Ryan Saathooff is a 29 year old computer programmer who lives with his very tolerant wife, Jan (that's me :-), in Cedar Park, TX. This was Ryan Saathoff's first competitive joust outside of the SCA. He competed in all three events and rode his trusty steed Zwanzig (Ziggy) in every event.
Ryan and Ziggy ready to compete (Photo by Jay Baum)
Ziggy is a 16.1 hand, 23 year old, chestnut thoroughbred that Ryan rescued 3 years ago. When Ryan found him, he was severely underweight, covered in rain rot and his hooves were badly grown out. The owner admitted that she had not been taking care of him properly due to unfortunate circumstances and pleaded with Ryan and I to take him with us because she was afraid that her husband had called the killbuyer to come and get him. Once we got the horse home and took him to the vet, we discovered that in addition to the obvious problems, he had overgrown and damaged teeth and his stomach was entirely lined in ulcers. It took us almost a year to get him healthy again. In the meantime, we decided to call him Zwanzig which means 20 in German because he was the 20th horse that we had looked at and we paid $20 for him. He has since become an affectionate companion and a wonderful jousting horse for Ryan. Not bad for a $20 horse.
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Ryan's sister, Audrey Saathoff, was his squire for the event though he was also helped by Michelle Caddell at times. This was Audrey's first time squiring for anyone at a joust.
Considering that this was his first real competition, Ryan did pretty well overall. In the Mounted Skill at Arms, he ...
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In the Melee a'Cheval, he was unfortunately the first competitor to be eliminated.
Ryan and Ziggy entering the field for the Melee a'Cheval (Photo by Jay Baum)
Although he and his horse Ziggy had practiced mounted combat a few times before with up to three opponents, they had never been on a field with this many horses. Ziggy got a little over-excited, and when Ryan asked him to back up in order to get in a better position from which to attack an opponent, Ziggy backed a little too fast, tripped over his own hind legs and went down.
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Fortunately, neither Ziggy nor Ryan were hurt (which was confirmed by experienced horse people in the case of Ziggy, and the on site EMT in the case of Ryan). But it did force them out of the competition.
In the Joust a'Plaisance, Ryan was actually quite pleased with how he did.
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Ryan was not simply a competitor in Lysts on the Lake. Since he is a good friend of Steve Hemphill, the producer, Ryan was also a part of the team that planned and worked to help create this year's Lysts on the Lake. He helped with everything from construction to sewing. Ryan also created the official website for Lysts on the Lake. While doing so, he wrote fake bios for himself and Steve Hemphill as placeholders to use before posting the serious bios. This is what he wrote about himself:
Atop his epic steed Zwanzig, Ryan is on a non-stop trajectory towards awesome. Seriously. It'll be like Awesome dipped in chocolate wrapped in *bacon*. Yes. Bacon. And if you don't agree, he will joust you. And then you will explode. The tournament organizer said that this bio was supposed to only be two to three sentences, but Ryan doesn't accept limits. He doesn't BELIEVE in limits. Because when he's not writing his dissertation on Medieval French poetry while bottle nursing kittens at the local animal shelter, he's training. In his spare time he enjoys collecting vintage 1950s Armenian bottle caps, and running wind sprints on the surface of the sun.
Ryans admits that:
I actually had to get Jen to help me write the bio that made it onto the site because every time I sat down to write a serious bio, something like those two things [his and Steve's fake bios] would come out.
He spent so much time working on Lysts in the weeks leading up to the event that his wife (that's me) got a little tired of never seeing him. :-) But jousting is something that he truly loves, and I truly love him, so I will do my best to always support him.
Overall, Ryan had a fantastic time and is already planning for next year's Lysts on the Lake.
(**Insert picture of Ryan having a good time.**)
Click for other Pictures of Ryan and Ziggy.
If you have something to add about Ryan's experiences at Lysts 2011, or if you have something you would like to say to Ryan, please comment below.
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