Remember at the beginning I said I had two tales about Alex Forman and one re Artie Hawkins? You all liked the Artie story, so even tho I havent gotten the pix for this and following stories scanned yet, here goes as I have time and Arthur is somewhat at bay. Somebody had posted the Practical Horseman article Never Miss Another Jumping Distance which reminded me to get this down. Youll see the Alex connection toward the end. I dont know why the Secor/Hillaire contingent went to Ould Newbury at Newburyport on the Mass.-NH border: whether it was because of hospitality, a pleasure horse division for Mother and Pat (de Foie), the buckets of fried clams just down the road or whatever. It was NOT because of the outside (hunter) course, a disgrace even for a C Show, much less an A. Most of the fences were very low and even more rickety. The normal course started over a birch pole fence, out over a couple of others, a sharpish U-turn to the right at the end with a long gallop to a wooden brick wall even with the judges stand, on to a very substantial and high white gate and four strides to a less than 22-ft (distance fixed!) rickety rustic rail in-and-out. The whole weekend I had been letting Ugly (Candy Stripe) just run to the brick wall, ending with a bloody ordinary (in Strine, thats an insult) jump. For the Stake class, I was determined to actually ride that fence (remember? I had only been having jumping instructions since 1962). The Stake class started over the first two fences, a U-turn to the left, over the gate, on to the in-and-out, a left U-turn and the whole regular course, finishing with the -22-ft in-and-out. There were more than 20 entries in the Stake class, with my go about 2/3 of the way down the list. By the time I went, there were only 2 or 3 clear rounds (no knock downs), with Jay Golding on his big, almost white grey one of them, but his horse had so twisted over the gate, you could count the stitches on the bottom of his girth. My first four fences were fine (Ugly hadnt really gotten going, so I did not have to balance too much for the first time over the in-and-out), out to the end and the right U-turn. I really balanced Ugly and waited until I saw my distance. About five strides out I saw a big one and rode for it. Why, Ill never know, but at the height of the jump, I lost my right (facing the judge) stirrup. On to the white gate, four strides and over the in-and-out. There may have been a slight hind rub, so I turned around before pulling up, saw it still intact, threw myself on Uglys neck and yelled: Ugly, youre beautiful! I pulled up and left the course. I had never bothered stripping for jogging as Ugly really was compared to the million $ TBs he was up against, but Randy, head road groom, pulled me off by my coat collar and three grooms stripped Ugly and buffed as hard as they could. I watched the rest of the class, not too proud even now to admit I may have mentally jinxed the rest. At the end, there were only four clear rounds. I thought I might get second or third (Ugly was not a good mover) but would have been insulted if called fourth (behind Jay Goldings grey). When I got called first, I shrieked and jumped higher than Uglys 16-2 withers. In later years when he had become a close family friend, Alex Forman also remembered that day. He, too, had no idea why I lost my stirrup and had hoped it would not affect the rest of my round. But he also said that he had never been so pleased by the reaction of somebody being called out to jog first. Of course, Ugly was sound, and I must have still been smiling when I returned to work on Monday.
Posted on: Sun, 04 Jan 2015 05:04:19 +0000
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