, he worried.
“She’d only ridden a little bit,” Mitchell said. “I was concerned for her safety. My mom was an experienced equestrian and she even took some bad spills on Hopper. I didn’t want Aunt Bobbie to get hurt.”
A GRUELING RACE
The Tevis Cup is for serious horsepeople only. Since the race’s beginning 50 years ago, the ride has followed a rugged, mountainous 100-mile course from Tahoe to Auburn, Calif. The trail is single-track for 60 percent of the race. With deadly drop-offs in many areas, there’s little room for a misstep.
The trail traverses the remote wilderness of the Sierra Nevada Mountains, up and down rocky peaks, over many different types of bridges (including a swinging bridge), and crosses the American River. It includes some 19,000 feet of uphill trail and 22,000 feet of downhill, according to the race Web site (www.foothill.net/tevis). The route is known for its dust and withering heat with temperatures routinely hitting 100 degrees.
The start is one of the most nerve-wracking parts of the event. There, 250 horses and riders pack into one area for a mass start at 5 a.m. Riders get dumped, kicked, or run over before it even begins.
Competitors cannot use headlamps because the lights may startle the horses. Instead, to see the trail, they carry glowsticks and rely on the light of the start’s traditional near-full moon.
Competitive trail riding isn’t just about who gets their horse to the finish line first. According to the race rules, the philosophy of the Tevis Cup is “to ride in the best tradition of good sportsmanship, good horsemanship, and to finish with a mount that is ‘fit to continue’.” There are 19 checkpoints. Riders have crews bring in food, water and gear to eight of the official stops. At most of the checkpoints, veterinarians assess the condition of the horses before releasing them to continue.
The key in endurance racing is to get the horse’s heart rate down as quickly as possible at the checkpoints. Many riders get off and walk their horses when they know a checkpoint is coming. Each veterinary checkpoint has a mandatory pulse criteria. A horse cannot leave until its required heart rate is achieved. At the earlier checkpoints, the horse’s pulse must drop to 60 beats per minute. Later, the pulse must be 64 to 68 beats per minute depending on the stage. If after 30 minutes the pulse is still not down, the horse is pulled from the race.
Race vets also evaluate the horse’s gait for lameness. They check hydration and gut sounds and test for performance-enhancing drugs. Vets have the power to pull a mount from the race at anytime and they do. On average, only half of the horses that start the Tevis Cup finish.
Rider and horse must finish the race in 24 hours or they are disqualified.
The Tevis Cup and Haggin Cup are two of the most sought after ride awards. According to the race rules, “the Tevis Cup trophy is awarded to the person who completes the 100-mile one day course in the shortest amount of time and whose horse is in sound condition and fit to continue.” The Haggin Cup is awarded to the rider whose horse is in the best physical condition of the first 10 horses to cross the finish line.
There are no monetary prizes. Participants who complete the ride within the 24-hour limit get the coveted silver completion belt buckle. For many of the 250 riders, the goal is just to finish this demanding race.
GETTING BACK ON
H. A. Lady Valerie, otherwise known as Hopper, stands at just 14 hands.
“When you hit the ground, she seems a lot taller,” Pomroy said. “The first year was really hard for me. I fell off so many times.”
It took a season of riding before she started to figure out Hopper. At first, she was scared to saddle her and take her on a stroll away from the house by herself.
“One time Jim and I were riding in the mountains and Hopper stumbled and fell,” Pomroy said. “If I hadn’t of jumped off of her she would have fallen on me.”
The close call scared her and she started thinking that maybe she couldn’t do this, she said. Her husband even gave her a way out. He told her that if she couldn’t fulfill her promise, he wouldn’t tell anyone she had made it.
“But I had to keep trying,” Pomroy said. “Every time I’d fall off and be laying on the ground too scared to get back up I’d see my sister’s face, especially the day she couldn’t talk anymore (just before she died). She was so scared. I knew I had to get back on for her.”
Her perseverance paid off. A year later in 2003 after completing a 25-mile ride, she decided to enter her first 50-mile endurance run in Roundup.
“Hopper was so excited that she ran sideways the first half of the race,” she said. “At the end of the ride, my legs were black and blue from the knees down from hitting the saddle.”
Pomroy and Hopper devoted last summer to qualifying for the 2005 Tevis Cup, completing the 150 miles of competition in rides of at least 50 miles.
This horse and rider team just keeps getting better. At this year’s Wyoming Wild Horse Canyon Ride, they finished two back-to-back 50-mile runs, winning both of the “best condition” awards.
LAST MINUTE DETAILS
Pomroy has trained hard but she does have worries. The extreme heat, running in the dark, and the mass start are at the top of her list of concerns. She does have one advantage over many Tevis Cup rookies; she has run the trail 6 times on foot in the Western States 100 Ultra-Marathon. Her best running time was 22 hours and 1 minute, placing her in the master’s record books. She knows what to expect.
“It’ll be really hot,” she explained. “Every time I’ve run through that canyon it was 120 degrees except for one rare time when it rained. In Montana, it’s hard to get good heat training for both horses and riders.”
She plans to get off Hopper in the canyon and run it on foot so her horse doesn’t get overheated.
“I rode Hopper 5 hours yesterday,” she said. “And this morning I ran 10 miles to keep myself in shape. I plan to run 10 to 15 miles of the Tevis on foot to give the horse a break.”
When it comes to the race start, she plans to be in the middle of the bunch. She doesn’t want to block those who are racing to win, but she does want to be in front of the problem horses that are usually put at the back of the pack. She will put a red ribbon on Hopper’s tail, warning riders to watch for flying feet if they get too close.
Pomroy and her crew plan to get to the race trail a few days early for one last lesson. She wants to take Hopper over the section that they’ll be traversing in the dark so the horse will know the trail and footing.
“After that training ride,” she said. “we’ll be ready.”
A PROMISE KEPT
Pomroy’s promise to her sister 4 years ago has turned into a family effort. Her husband, Jim, has since taken up endurance riding and is one of her main training partners along with Bill Miller, Wanda’s husband. Both men are now running in competitive rides on their own Arabians.
“The first couple of years I did this because I had to for Wanda,” Pomroy said. “Now I can’t wait to get out and ride. We’ve bought these other horses so we can be training them as our future Tevis horses. It’s exciting.”
She said she couldn’t have done this without Bill Miller, her brother-in law and main horse person. “He saw me the first time I climbed on board Hopper and he’s been helping me ever since.”
“Wanda would have liked to be here doing this for herself,” Miller explained. “And Bobbie just set her heart to do it for her. All of our rides together have been geared to help Hopper get to this point, to the Tevis Cup.”
With the race just nine days away, Pomroy is on high alert to keep Hopper healthy and injury-free.
“We don’t want anyone else touching Hopper at this point,” she said. “So Bill just put new shoes on her himself.”
The sisters’ husbands will be the main part of Pomroy’s Tevis race crew. Other family members also will be traveling to California to support Bobbie and celebrate Wanda’s life.
Wanda’s son, Jack Mitchell, is flying in from Florida and her other son, Will Mitchell, and daughter, Tina Klotz, and their families are hoping to come as well. The sisters’ older brother, Gary Fornfeist, also plans to be part of the race crew.
With her family’s help, this Montanan woman saddles up on July 23 for the ride of her life, to honor her sister’s life and a promise she made at the end of it.
“My mom and Aunt Bobbie are the most tenacious people I’ve ever met,” Jack Mitchell said. “They held each other up throughout their lives until the end. I know how much this would have meant to my mom.”
( 1 Vote )
