Border Terrier Trial

I can't upload pictures of the beautiful rosettes for some reason, but what a weekend we had trialing.  Yesterday Rollo Qed in T2B from  a class of 12 for a single point.  His time was 48.05 but the winner scored an astounding 24.2.  Chudleigh popped out of the weaves and restarting them took up too much time so we didn’t Q.

Chudleigh was the star the rest of the day though with a Q in both open standard preferred and open jumpers preferred.  His jumpers leg was a clean run 42.04 in  a 47 second course for a 1^st place.  The standard leg  was a 95 due to a table refusal, he mounted from the side as he was going too fast to get on from the front.  He was 10 seconds under course time with a 74.31 out of 84.  He got a 4^th place for his 2^nd leg.

Today 

Day 2 was a single Q for each dog.  Rollo got another single point from T2B.

Chudleigh had the final run of the day and he did it in grand style with a clean run and a whopping  18 seconds under course time.  It was a 74 second course and he smoked it in 56.78.  That finished his open standard preferred title.

Christy

Sunday agility fun

We picked up 2 more legs today at the trial and it wasn’t nearly as cold, so it was a very good day.

First class was T2B and darn if Chudleigh didn’t pop out of the weaves around the 9^th pole.   I was moving away from him instead of straight ahead so he needs more practice on that.  If I had put him back in the poles he would have been way over time so there was no way to save the Q.

Rollo ran the same course and had no problems in the weaves.  He actually qualified and picked up 8 points with a very nice run.

Next class was open standard.  Chudleigh incurred one refusal when I ran past him while he was in a tunnel and when he came out he was confused and ended up in the wrong position to take the next jump.  I got him heading in the right direction and we managed to complete the course with no further mishaps.  He was 5 seconds under course time and his 95 still got him a first place.

I had great hopes for Rollo in that class but the agility gods refused to smile on us.  Rollo the huge worrier about tunnel monsters actually dashed into the wrong end of a tunnel that we were just running by on the way to a jump.  Despite it being a fault I was beyond happy because that meant tunnel monsters were no longer a worry to him.  Unfortunately he incurred another refusal when he got on the  wrong side of me heading for a jump and to make things even worse he dashed right through the weaves between pole 1 &2 coming out the back side!  Talk about a Whack A Mole moment, yesterday his weaves were spot on and to die for.  He did nail them on the second try, but in of course in open you only get one screw up and weaves do count.

I had high hopes for the final class, open jumpers but alas the agility gods were giving us the Bronx cheer instead of smiles.  Chudleigh evidently left his brain back in the crate in the van, he was beyond AWFUL!  Charlie was standing ringside holding Rollo for me as Rollo was just 6 dogs after Chuds.  Unfortunately Chudleigh figured correctly that Charlie had the holy grail of super yummy treats that you only get after you come out of the agility ring.  Chuds was stopping every few jumps to gaze longingly at Charlie, then would take a long loop away from me and head for the wrong jump.  I managed to redirect him every time and all that foolishness only incurred one refusal, but the time penalties ate us alive.

Final run of the day was up to little Rollo, and his run was stupendous.  His cheering section was lavish with their praise for his wonderful run.  He tried so hard but in his enthusiasm he ended up on the wrong side of me and had to be redirected to be able to clear the jump he needed to take.  He finished the course beautifully but the 5 point refusal and the 6 seconds over course time killed us.  In open those 2 points per seconds add up really fast.  I was tired and hadn’t quite caught my breath after running Chudleigh and honestly we had just done  the 2 runs in the standard ring barely  a few minutes earlier.   I think I need to stash some oxygen for just such occurrences, dratted congestive heart failure trying to spoil a good time.  

Next weekend we will compete again both days in the same place.

I got digital copies of 2 of Rollo's runs this weekend, the T2B and the 1st open standard leg.  Here are the links

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=endscreen&v=W3vrmqi5Y6Q&NR=1

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H3zsctHxs2w&NR=1&feature=endscreen

 

Christy

Snow Girls!

The dogs adjusted to the snow with no problem - and - we have too!

Happy New Year to all of you,

Sydney

 Our first snow - week before Christmas.

 My niece's dog, Tallulah and Coffee - Sentinels!

The La Plata Mountains from the east.

Those ROSE dogs!

No pictures from today, it was pouring rain when we were done and of course my dogs had to wait until the final 2 classes of the day to qualify.   This weekend we are doing the Weim club agility competition up in Santa Rosa and about froze our patooties off.

Both dogs did novice FAST, both did open jumpers, and Rollo did open standard and Chuds did novice standard.

Going small to tall Rollo was first to do FAST.  For some reason he bailed on the teeter just at the pivot point, and refused to do the send.  He is somewhat of a Velcro dog and couldn’t POSSIBLY leave my side to do a simple jump and tunnel.  Oh well, everything else was good and we figured it was just a warmup for later.

Chudleigh did amazing in FAST and if the judge hadn’t made a colossal mistake in designing the course he would have handily qualified with a 67 AND 3 seconds under course time.  Okay, what I am railing about was the tunnel in the send portion.  The open FAST dogs went into the left side of the tunnel while the handler ran along the right side of the stuff.  The judge decided to have the novice dogs take the right side of the tunnel but there was no switching of the angle of the jump so when the speeding dog took the jump the left side of the tunnel was what they saw first.  Of course it called Chudleigh’s name despite me trying to get him to come to the correct end.    Only 5 novice dogs managed to qualify and it was totally unfair to have the open course easier than the novice, and that was the ONLY difference between open and novice, grumble, grumble!

Oh well, Chuds tried and that was all that mattered.  He is feeling and looking good, and preferred seems to agree with him.

Open jumpers was interesting, it was a good course, but a bit challenging.  I was ready, and so was Rollo.  In fact he was so ready he went rocketing along and where I had planned to execute my front crosses he had already gone right on by,  generating more refusals  than I care to remember.  BUT, and there is always a but, his weaves were to die for!  All 12 of them, perfect and FAST!  I did something different and it worked, I ran fast and told Rollo WEAVE, and by golly he stayed in the poles and raced along behind me!  That in itself made my day, Mr Pokey sniffing in the weaves is no more.

Chudleigh  did great in this class, and also raced along in the weaves when I took off.  Unfortunately about 3 jumps from the end when I kicked in the afterburners heading for the finish line he managed to drop a bar.  That is the most sickening sound to hear on a lovely run, and the whole audience let out a collective “Oh” when that happened.

Last runs of the day were pure paydirt, though.  Rollo got his first open standard leg with a 100 and 9 seconds under course time.  He flew through his weaves just like earlier, and I couldn’t be prouder of that little bulldog.

Chudleigh  was 6 seconds under course time and some of that was due to having to check UNDER the teeter to see what those yellow weight bags really were.  That gave us a 5 point refusal but hopefully that satisfied his curiosity and it won’t happen again.   His weaves were really fast, I could hear the poles rattling as he strove to keep up with me.  That was his final novice leg so tomorrow both dogs will be in open/open.  We are also doing T2B.

I was hoping to see Jennifer or Donna out there competing in this new year.  I did see Shiffra Steele out there running some Weims.  Right now Chudleigh is the only boxer competing.