I was driving through the coastal countryside of northern California one drear grey day, when I saw something that added a little color to my day. I came across the Tomales Racing Sheep during a practice session. They were running dry heats, getting used to the competition, the excitement, the timing… It’s a very different thing running against opponents, versus running just for the joy of it. The dynamics just change.

On this day I mostly took portraits as they rested between sprints, ruminating on their strategies. Their racing stripes seemed to need a little retouching, although they still wore their Tomales Red proudly. The ones who were out of shape and not running as well looked decidedly sheepish. I’m not sure if all them had qualifying times for the upcoming races against Valley Ford.

I used a long lens for the picture- a 70-200mm zoom with. 1.4x converter if I recall. The aperture was open fairly wide, since the shutter speed was more important to making sure that I captured the action without blurring it. I was using one of my older cameras, so the ISO was set low for the shooting- between 100 and 200 to make sure that there wouldn’t be much noise.