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Don Epps, Bellefontaine, pitches a shoe during a horseshoe competition at the Auglaize County Fair on Wednesday evening.
WAPAKONETA - The game of horseshoes was once a staple summertime activity in these parts before its popularity largely tapered off to a smattering of diehards. There's just not enough young blood to replenish the thinning ranks of mostly older players, some say.
But the clink and clank of iron striking stakes in clay resounded throughout parts of the Auglaize County Fairgrounds Wednesday night during the multiday open horseshoe pitch tournament.
The horseshoe pits found 13 competitors from throughout the region going head-to-head in two classes of play - and keeping alive the game they cherish so much.
The players hailed from "Celina, St. Marys, Lima, Bowling Green, Uniopolis, Wapak, Sidney, all around," said Rex Knoch of Uniopolis, who has served as the tournament director at the Auglaize County Fair for 30 years.
Horseshoes reigns large in some of the further-away cities.
"Lima's got leagues about three nights. Kenton, they've got league three nights - and there were three guys from Kenton here Sunday night," Knoch said.
The same can't be said about local municipalities.
"Not very much. It's real skimpy," he said. "They always said, 'The young people don't do it,' and you've got to take young people to do it."
Knoch himself used to toss horseshoes, but was sidelined from play by health issues.
"I was a player and I got heart trouble. I don't play anymore," Knoch told The Daily Standard.
Still, he takes great pride in running the tournament as well as the fairgrounds' horseshoes pits themselves. The stakes of each pitching court are planted in clay and separated by 40 feet of concrete. Each court is separated by wide swaths of grass.
"We just take care of them. I had a guy for 10 years, he didn't pitch very much and he said, 'I'll take care of the pits,'" he said. "He mowed it all the time."
Paul Poor looks for a ringer during the horseshoe competition at the Auglaize County Fair on Wednesday evening.
Among the players on hand Wednesday night were Rick Muter of Celina, and his long, silver-haired pal Don Epps of Bellefontaine, who competed in the Team World Horseshoe Tournament in Beloit, Wisconsin, in May.
Epps, who is in his mid-70s, also won the National Horseshoe Pitching Association Top Ten Award in the elder's division for 2023-2024.
"Me and Don, we teamed up at the state a couple years ago in the doubles and we tied for first," Muter proudly noted, adding that he met Epps through horseshoes. "He's a state champ."
The 65-year-old Muter, sporting a pony tail under a patriotic ball cap, took a moment after earning a bye to point out the ins and outs of horseshoes.
"Rex puts this on every year for the fair, and he'll get an A Class, which is the seven people at this end, and then he'll get a B Class, a little lower percentage players at that end, and then we'll play each other to 40 points," he explained.
Horseshoes rest near the stake during competition at the Auglaize County Fair on Wednesday evening.
A ringer occurs when a thrown horseshoe fully encircles a stake, earning the player 3 points. However, if both players score a ringer, the two cancel one another out, resulting in no points, Muter explained.
"Two good players together can throw, what, 60, 70, 80 shoes … if nobody's scoring," he said. "There's been games to go to 130 shoes."
Muter himself likes to get a least 100 practice horseshoes in before entering competition, "just because I like to win," he said.
"I probably throw about 400 shoes a day," he said. "Sometimes in the winter, yeah. It doesn't take much to go there and throw a few of them back in."
Possessing stamina is important to make it through numerous matches, some of which can drag on.
"I'll swing three times before I throw my shoe," he noted. "That gets my arm ready and it gets my height to where I need to be. Because sometimes I like to get the shoe up a little higher if (the opponent has) got two on (the stake). I want to get mine up so it stays on, not low where it hits theirs and comes off. There's a technique and a practice you put into it."
Muter underscored the proper bodily mechanics of a well-executed throw.
"No moving your head, no bouncy back-and-forth," he said. "Everybody's got their own little style and technique, but if you watch, most of them don't move their head. Your head's straight, your arm's coming up straight and it's all timing. … If you're doing pretty good, another guy might try to take you out of your rhythm."
Muter played the game as a kid but really got into about 20 years ago, segueing into the sport from softball.
"It takes years sometimes, I'm telling you," he said about getting good. "It depends on how much you practice. I mean, it takes a lot of practice. This is one of the hardest games you'll ever play. To get ringers, you're not going to get 100%. Nobody does. And you might have a good day one day, and it's bad days the next."
Muter will run the horseshoes pitch tournament at the Mercer County Fair Aug. 7-13. He said this year they're welcoming kids into the fold.
Paul Poor prepares the pit before the horseshoe competition at the Auglaize County Fair on Wednesday evening.
