Column by Hal Walter
Mountain Life – September 2002 – Colorado Central Magazine
It’s the morning after the Buena Vista pack-burro race, and when I put my feet down off the bed I wasn’t sure that I would be able to stand, much less walk. There’s a sharp pain on the inside of my left ankle and something dull and swollen on the ball of my right foot, a problem I didn’t know I had when I went to bed last night.
One of those four-legged walkers like old people use would be handy to get to the coffee pot. Outside the burros are braying and bashing against the gate. They’re hungry, and I have overslept. This morning’s chores of feeding may be more physically demanding than yesterday’s race.
It’s been a long summer on the pack-burro racing circuit. Actually it’s been a long couple of years. Since winning the World Championship in Fairplay in 2000, the only time I’ve found myself in the winner’s circle was at a small race in Los Sauces last summer. Other than that it’s been a frustrating string of seconds, thirds, fourths and even a fifth place.
It’s a peculiar sport I have chosen and have stuck with for 23 years. Get Your Ass Up the Pass. We run with these animals over some rugged terrain, 10 to 29 miles, to altitudes over 13,000 feet. The saddles are weighed to make sure they are at least 33 pounds before every race. We are not allowed to ride. We are required to answer the ridiculous questions of tourists.
Last year after a disappointing season I went shopping for a new animal. My gelding Spike had won some races over the last four years, but his psychotic behavior and almost belligerent laziness had begun to wear on my patience.
I found in New Mexico a jack by the name of Ace owned by donkey breeder and trader Scott Martin. So I drove to Belen, south of Albuquerque, to check out Ace at a donkey and mule show at the fairgrounds there. When I drove into the parking lot I immediately recognized the jack from photographs, but he appeared even better than I had anticipated. He was a very colorful paint donkey, 13.2 hands tall. His build was racier than anything I had ever seen. His attitude was distinctly active.
Ace’s owner hadn’t done much with him other than use him for breeding, though he did say he had ridden him a couple of times. I led him away from the trailer and he walked away with me on a loose rope. I took him away from the show where most of his attention seemed to be focused on jennies.
Within minutes I had him running alongside me. He seemed to learn quickly and was very fast on his feet. I put a riding saddle on him and, with my friend Carol who is a horse trainer leading him, I got on his back and found that he would trot out under a saddle.
The price was high but this donkey seemed to be the most perfect animal I’d ever seen. Carol, who despite being a real cowgirl has a bit of a cosmic streak, produced a trinket on a string and asked the blunt question. The trinket swung strongly in the positive direction. I don’t put much stock in such things, but everything else seemed right so I wrote a check to Scott and loaded Ace in the trailer.
[Burros and humans just before the Buena Vista race]
We stayed with a friend who lives near the New Mexico State Fairgrounds in Albuquerque and I hoped to find a stall there. I pulled in the main gate and a woman told me to drive back out and around to Gate 8. When I arrived at that gate there was a line of trucks and trailers and it occurred to me that a lot of people were boarding stock at the fairgrounds. A guy asked me my name, and charged what seemed like a very nominal fee for a stall. He handed me a bunch of papers and pointed toward the barn where I was to take my “horse.” I didn’t feel like explaining so I just drove on over to the barn.
As I unloaded Ace and got him set up in his stall I noticed the other trucks and trailers were pretty fancy and the horses that were being unloaded were even fancier. I started to wonder if there was some sort of event going on here at the fairgrounds. Before I drove away I looked through the papers and realized that I had unwittingly gotten lucky on this stall because of a roping event the next day. I decided to just go with the flow. I came back that evening to check on Ace and everything seemed quiet. The next morning bright and early we loaded up and were off to Colorado.
Back home, the first time I ever took Ace out for training he went out the front gate at full stride and ran a short loop almost perfectly. I was astonished. Not only was he fast, but he was easy to handle. The only problem I could foresee was my own inability to keep up with him.
However in the weeks ahead, Ace became sort of sluggish. I wondered if he was just plain bored, or if there was some nutritional problem. Or maybe his feet were bothering him. Still, I plodded along with him because he in fact seemed so much smoother than Spike. In fact, one day on a long run in the national forest we spooked a bear out of a creek bed. As it ambled up the hill I marveled at its strange red color, almost like a red-hot candy in the morning sun. Ace kept his ears forward, barely gave the bear a glance and just trotted right on by. Any other burro I’ve ever owned would have snorted, spun on its haunches and bolted back downhill.
Commonly and for variation, I would take Ace on a run from here and then ride him home. One golden evening we were headed for home on a nearby trail. He was trotting and I was standing in the stirrups. The next thing I knew he tripped and I was flying forward. I landed on my head and right shoulder, and as I rolled I could feel Ace’s body starting to do the same and envisioned him flipping over on top of me. But there wasn’t quite enough momentum. Soon I felt the thudding of hooves as he scrambled to his feet. I rolled out of his way. When I got to my feet I began to assess the damage. Ace had a bloody mouth and nose. I didn’t have a scratch. I collected my hat and sunglasses. We walked the rest of the way home.
This summer we put together a string of decent training runs. I felt confident in my decision to go with Ace in the first race at Cripple Creek. From the start there seemed to be an air of indifference on Ace’s part. He obviously did not understand what was going on. Still even without trying we gradually worked our way into second place and somewhere in the last third of the race held the lead. But I recognized he was holding back, and realized that Ace was waiting for Spike, who my wife Mary was racing. In fact Spike soon caught up and we ended up running into Cripple Creek together and placing third. Mary won the women’s race.
I was a bit disappointed but it was only his first race, and I thought he’d do better on the longer courses where his long trot would eat up the downhills.
Thirteen or so miles into the Fairplay race on American Flats we were trailing the leaders by only a few minutes. I thought that I had paced Ace perfectly and would easily catch them all on the downhill. When we reached the summit of Mosquito Pass, Ace began to look around wildly. The sounds of motorcycles, ATVs, SUVs and other vehicles that have absolutely no business up there on the last Sunday in July were ringing off the talus slopes and Ace simply freaked. I had to drag him down off the rocky pass, and by then the race really was over. He was truly done and there was a discussion about going back for the trailer. Still, I’ve dropped out of this race twice before and know how much it truly sucks to “wait until next year.” I kept on.
At the checkpoint at the Alma cutoff they asked if I wanted a trailer and I merely said: “This is where other people quit but it’s not where Hal Walter quits.” Seven hours after the start, I found myself dragging Ace down Front Street. It’s true that you learn more from experiences like this one than you do from winning.
I decided to go with the experience of Spike for the next weekend’s race at Leadville, and we finished a disappointing second. I’d come back to Ace for the final shorter race at Buena Vista. He had the same air of indifference he showed in the first race. But on the backside on the old Midland railroad grade en route to my most disappointing finishing place in many years Ace showed me a huge gallop that I had never seen before and that I could in fact not keep up with. After the race people asked me about my frustration and leveled the criticism at Ace. But I can’t help but think that there’s still a chance with him.
This morning with my trashed ankle and foot I’m sitting back and pondering this year I’ve spent training this animal name Ace. There’s a message here but I’m not sure what it is. Maybe Carol’s trinket on the string was right after all.
In answer to recent criticism that he may be spending too much time consorting with jackasses, Hal Walter says he prefers donkeys to most letter-writing cranks because, even though their reading skills are similar, the long-ears can better understand what’s being said, have higher senses of reason and logic, and are more aware of their environment, its resources and its limits. Moreover, donkeys know their place in the scheme of things, and when flies annoy them they merely swish their tails and continue on their way.