I’ve been back a week now and it still feels incredibly strange to think that I have completed the Mongol Derby. I still can’t quite believe that it is all over and that I have actually done it, it feels like a bit of a dream! So it’s time to put pen to paper…
Start Day -1
This should actually have been the start day but a few things got in the way. I am not normally one for nerves or apprehension but I have never felt as sick as I did that morning! Forcing breakfast down because I knew I needed to eat even though every mouthful made me feel worse. I have a new found sympathy for those that suffer with nerves like this… What the hell was I doing here and what was I about to embark on???
We went out to the horse line in groups, I was in ger 9 so the last group to head out. Charmaine and I actually made a beeline for the same horse, but she got there first. I went for the chunky little roan next to the chestnut she’d picked. The horses were saddled, our vet books were signed out and on we got for a warm up. And then the announcement came. The satellite monitoring our trackers was down so we couldn’t start the race… The HQ team had no idea how long this was going to take to resolve so we dismounted, horses were untacked and tied back on the horse line and we waited, and waited, most of us just out by the horse line with the herders.
By lunchtime everyone started to move back into the camp. We could see a huge storm coming down between the mountains where we would have been riding had we started that morning. We watched the lightening flashing until the rain started and everyone took cover. There was a silver lining to not having started that morning! It blew through quite quickly but looking back out to the mountains we could see rivers appearing that hadn’t been there before, flood water flowing down the hills.
The satellite came back up later in the afternoon but it was too late to start the race by that point. The crew managed to pull together a dinner and an early night was had in preparation for our new start which was now at 7:30 the next morning.
Start Day
Strangely no feeling sick or apprehensive this morning. I think 24 hours of waiting just made me want to get on with it. Up, breakfasted and out to the horse line. Once on there was a bit of milling around before we headed down to the start line. After a few words from Race Chief Katy we were off. It was a bit of a strange feeling knowing that there were another 40 riders around you but strangely not everyone headed off in the same direction…
I’d named my horse Viking as he reminded me of an Icelandic pony. He went off quick but couldn’t keep up the speed so his canter slowed. The field became more and more spread out and I started to loose sight of the front runners. We chugged along for a while and after about 20km I realised that my fender had broken! Not a great start with the kit… Just as this happened a group of riders caught up with me and Kelsey stopped whilst I duck taped the offending article. We then rode together to HS1.
The terrain changed quite a lot on this leg. We had a lot of flat, flooded grassland to start with that changed into some quite steep hills as we approached HS1. It had been a slow leg taking over 4 hours. Viking vetted in fine at the station, I stopped for a bite to eat and something to drink and whilst I was there Jeanette arrived. She’d had an awful start. Her horse had galloped uncontrollably for 20km and then stopped and laid down. She’d had to get off and lead it the last 15km…
We’d both been in ger 9 so had got to know each other a bit at start camp and so decided to ride the next leg together. We picked a pair of horses from the line and off we went in search of HS2. I had a fantastic little chestnut that just flew along, unfortunately Jeanette’s horse wasn’t quite so fit and tired relatively quickly. What we didn’t learn for the first few days was that we could have pushed the horses a lot harder than we did, it turns out we were just a bit too nice… So another pretty slow 4 hour leg and we finally got to HS2.
A very quick turn around as it was nearly 5pm and off we went again. We rode this leg with Jack and Rob who’d had to 2 hour vet penalty at the station. So 4 of us headed off into the oncoming storm. It goes against your natural instinct riding towards lightening especially when the ground is totally flat, and it was pretty unpleasant galloping into the rain when that finally started! But that being said all was going well, I had another forward going horse that was happy just to run regardless of the weather or the ground. We’d got about 20km in and reached some flood water that we couldn’t ride through. We were riding by the side of a road so went up onto the road to avoid the water. And that’s where it went wrong… Just as we started to come down off the road my seemingly quiet horse put in a cracking buck and that was me left sitting at the side of the road trying to work out what had happened. Pretty bad pain in my lower back where I’d hit the floor and a bump to the head. By the time I realised what was going on I could just see my horse galloping back the way we had come. As we’d been almost the last ones out of the HS2 there happened to be a passing crew vehicle less than 5mins later. The others rode on and the medics were called in to check me out. A bit battered and bruised and a few pain killers later and I was in the blood wagon on my way to HS3 hoping that someone would catch my horse and retrieve my kit. The thought of loosing everything on day 1 was pretty disheartening…
HS3 was busy, over 20 of us had made it to that station that day. Luckily about an hour after I got there someone delivered my kit, so I had dry clothes and sleeping bag which was all I wanted by this point.
Day 2
After a final check by the medics, because of the bump to my head, I was given the all clear to ride. The first horse I selected was a bit wild, bucking on the end of the rope once tacked up. Still feeling pretty bruised and sore from the day before I decided that he was a bit too much to handle that morning. So I switched him for a quieter horse, and off Jeanette and I went. Her horse had speed, but mine just kept going, so whilst we lagged behind a bit we always caught up. He was a great little horse, really sure footed dodging all the marmot holes as we went along. Unfortunately a couple of km from HS4 he went lame, so that was us walking in the last 6km, another slower leg than we’d anticipated.
A quick turn around and we were off again, Cele had come into the station as we were there so joined us on this leg. Unfortunately we all had pretty slow, stubborn horses on this leg. The little bay I was riding would go for it, if it was a direction he wanted to go in, unfortunately most of the time the direction on the gps was not the direction that he wanted to go! And I knew he was just testing me because at no point during the 35km did he even break into a sweat… So another slow leg and we finally made it to HS5.
We tried for a quick turnaround here but the horse I had picked got loose after the herders had saddled him and he went for a gallop with his herd for 10 mins. A note to anyone thinking of taking this on, always switch the horse if they’ve been for a gallop before you get on… This particular horse was great for the first 20km and then he was done. I now understand where the term flogging a dead horse comes from… Jeanette’s horse had been pretty steady from the start and was unfit so 16km out from HS6 we were wondering how we were going to get to the station by the 8pm deadline. We’d been riding with Cele and Karin who’s horses were still fresh so they carried on to try and make the station in time.
Jeanette and I decided we had no choice but to sleep out. At 8pm and about 7km out from the station we found a ger. After about 30 mins we managed to convince them to let us stay. At first they weren’t too keen as the station wasn’t that far away but we couldn’t get them to understand that we had a time limit for when we had to stop riding. Cele actually returned at this point as well as she wasn’t going to make it to the station by 8pm either. So we tied the horses up and as I was untacking my horse went crazy, broke free and galloped off!! So the poor family spent an hour catching him. They were incredibly hospitable, welcoming us into their ger, cooking for us and allowing us to bed down. The next morning we were up a 6am (later than we’d hoped but the family weren’t up). After we’d packed up and tacked up the horses we gave them some time to graze. As I went to mount, my horse turned into a bronco, kicking me in the leg, knocking Jeanette to the floor and kicking her in the chest. Luckily she was wearing a body protector! And so he was loose again. The family tried to catch him but then another 2 herders turned up, the owners of the horse. I’ll never know if this was coincidence or if the family had called them in to help… Anyway they caught him, rode him and then helped me get on. We decided at this point that we weren’t going to stay with any more family’s given the trouble we had caused, I felt awful… So we finally got to HS6 at around 10am!
The first 2 days hadn’t really gone to plan and day 3 started pretty badly and it didn’t get better right away from this point but that’s enough for today…
My fundraising night page is still active so if you haven’t done so already you can still donate and 100% of all donations goes directly to the charities…