USDAA
Happy Dog Trial
Moorpark
May 28 - 30, 2005
Reports from Mia, Paula, Bob, Peggi,
Susan, Rita, Rose and Scott
I just love the Happy Dog Starters/Adv. shows! This one was even better, than normal, since it had a Steeplechase and 3 days of Masters Snooker. It was a very nice group of people there. There were a lot of classes for a one-ring show, so lots of action and there was always someone to watch. We had a great group of GVDCers at the trial and it seemed like everyone had a great time.
The Steeplechase was on Saturday, so I brought Finn for Saturday and Sunday (he did some PI classes to work on his contacts) and Max went all 3 days since I've become somewhat obsessed with Masters Snooker runs. This was also Star's return to Standard, after an extended stint in teeter rehab.
Saturday started with Starters Standard and the dreaded teeter. Star had a great run, made an awesome weave entry and did the teeter without worry. To top it off, she won the class for her first blue ribbon! Yay! She gave good efforts in Steeplechase (knocked bar, missed weave entry and I held her A-frame) and Jumpers. She took 4th in Jumpers despite not Qing. Her Masters Snooker run on Saturday was her best Snooker run of the weekend. She should have Qed (which would have gotten her a Super Q), but I made a bonehead mistake in the closing. Sigh.
Max and Finn were good dogs on Saturday. Finn's contacts weren't my ideal, but he was trying. He back jumped a 1 in Snooker, but did a beautiful Steeplechase and qualified 3rd to go into the second round. It was a really great run. Max took 2nd in Snooker, despite only getting through 6 in the opening. He also ran a great Steeplechase and qualified 3rd in his group, though I have to note that Finn's time was about a second faster.
Sunday was a pretty long day. Star was a bit spooked by a photographer in Standard and was tentative about her teeter and dogwalk. It was still a Q (3rd) and it finished her AD! What could be better than finishing a title...finishing two that day! She did a terrific job in Gamblers (a gamble that Bob and Kadi made look easy) and that Q (3rd) finished her AG! Go Star! She couldn't resist an orange tunnel in Snooker, but did make a good weave entry in the opening.
Max and Finn both started the day with the second round of Steeplechase. Max did a great job. We had a wide turn and he fell on his face doing a pinwheel, but he still took 4th in the class. Mr. Finn was having a GREAT run then at the weaves (3rd to last obstacle) he came out at pole 10 or 11. I barely caught it in time and corrected the weaves, but it dropped us to 3rd. Otherwise, I'm sure he would have won the class.
Finn really tried in Masters Snooker, but I left my arm sticking out towards a tire I didn't want Finn to take, so of course he took it. Max did a great job despite a challenging opening plan and won the class. Yay! The highlight of Sunday for Max and Finn was running Zippity Pairs with Peggi Bean. Literally, they ran with Peggi and I ran Peggi's dogs. That was too fun. Wouldn't you know, Mr. Finn had a perfect startline and both dogs did perfect two on/two off. I on the other hand, seemed to bring out the worst in Peggi's dogs. ;-) Jessie leaped over her dogwalk contact (she was so fired up!) and I forgot to tell Indy to "touch". At least I was driving the dogs. ;-)
On Monday, I was thinking I was pushing my agility luck, because the dogs had been so good the prior two days. In Snooker, I learned that it's time to teach Star a "close" command ;-), but she was happy and fast. Star's contacts started to disappear on Monday. I tried to mark them in Standard (I have witnesses), but Star wasn't having any of it. ;-) She still Qed in her Standard and took 4th. Her last run of the weekend was Adv. Jumpers. It wasn't the prettiest run, but it wasn't the kindest course. Still, she did Q with a 2nd, which finished her AJ title! Three titles in one weekend, I always believed she'd surprise people, but I didn't realize how much she'd surprise me. What a girl. Max only had Snooker on Monday and he was perfect. It was a run I will remember, he's such a great dog. The run also won the class, but the connection I felt with Max on that course is the real highlight of the class for me. I saw lots of great runs by GVDCers and lots of people enjoying their dogs.
Tell your dogs they're good. mia
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From the desk of Zoe Kotowski (and Paula)
Zoe was a real little trooper on Saturday. Our usual AKC routine is to
show up twenty minutes before our first run while the excitement level
is still high (Low drive dogs are such delicate creatures), but this
weekend's schedule was a little different. Fortunately, Tierra Rejada
is a beautiful place to relax, and relax we did, before and between
runs, watching lots of great agility including Mia, Max, and Finn's
phenomenal Steeplechase rounds. Zoe had a fast and fun PII Snooker round (minus Mom's handling error -
no Q), and a solid Jumpers round to finish her PI title. Long days aside, Zoe thinks the best part of doing USDAA events is
that she doesn't have to be a poodle!
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Bob's report:
Sunday,
Kadi continues to make great progress, this was one of her best shows ever! First up was Standard, an awesome fast run with great weaves but 1 bar down. Pairs was next, she ran perfect and fast but our partner had 2 bars down and placed 4th. Lastly was Gamblers, we love to play Gamble but have been having trouble recently, but we came through with a fast run and perfect Gamble for a Q and placement! Bubbles ran well too, had a great Standard but missed the down contact on the dogwalk, ran Pairs well for a Q, and in Gamblers did the Gamble but did not have enough points for a Q.
Monday, Kadi had an OK Standard, didn't Q, but came through with an awesome Snooker for a Q and 1st place! We also ran Jumpers for another Q and 2nd place! Bubbles also ran great, Qed and 2nd in Standard, Qed and 2nd in Jumpers, but got whistled off early in Snooker. 2 out of 3 Q's ain't bad.
Kadi is really getting better at shows and fun to handle. I can tell she's having more fun out there, and is running fast and handling great. We've been working hard and hopefully we see a tiny light at the end of the tunnel. We'll be out for a while now as the plan is for Kadi to be a mom very, very soon!
It was fun seeing everyone and watching great runs by Susan (with my buddy Cooper!), Mia (Mr. Max was of course mistake free and perfect all 3 days!), Peggy, Rita, Nora, Scott
Hope to have a "Dog days of Summer" club summer party at my house and pool soon!
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From Peggi Bean:
Well, well, well!!!!! This was such a great weekend! Watching everyone having fun with their pups! Again there were several runs where I was just not with it but the dogs and I had a blast! Jessie got two snooker Q's and got to run a fun, fast Zippity Pairs with Mia!!!! Indy got a SUPER Q! No thanx to me and a couple of goof ups. But everyone else goofed up even more so I will take it! She also got to run with Aunt Mia! Thanx for working my contacts! WINK! I had the best time running Max and Finn in Pairs! Mia and I were sooooooo excited after our runs!!!!!! It was just the highlight of the weekend! I had this bright idea to swap dogs and I am so glad we did! Made it interesting. We had to really be careful at the handoff and took extra time to make sure I had a good hold of her dogs but who cares! It was just AWESOME!!!! What a high!!!!! I got in some training running a few P1 runs and that was great! Some better than others!!! All in all the best was watching everyone having fun with their dogs. That is what it is all about!
Peggi and labs
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From Susan:
We had a fun weekend, got our first Gamblers P1 Q which was our last
run on Sun. We just missed Q's in a PII snooker and PII Standard
(can't figure what fault we made in our first Standard run Saturday).
Anyway, thanks to oodles of advice from the Grand Dames of Santa
Barbara Agility, Mia, Peggi and Terra, Cooper and I learned a lot and
made a stunning comeback in Gamblers. Also, just appreciate all the
support from all the rest of GVDC who were there. That's what makes
the sport worthwhile.
Susan & Cooper
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Rita’s report
Our trialing weekend started off on Thursday when Blur and I went down to Pomona to the Pet expo event. We entered in our first Pre Novice obedience trial and received a big 3rd place ribbon, with a score of 137.5 out of 200 –zeros for the sit and downs (did the opposites, heehee) but I’ll take it for a baby dog. Main thing was he was a happy boy and was not scared of strangers touching him. It was all a positive experience – that was my goal.
Now for agility – Pilot, Molly and I did our best and I had a few strategies I wanted to work on. I tried so hard to play with Pilot making sure he didn’t get too stressed out – nope not playing - until I finally tried his newer frisbee, yea!!! He’s playing. I kept Molly close to camp away from the rings as so she would not run out of the ring to get some treat she missed. Sometimes it worked sometimes it did not – but that is all part of this silly game - figuring out about our dogs and what works best. I was very please that Pilot actually played with me – this is the FIRST time at a trial that he played. It helped having a nice grassy area away from the rings to play. Frisbee is only for trails now.
I am glad that I finally got my routine down with my dogs so I could volunteered some time to help out at trails again.
Saturday
Monday
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From Rose:
Chase-it! had a great weekend. For this show, she was run by Olga. She ran 7 times this week end & had only 2 bars down, she gathered 6 Q's. Sat: Q w/2nd. place - Standard, Q - Snooker ( knocked 1 red bar).Sun: Q w/1st. place - Standard, Q w/1st. place Gambler, Q - snooker (knocker 1 red bar), Q - pairsI am very proud of her, the light finely went on.
Rose
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From Scott:
We lucked out and had much cooler weather than we had the weekend before at the show-n-go at the same location in Moorpark. I was prepared for long days as there was only one judge and two rings which turned out to be kind of a good thing because it gave me plenty of time to watch the other runs while I was waiting for our event take place. I did feel for the judge who had to watch all those runs but she did a great job, the course were challenging but fair and she managed to keep things moving right along. In fact we were done by 4:00 both days. Maybe it was because I finally had the time to watch more of the runs than at other shows where there are two judges and two rings and more going on but there seemed to be a lot of really good dogs and handlers putting out some great runs both of the days that I was there. It was really fun to watch my fellow GVDC members do such a great job we really have a strong group of teams in the club and the Q's to prove it! Great job Mia, Peggy, Nora, Rita, Paula, Rose and Bob!
Our show started out with starters standard on Saturday. This was Annie's first time running at championship level in competition but I was pretty confident that things would go well. She and I got off to a great fast moving start without any problems and our excitement seemed to build as we ran around the course. It felt like we were really moving and making some good time. The problem came on the third to the last obstacle which was the teeter. I got a little ahead of her and she drove right up the teeter only to have the bottom drop out on her causing her to have a fly off and missed contact. She looked back over her shoulder with a look that said "what happened?". She quickly refocused and finished the last two jumps without a problem. A little more conservative handling would have won us a Q. I took the run as a lesson to be learned in handling, I need to stay focused on my teammates needs while we are in the heat of a run.
I really thought Foster would have a chance at a good starters standard run. It would be his first run of the day and he would be fresh and not psyched out from a previous experience. Well that's' what I get for thinking! He made it over three jumps and the A-frame when he decided that he would rather visit that nice bush outside of the ring and christen it his very own. The whistle blew and we were done. So, we learned another rule of of the game the hard way, urination equals disqualification in or out of the ring!
Our next run was snooker and Annie Q'd but no placement. Foster bailed yet again but I was able to get a little work out of him as we left the ring. So it's baby steps for he and I. Following snooker was our jumpers run. Annie did a awesome job and Q'd with a 4th place. Foster redeemed himself by finishing about one second behind Annie with no faults and a Q, good boy!
Sunday wasn't as good a day for my team as the day before in fact it turned into a bit of a nail biter. We had a good clean std. run and I was able to get Annie to stick all her contacts. She was a little hesitant on that evil teeter but she completed it. I was schmoozing her for being such a good girl on her last run while standing near the score table and overheard the judge say there was a problem with the course. It turned out that the A-frame and the table were still set for P1 and not Champ, since we Q'd we needed to run it again at the correct heights. We were slow through the weaves and for some reason the cameraman was an incredible distraction and Annie felt like she had to stop for a photo op in the middle of the weaves. Once I got her attention again it was through the chute and up the A-frame only this time she didn't get her touch when she came down, not a tragedy but not what I was hoping for either. I think all of that rattle me a bit and I cut a turn a little too tight and she knocked a bar! I had no idea how the judge was going to score that and I tried to stay focused on the rest of the run which was clean. I have to say the judge was more than fair, she didn't count the knocked bar and gave us the better of the two times for 4th place! So, not only did we do well but we also got another run in that we otherwise wouldn't have had. Fun
Our snooker's runs weren't so great and it was all do to me pushing the guys too hard. I knew they were having issues with the A-frame and instead of avoiding it like I should have I tried to get them to take it a couple of times. Annie tried her best but she just wanted to get off that big scary thing as fast as she could and missed the downside contacts. Foster decided it would be better to just take off. I'm going to be smarter about the courses I run in snooker and gamblers and make sure to tailor them to my teammates abilities at the time of the run and you know what we are going to be working on in practice, contacts, contacts, contacts!
The last event for us of the trial was starters gamblers. I had learned my lesson from our std. run and tried to keep it simple. Just a couple of tunnels and a few jumps before the gamble. I just wanted to finish on a happy note for my dogs I didn't care about Q'ing. Annie and I did fine until the second to the last jump in the gamble where I got ahead of her and failed to push her out to the jump. She cut in and ran toward me so I had to reposition her to get her to take the jump but it didn't leave us enough time to finish the last jump. She didn't know what the buzzer meant all she knew was she was a good girl and that she had done a great job! Foster and I did the same run but he bailed on the dogwalk. No worries, I didn't make an issue out of it and we just kept moving. I stayed closer to Foster than I had with Annie and we completed our gamble. We were under time we just didn't have enough points to Q. Again no worries! We finished up our trial with two fun runs, I walked away content with the job we did and pleased to have two happy hounds in the car with me on the way home. All in all we had a challenging, fun show and I learned a lot about handling in the ring during a trial. It really is much different than in practice and classes.
Scott