Fords Cruise to Tevis Win
By Marsha Hayes August 5, 2012Garrett Ford has been declared winner of the 2012 Tevis Cup Ride, his wife Lisa in second place.
Riding his 12-year-old Arabian gelding The Fury, Ford crossed the finish line at 10:05 p.m. PDT on Aug. 4 with Lisa Ford a few steps behind on her 10-year-old gelding CE Cyclone. Their ride time for the 100-mile event was 14 hours, 50 minutes.
The Fury and Garrett Ford, 2012 Tevis Cup winners. (Photo courtesy of the Western States Trails Foundation)
Garrett Ford, who is the owner of the EasyCare hoof boot company, rode The Fury to fifth at last year’s Tevis Cup, and eighth in 2010, when the horse was also awarded the 2010 Haggin Cup for best conditioning.
This year’s Tevis was not without drama, as 2011 champ Jeremy Reynolds, a three-time winner, was eliminated early in the race when his horse took a spill around Mile 10. His wife Heather Reynolds, who won Tevis in 2003, was out front for much of the ride and appeared poised to win until mile 85 when Cyclone suffered a muscle cramp and was pulled by the vets monitoring the race.
“Lisa and I have been training with the Reynolds since May,” Garrett Ford told reporters at the finish line. “They are the two best riders in the world and Lisa and I would not be here without what we learned from them.”
Shannon Constanti and Dancin' Blaze finished fifth. (Photo courtesy the Western States Trails Foundation)
Ford pointed out that third place finisher Kevin Myers and fourth place rider Rusty Toth were among six 2012 riders who trained at his Durango, CO, facility to prep for the ride. “I’ve got a mountain that goes from 6,800 feet to 11,700 feet right out my backdoor,” Ford noted. Shannon Constanti and Dancin’ Blaze came in fifth. (Top 10 and link to complete list of winners below)
While in daily life the saying tends to be “ladies first,” endurance riding husband-and-wife teams have a tradition of deferring to the male ego. “We went through a little conflict with each of us saying, ‘You go first,’” Lisa said. “But, you know, someone has to win.”
Now in its 57th year, the Tevis Cup Ride is a non-profit endeavor, produced by the Western States Trails Foundation, which maintains trails throughout the Lake Tahoe area and Placer County, CA. Hundreds of volunteers work to make the annual event possible.
For a complete list of winners, follow this link, and in the upper right-hand corner of the new page, use the drop-down menu to change the number of “Standings Per Page” from 10 to 100.
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