USDAA, Moorpark
June 26 & 27, 2004
Mia and Peggi's Report

Another fun show by Happy Dog, Kristi Netzer is so great for putting on so many USDAAs. Saturday was foggy and cool in the morning, warm and sunny in the afternoon. Sunday was just plain warm, some would call it hot. That said, I'm betting there will be much hotter USDAAs coming up this summer, so I don't want to start complaining early. It was a Masters only show and there weren't too many GVDCers there. It was just Rose with Locksley, Peggy B. and Indy, plus me with Max and Finn.

Saturday started with Gamblers. Max and I had a sketchy opening, but he did a beautiful gamble and ended up 5th. Finn and Locksley weren't as lucky, but gave great efforts. Saturday's Standard was very fun. Max finished his SACH-Bronze (15 Master Standard Qs) with his first ever win! He gave a great effort and beat teams whose runs looked much faster than I thought Max and I could go. Finn was very good as well. He tried his heart out and also Qed with a 3rd. Locksley and Rose had a great run, but were just a little over time. Next up was Pairs. Max was teamed up with Candy Gaiser's lovely hound Bounce. Bounce took some time taking in the view from the A-frame and I came thisclose to being called for a refusal (thank you Max for covering me), but we still managed to Q with a 4th. Finn and Indy had a fun time in Pairs. Indy had a knocked bar (the last jump for the first half was a TRIPLE which had the dog landing within 5 feet of their partners) and Finn blew past the weave entry, barking his head off. We had the time to cover one mistake, but not two, so no Q. At least, Peggy and I can pair Indy and Finn up again. It's so nice pairing two 26" dogs and being able to pick which side you're going to run.

Next up was Snooker, both Snooker courses this weekend were really challenging and I don't think anyone got all 7s, at least none of the big dogs. I had a wild run with Max on Saturday and we went into the closing with one 6 and three 7s. We wasted a ton of time in the opening chaos and just missed getting through 4 in the closing. Finn had a great opening and just ran out of time in the closing. He still picked up a Super Q (3rd) and finished his Snooker Master title. Yeehaw! Peggy went into her Snooker run realizing her shoelaces were untied and worried most of the course that she was going to trip. The Snooker course was set up that if you got off your plan it became very confusing. The time was very tight as well, so there wasn't time to be confused. It was great fun!

There were 5 runs on Saturday, which is a very full day of agility. We ended with Jumpers. There were angles on the jumps that I've never seen before and never would have anticipated seeing in competition. There was a point with Max, that I thought we must have gone off-course, because of what he had to do to get over the jump. I ended up blowing his run later, by taking my eye off him and telling him an early command. Finn had a gorgeous Jumpers. We had one wide turn that crossed the plane of the next jump, so we were given a refusal. It was a tight course and Finn tried to get the turn, but I needed to really start shaping it before the jump, which I clearly didn't do good enough.

Sunday started with Gamblers again. I waited until it was too late to tell Finn the "turn" command he needed ("out" just wasn't cutting it), but he tried. Max had a crazy gamblers. The gamble was a tunnel under the A-frame, 90 degree turn to a jump (15-20 feet away), 180 turn to the right coming back towards the handler over the teeter (teeter up is on the same line as the jump they're coming from), then out over a jump. Max went out to the jump, then I said "turn" instead of "right", so Max went left (bad handler). I was able to get Max (who after the wrong turn confusion, came back to me) to go between the jump and the teeter (maybe 6 feet apart), get on the teeter and finish the course before the whistle. Unfortunately, Max missed up the contact on the teeter, but it was still very cool.

Standard was another fun course. Max had a very good run (he was close on the A-frame) and picked up another Standard leg and placed 3rd with a great time. Finn popped out on pole 10 of the weaves, tempted by the tunnel. Other than the missed weaves and an annoying table ("Seriously Finn, TABLE! Down, down, down"), it was a gorgeous run. Locksley had another beautiful Standard (no missed A-frames all weekend!), but was just over time. Pairs had Indy and Max representing the SB crew. Indy was a little distracted by the chute being blown by the wind, but came back and did a very good job. Peggy even took the half with the weaves to push Indy! Max did his part with a nice half and they picked up a Q. Woohoo! Finn fell off the dogwalk in his Pairs run, but was gorgeous before and after. It was a day of lots of near misses for us.

Snooker finished up the show. It was only jumps, a tire and one tunnel. Finn was so good in the opening, but I took my eye off him for one-second and he went over a jump I thought I'd already called him from, but he still Qed placing 4th. Indy was the only dog in 26" to get through the closing with a very nice run and a Q (knocked bar in the opening kept their points lower than they could have been). Max tried his heart out, but I didn't anticipate a temptation that Max saw, so he had an off-course early in the closing.

Here's more from Peggy B.: What a fun weekend. I went into this show telling myself I was going to have fun no matter what and I did!!!! From trying to run snooker with my shoe untied to Indy wanting to visit the chute flying in the breeze!!!! I want to thank Mia for letting me have the pairs half with the weaves not knowing if Indy would stick them(she did) and risking a Q!!! What a good friend and someone who understands that life is not just about the "Q"!!! If it was Indy and I would have no business having all the fun we do!!! Great weather, fun courses and just a good ole time!!! ~ Peggi

All in all a very fun weekend. There were a lot of challenging angles to jumps that I'd never seen before and lots of great handling challenges. It was also nice because the show was so peaceful. It wasn't very large and there were numerous times while walking the courses, that people would comment on how quiet it was. Even with Max, Finn and the ever vocal Star there, most of the time you didn't hear the sounds of dogs barking (thank you Betty for being such help with Star and Max). There was also a wonderful community feel between the competitors at the show. It was one of the most laid back USDAAs I've ever attended.

Tell the dogs they're good. mia