The Weekend Report: A Double-Q at Long Last!

Jimmy and I attended both days of the Potomac Valley Golden Retriever Club. It was a very hot and muggy weekend so it was great to have something fun to do indoors. Luckily, the A/C at the sportsplex did a good job keeping up with the heat. Both days ran Small to Tall so we even had much of the afternoon free.

Here are Saturday's maps:

The Standard course was a bit tricky with the tunnel work and a speedy dog, and 14 to 15 was interesting, but all in all it ran much better than it felt in the walk-thru. Jimmy, being the good speedy boy that he is qualified in 1st place and brought in 27 points on this run! While we don't need any more points for his PACH title, we dearly need them to qualify for AKC Nationals next year.

This was the only run I  video'd:



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It has been quite a while since a Standard Q and a chance for a double-Q. Jumpers is a bit easier to qualify in so we are much more likely to Q there than Standard. But now that I had a double-Q on the line, I was more nervous than usual. (You would think after 10 years of playing this game, I would have my nerves under control!) On this course, a lot of dogs pulled out of the weaves too soon as their handlers turned to 14 a stride too soon, or the dog spied the back of the #1 jump with its electric eye timers attached and thought that was the end jump and rushed off to finish the course (and get that end of run treat!). I made sure to stick close to Jimmy to prevent that error and we made it out clean! Again my speedy boy brought home the blue ribbon and 25 points! So, finally we had broken our double-Q drought! It was double-Q #10 toward our PACH so we are officially half-way! It also counted as double-Q #3 toward the 5 needed to qualify for AKC Nationals. All in all a very good day! It is days like this that keep you coming back!

Here are Sundays maps:

Sunday started with Standard also. It was another course with tricky tunnel manoeuvres making the 6 thru 9 obstacles the biggest challenge. It is very hard for me to beat Jimmy to the end of a fairly straight tunnel so I really had to pour on the steam!  The rest went well and we had another 1st place Q in Standard! This one gave us 30 points! Holy Moly!

And then our final run of the weekend, Jumpers with a double-Q on the line again. Alas, thanks to poor handler decisions, I managed to disqualify us right from the very start. The #1 to #2 jump was our downfall. I lead out and Jimmy did not read my cue to turn and jump and never took the 2nd jump. I so wanted to kick myself!

But all I should do is focus on the positive which is three beautiful blue ribbons proving that Jimmmy and I can pull it off more times than not! We moved ourselves a bit closer to our goals, well, my goals anyway. Jimmy just cares about his big treat at the end of each run!

Not having to wait around for a ribbon, we hurried home with enough time for a nice swim session. Both boys were very pleased about that...until the bath afterwards of course!

Tracking Jimmy's PACH progress:
Very 1st Double-Q: Saturday 06/21/2014
Masters JWW legs: 18...MJP Title 01/25/15
Masters STD legs: 18...MXP Title!10/24/14
Double Q's: 10
PACH Points: 836

AKC Nationals 2016:
Double-Q's: 3 (out of 5 needed)
Points: 318 (out of 600 needed)....
Masters Legs: 14 (out of 20 needed)