The Weekend Report: Getting Back to Regular Life

So now that I have both of my "big events" behind me, I am back to just the usual run-of-the-mill agility trials. It sort of seems anticlimactic now. You invest so much time, effort, and emotion into the National shows, that going to a normal trial (and especially on a quieter Friday!) seems strange.

This weekend (as I said Friday. It was a three day trial.) was a trial given by the Shenandoah Valley Kennel Club and held in Winchester, Va. It was a cold and cloudy day so absolutely perfect for indoor agility!

It started with Jumpers on a fairly tricky course. We were going along well, and getting close to the end. Unfortunately Jimmy crashed the triple jump. Not exactly sure why, maybe the busy background behind the jump made him unsure of what he was jumping. It looked like he didn't jump quite high enough to clear it or he launched a bit too soon. But down the bars went and no Q for us.

Here are the map and video.....

The day moved along quickly and before I knew it was time for Standard. The triple was in pretty much the exact same place but this time Jimmy knew what he was doing and cleared it just fine. We had a nice run everywhere else as well and earned the blue ribbon! Yay for Jimmy! Of course, right now we are counting down the double-Qs to our PACH2 title, so this won't count toward that. But then I don't want to get there too quickly because I don't really have any more goals after that!

Here is the map and sorry, but no video.....

Tracking Jimmy's PACH 2 progress:
Very 1st Double-Q: Sunday 5/1/2016

QQ#20: 
Masters JWW legs: 56...MJP Title 01/25/15 MJPB 10/11/15 MJPS Title
Masters STD legs: 51...MXP Title!10/24/14 MXPB 04/30/17 MXPS Title
Double Q's: 15(out of 20 needed)
PACH Points: 1582 plus many more! I have lost count!

The Weekend Report: A Premiere Double-Q!

It was a very rainy weekend here in the mid-Atlantic region, so there was no better way to spend it than at an (indoor!) agility trial. Jimmy qualified in five of his six runs, with four 1st places and a 2nd place. He qualified in BOTH of his Premiere runs. Fortunately we had another dog running against us this time, so the runs even counted for his Top 25% requirement!

I have lots of video to share. I won't give a long, boring description of each run. I'll let the video do the talking!

First, only the Premiere maps this time....Jumpers was particularly challenging, but alas it is not on video.

Here is Saturday's Standard Premiere run:




We had a nice run in the regular Standard as well. It has a lot of similarities to Premiere...




Our Jumpers run was going so nicely until right near the end. Jimmy ticked the second to last jump bar and down it went. Oops!




Sunday started with the Jumpers Premiere followed by this Standard run.....




And finally Sunday's Jumpers run. All the bars stayed up this time. This was a very tricky course, nearly a hard as the Premiere version....




We also earned 77 points over the course of the weekend. A nice tally toward our National Championship requirement for next year! Plus Premiere counted as a Double'Q as you don't need to get them on the same day like you do with the regular STD/JWW. We made some real progress on our NAC requirements! Yay!

I almost forgot! Adding this as an update.....Since this was the first trial after Jimmy's PACH last weekend, I brought the traditional cake as well as my PACH bar for friends to sign....

Tracking Jimmy's PACH 2 progress:
Very 1st Double-Q: Sunday 5/1/2016

QQ#20: 
Masters JWW legs: 37...MJP Title 01/25/15 MJPB 10/11/15
Masters STD legs: 34...MXP Title!10/24/14 MXPB 10/11/15
Double Q's: 1 !!!
PACH Points: 792 (We are starting with all the points we need!)

AKC Nationals 2017: Perry, GA
Double-Q's: 4 (out of 7 needed)

Premiere QQ's: 1Points: 270 (out of 550 needed)

Premiere legs:

STD: 1 Top25: 1 (out of 25 legs needed, yikes!)

JWW: 2 Top25: 1 (out of 25 legs needed)

The Weekend Report: When Good Agility Goes Bad

This past Friday and Saturday was an agility trial at one of our usual indoor locations. I have to say, the courses on Friday, especially Jumpers, were some of the trickiest I've run in a while. Here are the maps and then I'll say why.....

Our first run of the day was Standard, the map on the left. For the most part 1 through 10 was pretty routine. Even the weave pole entry after the chute wasn't too bad, but it was the line after the weaves that took out lots of competitors, including Jimmy and me. 12, 13, 14 and 15 were all angled just oddly enough that it was hard to be where you needed to be to get your dog over the right jump and not miss any. I pretty much trampled poor Jimmy. You can see it in the video.

Jumpers (map on the right) was just plain tough. The 20 inch jump class has the most dogs in it usually and of this large group only TWO were successful. The success rate went up a tiny bit with the smaller dogs, but not for us. We were good until # 12 when Jimmy jumped it correctly the first time but turned right around and back jumped it. My poor handling of course, but it got worse from there. Look at  13 to 14....they jump 13 almost directly into the wrong end of the tunnel and sure enough Jimmy went in the wrong end. Now look at # 15. It's not the side of the jump facing the tunnel exit, but the backside of that jump bar! Holy Moly! While we do practice this in class, Jimmy sailed out of the tunnel (and the wrong end) so fast he was over that jump before I could call him to the back side. At that point my brain was addled and I walked us off.

I've got video of what was very definitely not my finest moments in agility. Don't let it be said I only share the  stuff that makes me look good. These two runs show a clutzy mess. Poor Jimmy deserves better!

Standard:

Jumpers:




But let me add one more comment on Friday. Normally I would have been at work for eight hours, so a day of botched agility courses is still WAY more fun than a day spent working!

Saturday, the courses were much more doable. I don't have the map for Standard as they were all gone by the time I got there. It had a couple of tricky spots but nothing like Friday. My confidence had taken a bit of a beating so I wasn't sure how we would do, but we made it through and managed to redeem ourselves, earning 2nd place!

Jumpers was not bad at all and set up to make you really RUN! Here's the map:

Jimmy hauled through this course! I was really huffing and puffing afterwards. He was fast enough to earn us 1st place!

The fun part about the ribbons is..... a good friend runs Pembroke Corgis (the Queen's corgis)...she just recently moved her girl Twist down to the 8 inch class Jimmy runs in. Twist is every bit as speedy as Jimmy so it's always a guess as to which one will beat the other's time. So in the Standard run, Twist beat Jimmy by about 1/2 of a second, a very close match, earning the 1st place ribbon! Then in Jumpers, Jimmy really turned on the afterburners and beat Twist by about 2 seconds, earning 1st and Twist earning 2nd. Our dogs are very evenly matched in speed so it makes for a fun competition. But I must say, my friend is a MUCH better handler! Those rough courses on Friday? Yea, she and her dogs were successful on both of those!

Tracking Jimmy's PACH progress:
Very 1st Double-Q: Saturday 06/21/2014
Masters JWW legs: 13...MJP Title 01/25/15
Masters STD legs: 16...MXP Title!10/24/14
Double Q's: 9
PACH Points: 678

AKC Nationals 2016:
Double-Q's: 2 (out of 5 needed)
Points: 160 (out of 600 needed)....
Masters Legs: 7 (out of 20 needed)

The Weekend Report - The Glass is Half Full!

This weekend Jimmy and I had an agility trial both days. It was held by the Capital Dog Training Club.

Saturday we had a lot of success! I won't give a blow by blow as I will just share the video. For our Standard run, Jimmy even ran quickly enough to place 3rd! He was speedy in Jumpers, too, and came in a very respectable 7th.

Here's the Standard....




Here's the Jumpers.....



Since both these runs were clean and successful, we earned Double-Q #10 toward our Championship! Our glass is officially half full!

Sunday, success wasn't as easy to come by, and it was totally MY fault. It was a pretty tough Standard course, and I overworked a triple jump to a left turn into the weave poles. I pushed Jimmy a bit too far out and when he turned toward the weave poles, he skipped the first pole. Sigh. And of course, the rest, including a very difficult ending sequence was clean.......Our Jumpers run was a thing of beauty, speedy and clean. Jimmy placed third, and earned 16 speed points,  an impressive feat! So no Double-Q for Sunday....The club also offered a class called Time 2 Beat. It was at the very end of the day, so I had to wait at least a couple of hours for our run. Jimmy took out the very first jump, so we were cooked before we even got going! It was one of those things I just had to laugh off. Oh, the irony!

All in all, I was pleased with our efforts!

Tracking Jimmy's MACH progress:
Excellent B JWW legs: 27  Now he's working on his MXJ3!
Excellent B STD legs: 16. We earned our MX and are working on MX2 now.
Double Q's: 10 (out of 20 double-Q's needed for a MACH.... 50 Percent! We're halfway there!)
MACH Points: 672 (out of 750 speed points needed for a MACH...... 89 Percent!)

Time 2 Beat legs: 6 (out of 15 needed for his T2B) 48 points (out of 100 needed) 


AKC Nationals 2014:
Double-Q's: 2 (out of 4 needed)
Points: 111 (out of 500 needed)
Masters Legs: 6 (out of 20 needed)

The Weekend Report - Two Steps Forward, One Step Back

Well, yesterday was the Potomac Valley Golden Retriever Club agility trial held in Westminster, MD. This trial was run small to tall so it made for a nice short day. Gotta love that! Unfortunately, that's all there was to love...well, other than Jimmy, in a general sense! We had no success in either run, so it was a big double-NQ!

Standard was first. I knew where I would find trouble on the course and sure enough, I did! It was the dogwalk, to a jump, to the far end of a tunnel. Clustered into that same area was the table, as well. I was so concerned about, a) Jimmy hauling down the dogwalk toward the off-course end of the tunnel and/or blowing his contact and b) in trying to work the end of the dogwalk, that I might actually get an off-course table, that I ended up getting a refusal at the jump he was supposed to take because my handling sucked!  Jimmy was a bit annoyed at me for all the confusion, so he did not want to get on the table. After a couple of tries, he did get on, I praised him profusely, and we ran the rest of the course cleanly.

Jumpers was not too long a wait. It was not a very difficult course. Unfortunately, Jimmy took out the top bar of the triple. I am pretty sure it was my fault as I think I told him to go to the tunnel while he was still in the air over the jump. Saying anything over a jump is a very good way to get a bar as it calls Jimmy's attention to me and his feet drop just enough....Since I am on the quest for Double-Q's, not qualifying in STD means not qualifying in JWW really isn't too upsetting other than missing out on a few speed points.

Here's the STD run.....I did not get video of JWWs.




Tracking Jimmy's MACH progress:
Excellent B JWW legs: 20 (out of 10 needed for his MXJ) Now he's working on his MXJ3!
Excellent B STD legs: 7 (out of 10 needed for his MX) Better than halfway to our MX!
Double Q's: 5 (out of 20 double-Q's needed for a MACH.... 25 Percent!)
MACH Points: 386 (out of 750 speed points needed for a MACH...... 51 Percent!)

Time 2 Beat legs: 4 (out of 15 needed for his T2B) 32 points (out of 100 needed) 

The Weekend Report - Timing is Everything!

Well, my title, Timing is Everything played into both my Jumpers and my Standard run yesterday.

First up was Excellent B Jumpers. It was a middle of the road course for difficulty and Jimmy whipped through cleanly. Yea! As I am putting his leash back on, the judge walks over and tells me the electronic timer failed for my run. This does not affect my Q any, but it means I have no time with which to earn MACH points. When this happens they offer you two choices, take the full standard course time (47 seconds in this case) and get no points, or, you get to re-run the course just for time. And the best part, when you re-run for time, you do not need to worry aboout keeping the jump bars up! How cool is that! Just go full out to try for your best time. You must complete the mapped course but your Q sticks no matter what! Who would pass up that opportunity?! So at the end of all the 12s, I got to run again. I cheered Jim on through the weaves, something I would never risk in a regular run, and hauled as fast as I could everywhere. We finished in 37.19 seconds, earning 9 more MACH points and a respectable third place!

Next was the new Time 2 Beat class. It was a slightly tricky course, starting with a jump, jump, AFrame....off to the right of the AFrame by about 6 or 7 feet was a tunnel. I put Jimmy in a stay, lead out past the first jump, released him and clearly indicated he was going to the AFrame. The naughty little tunnel-sucker zoomed BEHIND me (very bad!) to take the off-course tunnel! The brat! He came flying back to me, and promptly got snagged and given the walk of shame out of the ring. There was no way he was going to get to play with such disrespectful behavior!

Very soon after T2B came Excellent B Standard and of course a Double-Q was on the line. It was another middle of the road course, not horrible but a couple of concerning spots. Now we have been having an incredibly dry, hot summer, but Saturday decided to give us off/on showers, some quite heavy. When the rain came down hard, it made ALOT of noise on the metal roof of the sportsplex. Just as I was queuing up for my run, the rain started once again. It made Jimmy a bit nervous. By the time it was our turn, and Jimmy was going to the start line, the sky cracked open and poured! Poor Jim just wanted to leave the ring and hide. Unfortunately, the rules of the game don't allow you to wait out the rain, so we had to try. I lead out and released him, and he did his best to concentrate. When we got to the table, he got on just fine (good boy!), and I nearly lost his stay to him wanting to run to the judge for comfort. He was giving her his cutest little, ears-back, tail-wagging best, and was barely holding his stay in his desire to run to her. But he stayed the count. Whew! Next was the biggest jump, the triple. As we head there, unbelievably, it rained even harder, and it scared Jim enough he knocked the bar. So, there went the Double-Q, but I could hardly get annoyed with him, as he was giving his absolute best in what for him was a very scary situation. He just wanted out of that ring! He even finished up fine after the bar, getting the correct end of a very tough tunnel, sticking his dogwalk contact just fine. Just as we finished up and grabbed the leash, huge peals of thunder boomed out. Poor Jimmy, what a miserable experience he had! But he still had the wherewithal to lick his peanut butter reward :-) And within just a few minutes of leaving the ring, the rain ended. Sigh.

So, as I said, timing was everything. Fun in my first run, a disaster in my last. C'est La Vie!

This will be the last weekend report for a while. I am not signed up for any more agility trials until the October/November period. After such a long break, I am going to be jonesing for a trial, Jimmy, too!

Tracking Jimmy's MACH progress:
Excellent B JWW legs: 13 (out of 10 needed for his MXJ) Now he's working on his MXJ2!
Excellent B STD legs: 2 (out of 10 needed for his MX) But at least we are now in B class!
Double Q's: 2 (out of 20 double-Q's needed for a MACH)
MACH Points: 205 (out of 750 speed points needed for a MACH)

The Weekend Report - A New Title and a Double-Q, Too!

This weekend we had an agility trial in Fredericksburg, Va, held by the Norwegian Elkhound Club of the Potomac Valley. The very first class of the day was Open FAST. This is the class where you pick your own course based on points and then must complete a Send. The send is a taped off area I cannot enter but must send Jimmy into to complete it. The judge was very kind and set up an easy challenge, just a tunnel to an AFrame. Jimmy did it without a hitch. This was his third leg so he earned his Open FAST title (OF).

Next up was Excellent B Jumpers (JWW). It was a medium difficulty course and we made it past all the challenges. We were in the home stretch, but alas, Jimmy knocked down the top bar of the triple jump, the 2nd to last jump. So close, so close.....

The running order for the day was tall dogs down to small dogs. When I had finished the JWW run, Excellent Standard B had just started, which meant I had about a three hour wait to run. Since we are in need of Double-Qs now, and my chance for one had been knocked down by the JWW bar, I opted to save all that wait time, packed it up, and headed home. Even with the hour and a half drive home, I still had a whole hour at home before my 12 inch competitors had their turns.

Here is a very rare photo of me. Jimmy's breeder, Anne, came to watch us run. She snapped a nice photo of Jimmy and me with his new title ribbon.

Today, the running order was the much more pleasant small to tall. Excellent B Standard started the day this time. It was a fun course that spiraled in on itself. Jimmy did his table just fine! He finessed the rest of the off-course traps and completed with no mistakes. He was 22 seconds under course time, so he earned 22 more points toward his MASH tally. He wasn't quick enough to earn a placement ribbon but did come in 6th.

We waited a couple of hours for Jumpers. Of course,Qing in Standard meant the chance of a double-Q if we were successful in JWW. I tried not to let that pressure me, yea, right! Fortunately, the judge was kind (and wanted to go home!) so she gave us a reasonably easy course. We had a bobble or two but nothing that ruined the run. Hooray! We earned Double-Q number two! Also, we added another 15 MACH points. There were a lot of speedy dogs running, so we came in 9th, but I am happy with a top ten spot!

Tracking Jimmy's MACH progress:
Excellent B JWW legs: 12 (out of 10 needed for his MXJ) Now he's working on his MXJ2!
Excellent B STD legs: 2 (out of 10 needed for his MX) But at least we are now in B class!
Double Q's: 2 (out of 20 double-Q's needed for a MACH)
MACH Points: 196 (out of 750 speed points needed for a MACH)

The Weekend Report - Not Our Day

Jimmy and I signed up for one day of the Pembroke Welsh Corgi Club of the Potomac's  AKV agility trial with the intention of kicking some bunny butt. Unfortunately, neither Jimmy nor I had our game on yesterday. One word describes our first course of the day: BRUTAL. It was an amazingly difficult Standard run with traps every which way you looked. It was tight as could be, sharp turns abounding. We actually got off to a good start, made it past the dogwalk without Jimmy blowing his contact, made the extremely hard weavepole entrance (a teeter to a sharp left into the weaves, most dogs weren't getting it!), but our old nemesis, the table, reared its ugly head! Yes, Jimmy, that little stinker, refused the table like 5 times before I finally got him on there! He was either getting on that table or he was getting walked off the course in shame. He was NOT going on to the tunnel. It was the next obstacle, he loves tunnels, and I do believe he just plain did not want to wait on the table to have his fun in the tunnel. So he did finally get on, I told him he was a good boy (I lied!), and then he shot into the wrong end of the tunnel. Of course we were disqualified six times over already, so it really didn't matter. The rest went fine, of course. My confidence going into this run was poor, so my mental game failed me, but I truly did not expect a table fault. Sigh.

So, since we are now in search of Double-Q's at every trial now, the day was already a wash.

The club offered the optional class called Time 2 Beat. I had never tried it before as it is new and since it is optional for the clubs, you don't see it at every trial. The idea for this one is speed. All dogs run in just one class, so Novice dogs run against Open or Excellent dogs of their own height. The idea is the first dog to run sets the course time, and everybody else has to beat it. There is only one winner who gets 10 points, and the rest of the pack get points based on how close their time was to the winners. The courses are built to encourage speed, no table, no dogwalk, 12 weaves (tough for the Novice dogs).....So in the 12 inch class Jimmy came in #4. This earned him 8 points and got him his first leg. This title will take awhile, you need 15 legs! and 100 points to get the T2B title after your dogs name.

Finally came our Jumpers run. It wasn't too bad, my nerves were settled since a Double-Q was unfortunately not on the line, but I just didn't have my mojo right. I didn't hear the electronic GO, so I didn't know if I could start. I looked to the judge, she finally nodded, and in the mean time Jimmy broke his stay so my lead-out was gone. This messed up my handling and Jimmy knocked an early jump bar. With us disqualified, I ran all out pushing for speed, egging on faster weave poles, etc. The rest of the run was clean (of course!) and Jimmy finished with a nice speedy time of a hair over 30 seconds. I didn't wait around to see the results and compare his time to other dogs. The building was getting steamy hot ( a real and typical problem for this location), and we hit the road ASAP!

As a side note, there was a good Cardigan showing at this trial. My friend Aggie who I often train with got a Double-Q on her speedy gal Bella. Another girl Cardi with handler David, also got a Double-Q. I saw a beautiful fluffy brindle running. That was the first Brindle fluff I've ever seen. Also a speedy blue merle fluff was there, but I missed the run. And in the 8 inch JWW class, I saw a black-tri girl that made Jimmy look like he was walking the course! Oh my goodness, she was AMAZING! Thank goodness she runs in eight inch. She ran the jumpers course a full 5 seconds faster than Jimmy. A top sheltie would have trouble beating her time!

So there you have it, not our finest hour/day. We will give it another go next weekend!

The Weekend Report - Two more legs toward the MXJ!

Another weekend of agility trials is behind us, this time held by the Shetland Sheepdog Club of Greater Baltimore. These were at a nice indoor location only about 45 minutes from home. That's always a big plus!

Saturday started with Excellent Standard. Jimmy was a bit amped up. I put him in a stay, lead out, released him, and Jimmy took out the very first jump bar! We were done before we ever got started. Of course, we still run the course anyway, just with no chance of Q'ing. The good thing about it is you are free to push the limits of your handling, trying stuff you would never try if the Q was still possible. We had a couple more bobbles because my mojo was now a bit off, and finished with a nice quick time. Oh, well.....

Excellent Jumpers was late in the day. It was a fun course and Jimmy aced it! He had 44 seconds to get 'er done, and finished in 32.57, giving us 11 more MACH points. Yea!

Today started earlier because the dogs were running small to tall. Again, Excellent Standard was first. We got off to a very nice start, and made it all the way to the table, 4 obstacles from the end. And, no, the table was not our problem, Jimmy did a nice job of it. Unfortunately, the next jump was a triple and he knocked the top bar down. Crap! NQ! After that was a dogwalk/tunnel discrimination, and he chose the off-course tunnel, but who cares, cause we were already cooked! So close and yet so far......Another weekend without a Standard Q, but at least Jimmy did his table nicely both days so that part was a victory.

We finished the day with another really nice Excellent Jumpers run. Jimmy had 42 seconds to get it done and only needed 31.04, giving us another 10 MACH points. His jumpers runs were legs #7 and #8 out of the 10 he needs for his MXJ title. And a funny coincidence, for leg #7, he came in 7th place, for leg # 8, he came in 8th. Those were very respectable finishes considering all the super-fast shelties we were running against.

No more agility trials for awhile, mid-June being the next ones. I signed up for a May 21st trial but didn't get in. I am on the waiting list so there is a small chance I'll get in if someone drops out.......

Tracking Jimmy's MACH progress:
Excellent B JWW legs: 8 (out of 10 needed for his MXJ) More than halfway to his Masters Jumpers title!
Excellent B STD legs: 0 (out of 10 needed for his MX)
Double Q's: 0 (out of 20 double-Q's needed for a MACH)
MACH Points: 101 (out of 750 speed points needed for a MACH)

The Weekend Report - A Mixed Bag

Saturday started early, 4:30am! Jimmy and I had another agility trial this weekend. This club offered the optional FAST class, and ours at the Open level was the first of the day. This meant being at the trial site by 7ish. The "Send" (a taped off area I can't enter) was a tightly curled tunnel to a teeter. Fortunately, it was either end of the tunnel, so that part was easy enough. It was a sharp right turn for the dog to get to the teeter. Now, Jimmy doesn't really love the teeter, so me being so far away causes him some angst. Instead of heading to the teeter he came flying out of the tunnel toward me. His feet came outside of the taped area and we faulted. I did get him to go back in an do the teeter on a second try so that was good practice, but of course we were already disqualified.

The running order for this trial was tall dogs down to small dogs, so I had a long wait for our next run in Excellent A Standard. This course wasn't too difficult, the trickiest thing for us looked like the dogwalk to the table (our usual nemesis). Oddly, Jimmy messed up his weave poles, skipping one pole in the middle. He had done the same weird thing in FAST as well. He never messes up in the poles so I am not sure what was off. He was pretty pumped up for his runs, and I think he may have been trying to go too fast. My mental game may have been off as well (which can translate into funky handling) because I knew this run *could* earn us our Excellent STD title. Whatever the cause, the weave pole burp disqualified us. From there it was on to the dogwalk and then the table. Jimmy gave me a beautiful table! He nailed it and stuck to it. I even stayed away by several feet and he held for the count. We finished the rest cleanly and our time was good. So although it was disappointing not to earn our title, the wonderful table performance made me very happy since that has been our issue for so long.

Our final run of the day was Excellent B Jumpers with Weaves (JWW). At the beginning of the day, I pick up the course maps for our runs. However, I rarely look at all of them at once,
just the one for my upcoming run. I like a clear mind and don't want to be worrying about my last run of the day when I haven't even run the first. When I finally saw the map for this JWW run, I laughed out loud! I can say I have never seen this configuration before.

Here's the map: (for those of you who don't do agility, just follow the little numbers in the circles. No.1 is in the lower left corner with the 2 S's indicating the Start. No.19 is the Finish. Nos. 3 and 13 are the tunnels and No.9 is the weave poles, the rest are a variety of different jumps.)
 

Two side by side, straight tunnels was absolutely bound to be a challenge for lots of dog/handler teams. I sat and watched the 20 inch class for a while. It was not easy to get a fast dog into the proper ends of the tunnels and even more difficult to get yourself down to the other end to direct them on to the next jump. Many, many teams disqualified themselves depending on how they chose to handle getting into the tunnels.

If you didn't have a startline stay with a fast dog, it was pretty much a crap-shoot as to which tunnel you would get.

I ring-crewed for the 16 inch class and got a good idea of what was working and what wasn't. The smaller dogs were definitely having a more succesful time with this course. Their shorter stride was giving the handlers more time to cue the proper tunnel ends. The judge who designed this course runs very small dogs and you could certainly tell from the results.

When our 12 inch class came around, Jimmy was calmer than he had been in the morning. We were much earlier in the running order so he didn't have as much time to watch other dogs and get amped up. I put him in a stay and lead out past the second jump, blocking his view of the wrong tunnel with my body. I released him and he shot straight into the correct tunnel. I didn't make it to the other end of the tunnel before he was out, but I had just enough time to cue a rear-cross over the next jump. Fortunately, Jimmy read it perfectly, as rear-crosses are not usually my forte. Onward a few jumps to the weaves where I was careful not to pressure Jim. This time he did them just fine. Whew! Three more jumps to the other tunnel this time. I front-crossed after the 3rd jump, and swung Jimmy around my left hip, out far enough that he had no reason to think about choosing the wrong tunnel. Another sprint from me to catch up to him, another rear-cross over that same jump to an outer grouping of jumps and into the home stretch. We made it through clean and in 34.54 seconds. Woohoo! This was leg # 6 out of 10 toward our Masters Jumpers (MXJ) title and 9 more MACH points.

Since this was our last run, I gathered up my stuff, headed to the car to get organized, take the boys out for another walk, wait for the results to be posted, and get my green Q ribbon. I figured we probably ended up somewhere in the middle of the pack. Much to my surprise and delight, Jimmy placed 4th! It is very difficult to place in Excellent B JWW as we are competing against small, light-weight shelties, Paps, JRTs, and even those speedy Cavs! To make this sound even sweeter, Jimmy was "in the ribbons" with the newly crowned 12 inch NAC (Nat'l Agility Champion) sheltie, Sparkle. Sparkle took first place in this run. Now of course, truth be told, Sparkle beat us by a whopping seven seconds (an eternity in agility), but hey, it's still feels good to come in just three dogs later!

Tracking Jimmy's MACH progress:
Excellent B JWW legs: 6 (out of 10 needed for his MXJ) More than halfway to his Masters Jumpers title!
Excellent B STD legs: 0 (out of 10 needed for his MX)
Double Q's: 0 (out of 20 double-Q's needed for a MACH)
MACH Points: 80 (out of 750 speed points needed for a MACH)

The Final Agility Trial of 2010

Yesterday was Jimmy's and my final agility trial of the year. This was another trial that should have been at the now-closed equestrian center just 45 minutes from home. Originally I was signed up for both days, but their new location was way too far away. I don't do motels when it comes to agility, as that just completely blows the budget, and would consume all my training funds. So I dropped one day, and kept just Saturday. It was a 2 1/2 hour drive one way down to the Richmond International Raceway. The trial was held in an open-air, but roofed arena with a dirt floor. Oh, the DUST! Yuck! I now know what the folks who went to the USDAA Nat'ls in KY were talking about! I am sure this wasn't as bad, but still yuck! And the surface was very hard with a layer of dirt over top that made it quite slick. The club that holds this trial does a wonderful job and go out of their way to make sure everyone has a good time, so I will be sad if this turns out to be their new regular spot as I won't come back.

Anyway, on to our runs. First was Jimmy's first try at Excellent A STD. You get one quess at where we went wrong......yep, the Table. Jimmy did hop right on, but didn't stay for the count :-(
I shifted slightly to start my front cross to the next obstacle and I am sure he read my movement as a release cue. Bummer. But he did get on, so hopefully this was just a blip. The rest of his run was nice, he nailed his running DW contact even with a U-turn to a tunnel. And he had great fast time, so all in all a pretty good job.

Shortly thereafter came Excellent B JWW. It was a very tricky course with lots of side changes and a tough weave entry. Jimmy did it all in style! He was fast and clean. We had 49 seconds to get it done and Jimmy finished in 33.46. This still wasn't quick enough to place but we did come in 8th place which is still pretty darn good in the 12 inch class. We beat all the corgis and quite a few shelties! This run gave us another 15 MACH points as well. Woohoo!

Tracking Jimmy's MACH progress:
Excellent B JWW legs: 4 (out of 10 needed for his MXJ)
Excellent B STD legs: 0 (out of 10 needed for his MX)
Double Q's: 0 (out of 20 double-Q's needed for a MACH)
MACH Points: 52 (out of 750 speed points needed for a MACH)

Photos from Saturday

The trial this past weekend was at the farm I have posted about a couple of other times. It is a wonderful place for a trial, especially if you enjoy doing more than just watching runs. There are acres of land and farm roads to walk the dogs on, swimming in warm weather, the ambiance of a real farm, and the list goes on and on.

Here is a small section of what greets you as you arrive...their driveway is probably a 1/4 mile long!


Once you clear the woods, it opens up to the alpaca pasture.


Wandering around, here and there, are the most charming little touches. This very small Buddha was sitting on a tree stump. He's evidently been there awhile based on the mossy patina.

Here are the boys posing on one of the outbuilding's steps. This is another example of their good sit/stay as there was an alpaca behind me about 20 feet away in a small pen. That's what they are focusing on.

And as you can see, this lovely farm has all its ducks in a row! Wilson was quite mystified by this pile of Canada goose decoys. He definitely did a double take as we walked past.

Stepping across one of the outbuilding thresholds, I noticed this delightful footprint. Now I know why this particular agility trial is often lucky for me. It has a permanent good luck charm stamped on the property.

Just past the horseshoe print, was an old boat filled with end-of-season zinnias.

And last but certainly not least, another reason I love this trial is all the Cardigans! It is the only trial where Cardis sometimes outnumber the Pems or where I am not the sole Cardi person. This striking boy was just one of eight other Cardis enjoying the day.