New President Cops Out
I don't have
too much to write in the presidents message this month because
I wasn't there.
I was at the opera with another Quicksilver member. It was fun.
But, I understand
Judith did a wonderful job. The elected board members are Ken Cook,
Cathy Kauer,
and Steve Lenheim. Next month we have our awards banquet at Harry's
with a new
twist. They are under new management and you must come to the back
and get a
dinner ticket before going through the line. This is the only way they
can
keep track
of how many dinners we buy and the only way we will get our $150 deposit
back. We will
have our usual stunning array of prizes and a surprise or two.
Don't miss
it and don't forget to come back and get your tickets for the dinner
line.
Maryben
This is your last
issue of QUICKSILVER QUIPS if you have not renewed your
membership for the year 2000.
Your renewal form was in the December issue of
QQ, but if you have mislaid it (or
even thrown it out, heaven forbid!) you
should send your $25 for a single
membership or $35 for a family membership
to Maryben Stover at 1299 Sandra
Drive, San Jose, CA 95125
Book Review...A Christmas gift introduced
me to book of horse essays that
seem to hit home. The
author, Thomas McGuane, writes in the book Some
Horses almost exclusively
about cutting horses, a field of which I have
little knowledge. However,
I found it very riveting. The first sentence
stayed with me. He said “Those who
love horses are impelled by an ever
receding vision, some enchanted
transformation through which the horse and
the rider become a third, much greater
thing”. How many of us have
experienced what Mr. McGuane mentions,
but never knew quite how to express
it.?
Published in 1999, Some Horses sells
for $22.95, but can be bought for
considerably less through
Amazon..com. 172 pages,. It is worth your money
and your time.
j.s.
QUICKSILVER
ITEMS OF INTEREST TO ALL
ADVANCE NOTICE from JUDY ETHERIDGE
The QQers decided to schedule a 10 mile
pleasure ride which I will be leading
to McGuire Peaks to view the
wildflowers at Sunol Regional Park
on Sunday, April 16. We would like to
have it listed in the events section.
Participants should bring a
lunch--I'll provide brownies or
some such goody. The ride will start at
10:00 AM. There are plenty
more trails for those who wish a longer ride.
Directions to Sunol: take 680
north, take the highway 84-Calaveras (not the
237-Calaveras) exit, proceed about
4 miles east on Calaveras, turn left on
Geary Road which is about 1/4 mile
past Welch Creek Road and follow Geary to
the park. Trailer parking
fee is $6.00. If you want to put a little article
in the QQ about the ride here is
the description about the trail to McGuire
Peaks. Excellent views of
San Antonio Reservoir and Mt. Diablo. Bay area
plants found along trail rare to
rest of the park. For more information,
call Judy Etheridge at (925) 862-0232.
Editor's note: We will up-date this
information in the April newsletter.
A hearty welcome to new QUICKSILVER
member LEONARD CABANISS Leonard lives in
Gilroy with his wife and two children.
We hope to see them all at our
February 12th Banquet.
Cathy Kauer sends a report.......
Just a note for Quips, I had such
a lovely time doing DVE Day 2 (only) on
Rara Equus, what a fun and challenging
ride!! Had a total blast, Rara
finished 23rd and I was so happy
with her. It only took 7 years for the horse
to make me understand her!! As you
know, the weather was spectacular, the
event was lots of fun and well represented
by QSER.
As Dominique Freeman and I mused
over dinner, maybe Jacque will give a
NDNC award (No Driver, No Crew).
It turns out there were at LEAST 3 NDNC
Quicksilver members, Becky Glaser
being the third I ran into. Becky maintains
that driving solo is the only way,
and it was sweet without teenagers vying
for radio equal time, etc.!
There may have been some tough men
there from Quicksilver but I only saw
tough women, who basically were
the original ones to win the Wild West
anyway, the way I see it (don't
let Marvin hear me say that).
Cathy
Kauer
Editor's note...I’ve asked Maryben
to sign her president's messages with some
catch phrase (remember Steve's-
50 miles to go” and Brian's “Happy Trails”?),
but she claims she can't think
of anything. So we are going to have a
Quicksilver contest titled HELP
MARYBEN. All members are eligible to compete
except Marvin. All you have
to do to win a nice set of ULSTER interference
boot is to have your slogan picked
by Maryben. She will not know who wrote
it to keep it fair. Hand them
to me (Julie) at our banquet or by mail or by
phone by February 12th. The winner
will be acknowledged in the March Quips.
From JAN SNYDER
I would have written this greeting earlier, but I was
awaiting the
end to a story that started last
weekend. Now I can tell-- I have a new
horse!
I found a nice little 6 yo
Rocky Mtn Horse gelding at a dealer in the Aromas
area. I was referred there
by my vet and two friends who've purchased horses
from Terry within the past year
and had nothing but good to say about him.
I rode Laddie last Saturday.
We got acquainted in the rather informal
arena (front yard, don't ride on
the newly seeded lawn!), then down the road
and up the hill on a real trail.
We did obstacles of various sorts, I
experienced his spook mode, good
brakes and steering, good MIND on this
little guy, and we just kept getting
better together. His single-foot is
nice, his canter is a rocking chair,
and he can really walk out, too.
He's well trained but needs more
worldly experience on the trail; not a
been-there-done-that horse yet,
but his attitude toward new things is pretty
good.
Terry and his partner and
trainer, Phil, have only had Laddie since
Thanksgiving, so barely evaluated
him enough to put on the market. They will
keep him another 10 days to work
on a few things I want done (or at least
tested to see what I need to do
later).
He passed the vet exam adequately.
Some potential for bone spavin showed
up (negative flexion and some changes
noted on x-ray), but no current
lameness and that is a problem I
understand well enough to live with the
risk. (Hey, I talked the price down
a few hundred!) He showed perfect ground
manners for the vet.
So I got myself a red, 15.1h
Solstice present! I will pick him up on
January 3rd. Weather permitting,
I'll go for another ride with the trainer
before bringing Laddie home to Lightfoot.
Ed. note: We share your joy, Jan.
-Jan
QUICKSILVER MEMBER ERIC THOMPSON and THE REAL WORLD
So you are invited to Dubai, or, how not to ride off continent.
I picked up our phone messages
Saturday afternoon. Mike had called and left
a cryptic message about doing a
foreign ride. Please call him back as soon as
possible.
I called back immediately!
It seems a high official with the UAE Organizing
Committee had contacted him and
asked him if he could fill an available open
spot for an all expense paid trip
to Dubai. This would be for a rider, groom,
and horse. Would we be interested?
YES!
On Sunday, Mike calls back
and tells us we have been accepted and to fax
Kathy's' and Zane's' resumes to
the UAE on Monday.
We are elated to say the least.
On Tuesday I call Mike to clear
up some questions I have. Mike informs me
that USET has informed him that
Zane can not go because he is a stallion and
can not meet their quarantine restrictions!
He also tells me that USET has
slapped his hands for not going
through them first--politics!
I call Mary at USET. She tells
me that since Dubai did not inform her directly
that we were invited, we were not
going! Besides, Zane could not qualify to
go since he could not meet the quarantine
restrictions placed on stallions!
When pressed as to what these restrictions
were, she had to admit she really
didn't know, but she would get back
to me.
Later that day I received a
call from the shipper in New York. We played
phone tag that evening. On Wednesday
about 10 AM we finally made contact. The
shipper, Paul, stated that he was
informed we might be headed for Dubai, but
that there was a problem in that
Zane was a stallion and wouldn't
pass the UAE quarantine restrictions,
however he would fax the needed
forms to me soon.
Now it just happened that our
vet was here at this time. We were talking
about this matter when the needed
fax came through.
Upon inspection of the 5 page
document, we determined that Zane met all the
requirements except for possibly
the EVA reporting section. I called Paul
back. He reluctantly agreed that
it sounded as if Zane did meet all
requirements except for the EVA,
and the best way to prove he was not a
carrier was to do a semen test!
Our vet, Kris, got on the phone
to the local diagnostic lab. They said they
shipped all EVA semen samples to
the University of Kentucky! Kris called
Kentucky. We were in luck, they
were starting that particular test on
Thursday at 10:30 AM. The next time
they would do the test was January 10th!
They told Kris what they needed
and then faxed us the same information plus
forms to fill out.
We went out and got Zane feeling
quite confident in his ability to perform
on demand. I brought in Zane's'
favorite mare, took the cover off the
breeding mount, and waited and waited
and waited.
I put Shazi away and got the
virgin 3 year old that had been standing across
the road from Zane for the last
3 weeks. Surely this would work, after all,
Zane had been tickling his tummy
daily for the last 3 weeks just looking at
her. Boy did he get excited. He
jumped on the mount and then changed his
mind. He did this again and again
and again.
I put Toni away and got the
28 year old mare from the pasture next to his.
My did she like him! Wink wink wink.
This is it! We found the right gal for
Zane. Zane couldn't wait to hop
on that breeding mount. But he still wouldn't
perform. What's wrong with him?
Zane has never cared before,
18 to 80 he always pleased them all!
Kathy tried to contact the
local stallion station that ships semen for us.
Turned out they were gone for 3
days.
Kris called repro services at UC
Davis. We
need an emergency semen collection--NOW!
They could do it at 4:00 PM.
I now had one and one half
hours to get Zane to Davis and hope he would
perform there!
I made it on time. They were
running a little behind schedule. They would see
him at 4:30.
I took Zane out of the trailer and
found my way back to the breeding area.
This time he knew what he was to
do! When they brought out a strange mare
with her tail wrapped he headed
straight for that breeding mount. It was all
over at 5:05.
I loaded Zane back in the trailer,
paid my bill (plastic thank you), and
headed for Sacramento airport and
Fed Ex. I had till 6:15 to make the cut off
for Kentucky. I arrived at 6:00
on the dot.
"Zane" arrived at the university
at 10:20 on Thursday! That same day, Mary
at USET informed us that AHSA had
not received "official" notice about Zane
or Kathy. Consequently, Mary had
faxed to the UAE OC a list of "Qualified FEI
riders, and Kathy was not one of
them." She also stated " We don't rate
horses, only riders. Any rider can
always lease a horse if they want to ride
off continent!"
On Friday, I spoke to Lynn
at AHSA. She told me that since the UAE didn't go
through the proper channels, the
only way we could go to the ride was on an
"Open entry." She said she would
fax me the information required.
After receiving the needed
information, I called Paul to find out how much it
would cost to ship Zane from NY.
$12,000.00 round trip including my seat and
300 pounds of luggage.
WHEW! In one week, we had gone from
a free trip to Dubai to one that would cost
us about $18,000.00 after
Kathy and Katelynn's plane fares and hotel costs.
At least the OC was still willing
to cover Zane's costs once he was there!
Let's wait and see what happens.
On Tuesday the 21st Kentucky
let us know that they were 99% sure that Zane
was free of EVA and that they would
fax us the final results on Thursday.
On Wednesday, Paul called
to let me know that the cost had gone up for Zane
to $16,000.00 round trip and that
my fare would be $1,900.00, plus there
would be a $1,500.00 quarantine
charge upon returning, plus all baggage would
be at $1.00 per pound, and that
he would charge a service fee of
$300.00!!!!!!!!!!
Lynn said that the UAE had
canceled all outstanding invitations that had not
been accepted world wide. She also
stated that the UAE had decided it could
no longer "afford" to help with
the horse costs for open riders.
With this new news, our total
costs from NY to do one endurance ride would
be at least $30,000.00! Ain't
gunna happen!!!!!!!!!!!!
We faxed AHSA that we would
not be participating in the January Endurance
Ride in Dubai!
Now I will tell you what I
think happened here.
We were invited.
USET & AHSA toes were
stepped on.
USET & AHSA placed the
UAE OC in an awkward position that they could only
get out of by "canceling" all riders
in the same similar position as ours.
The only people who will get
to ride FEI are those who have LOTS OF
$$$$$$$$$.
Shame on USET & AHSA!
Eric J. Thompson
PS-- Valerie is still having
her way paid!
Editors note: LS Zane Grey
is last
year's Quicksilver Hall of Fame
horse.
QUICKSILVER
2000
ANNUAL BANQUET & AWARDS PROGRAM
Date: Saturday, February 12, 2000
Place: Harry's Hofbrau
Location: Stevens Creek & Saratoga Ave.
Time: 6:30 p.m.
BE IN ON THE
SUSPENSE!!
Who will win .....
ELEANOR NORTON AWARD???
Hall of Fame Horse and Rider??
Horse of the Year?
EVERYONE Is A WINNER--
not a single person will go
home EMPTY HANDED
Very important: Quicksilver
pays a refundable $150 deposit to reserve the
special room. Do not
go through the dinner line until you have received a
ticket from Maryben in our reserved
room. Hand in the ticket when you pay
for your dinner and then, and then
only, will we get our refund. It would
help Maryben (265-0839) if you let
her know if you are coming, but don't stay
home if you forget. Harry
has never runs out of food.
FEBRUARY 2000
February 12 QUICKSILVER
ANNUAL BANQUET AND AWARDS
Details: see page
February 14 VALENTINES’S
DAY
Send one - Get One
February 19 20
MULE TEAM 30/65/100
Jim Bumgardner 760-375-8915
February 26
SHINE AND SHINE ONLY II 25/50
Becky Hart 408-997-0814
Published by the Quicksilver
Endurance Riders Inc.
P.O. Box 71, New Almaden,
CA 95042
Julie Suhr, Editor
TEL and FAX 831-335-5933