What is this "touch" you speak of?

I haven't had any agility trials since early October and my next one isn't until the weekend after Thanksgiving, and add to that a vacation last month, and there hasn't been much to write about.

The Thanksgiving trial is a 3 day AKC event where Skye is going to earn his last few points he needs to qualify for Nationals in March.

Our vacation to Florida preempted my thoughts on going to the Cynosport games, USDAA's Championship event. Skye is fully qualified and I had intentions on going, but due to the expense and vacation time used for our Florida trip, it will have to wait until next year (unless USDAA does actually move the event to the east coast). Instead I will follow along online and I wish everyone the best in their runs!

So, an update on Mr Rip's flying contacts. Ok, I admit defeat, at least for a little while. Though Rip has been hitting his AFrames in competition and in practice, he has YET to actually hit the yellow on a dogwalk in competition (though he's only done about 4 trials). I can also get Mr Confidence to leap at the halfway point of the down ramp in practice.

Now, I am happy with his speed and enthusiasm in running his dogwalk, but rather than tightening up his stride and getting more consistent with the contacts, he has been extending out and seriously jumping, flying well over the contact. Because of this, I have started teaching him a 2o2o position with a "touch" command. It's not something he has learned before, because right from the start, he only understood that you run on the board. He's starting to get the point, and I will be working in this Stop on the dogwalk for the foreseeable future. When he gets the complete understanding and can do the stop reliably, I expect I will transition that to a quick-release. At some point, I will come back to running his dogwalks, but for now he just doesnt get the point of the contact zone.

Rip is also entered in the Thanksgiving AKC trial, and unfortunately we cannot "train" in the AKC ring, so if he misses, then he misses. Its not really his fault, so I don't expect I will down him or carry him off. Likely I will just verbally mark the miss with an "Uh Oh" and pause our progress, then finish the course.

Rip has been learning some new tricks like "spread em" where he stands up against a wall while he gets "frisked", and I have been trying to teach him to stand on his hind legs and walk forward. These have the benefit of strengthening his back and back legs too!

I'm back

Back from 9 days away for vacation. The pups are incredibly happy to see us after having given up hope on our return. We have a new addition to our family that we picked up in Indiana too - I will try to get a picture of him posted here. While we were gone, it snowed here, and though most of it is gone and today was 60 degrees, there is more in the forecast for tomorrow. Ugh. Doesn't bode well for outdoor training - glad to have the indoor facility!

So, no matter how bad your day/week was, it probably wasnt as bad as the owner of this car we saw on the ride back. I was mr. fast-with-the-camera for this one:

Rip is Two

Rip's birthday was last Sunday - my boy is 2. I decided to weigh him today and he's actually gained some weight - he is at 43.2 lbs now. Maybe that is due to his stealing Skye's breakfast the last couple days, or the different food that he's been getting. Either way, his shape looks good and I dont really feel backbone now when petting him. I dont mind feeling some ribs, but I dont want to feel backbone.

We have just 1 more trial this year, just after Thanksgiving, and then it's going to be time to have him neutered. ..

AKC in the cold at Brighton, CO

Fortunately we had an indoor trial this weekend at the Adams County Fairgrounds in Brighton. It was soooo cold, the high temperature on Saturday was something like 25 degrees. While driving up, we saw many accidents and at one point on I-25, there was a pile up with at least 12 cars smashed and in the ditch, including a police car. We made it OK though a little late, and I had to run Skye with the 20A group.

I am disappointed in my handling of Skye this weekend. We seldom have offcourses, but on both of our JWW runs, I took my eyes off him and he grabbed an off course jump. Since I wasnt actually seeing him take the wrong jump, I KNOW I wasn't watching him! Lesson learned the hard way.

We had a good Standard run on Saturday but he pulled his famous take-the-tunnel-instead-of-AFrame maneuver. The setup made the tunnel the obvious choice for the dog, so I cant blame him too much - a lot of dogs got that offcourse, but I did make sure to get his attention before it, and he took off anyway.

Our Standard run on Sunday was clean, though we had a slow sit on the table, and I over handled the dogwalk/tunnel discrimination - I wasn't going to lose yet Another Q due to that. The courses this weekend seemed to be wheeled really tight, thus the times allowed didn't provide the normal cushion, and we ended up with a Standard Q but only 10 MACH points (our usual is 20).

So this leaves me still needing 25 points to qualify for AKC Nationals. We have 1 more AKC show after Thanksgiving, so I have 6 runs to get the points. It shouldn't be a problem. I hope. Fingers crossed.

Mr Rip had a good weekend. He ran two great JWW runs. On Saturday, he dropped one bar at the jump after the tunnel, but he ran fast and accurate - no bobbles and his weaves were great. He actually had the fastest time on Saturday of all Novice JWW dogs by 5 seconds. On Sunday, he got the JWW Q with a tougher course than Saturday's. It had pinwheels and more side changes. He was the fastest of all the Novice JWW dogs by 3 seconds.

Our Standard runs were actually really nice too, though he absolutely launched his dogwalk contacts in both runs. I mean, he left from halfway down the board. His running dogwalk has deteriorated so much its just not funny. I am still training with the hoop, and I need to do lots more repetitions and I am going to change a couple things as Katrina suggested. If he doesn't hit any in the November competition, I will have to make some more drastic decisions on his contacts. I do not want to have to go to 2-on-2-off, but if thats where I need to be to help him understand, so be it. For now, I am going to have to put him on the dogwalk at least every day, and I may do a couple of 2 minute sessions a day. He loves to work for the squeaky ball and I dont think this will be overdoing it for him. Besides, I have a vacation coming up at the end of the week and he's going to get a whole week off any agility anyway.

I will post some video soon.

Ha!

Rip's USDAA Video

Here's the video of Rip from the USDAA trial in Fountain.

USDAA in Fountain, CO with the boys

I ran Skye and Rip in this local USDAA trial (only a 40 minute drive). We did not enter Friday's team events.

Since there have been so many trials in a row, and with the expense of entering 2 dogs, I only entered select runs for both dogs, thus I played in Gamblers, Snooker and Jumpers on both days with both dogs, and did Pairs with Rip. No Standards or tournaments this time. I was trying to still avoid dogwalks for Rip until I think he will hit at least 50% of them in competition.

So, Saturday was a pretty good day. Skye got a tough gamble with a send to a jump straight away from a teeter, where the gamble line was before the fulcrum of the teeter. He also Q'd his Jumpers run with a 1st place in the dark - the trial ran sooooo late, that it was nearly dark (7pm with no lights) when we ran it. He had his own idea for Snooker and took an offcourse jump instead of coming to me when I called him, and we thus joined the Zero Point Club for snooker. I also managed to take a spill during the gamblers run and wipe out a jump. I was fine and popped back up, but the little bit of time and downed jump cost me 1st place (3rd instead). Video to come :)

On Saturday, Rip also Q'd his gamblers run. The Starters gambles are not very tough, but Rip works away from me better than Skye does, so I expect gamblers will not be an issue. Rip also had a very nice Snooker run and was the only big dog to finish the closing. We did 7/7/6 as it was the most logical sequence in keeping good flow. He knocked one bar in his otherwise very nice jumpers run. Rip-boy is a lot of fun!

Sunday was not quite as successful for us, though not too bad. In Skye's gamblers run, I didnt think we had a chance, so it was just a warmup for the other runs of the day. Only 10 of the 70+ masters level dogs got the gamble successfully, and we were not one of them. It was offside weaves, with a flip around to the chute, then over a jump. The gamble line kept you behind pole 6 and when I stopped, Skye came out of the weaves to me as expected. We did a little bit better in Snooker but Skye ended up ahead of me and took an offcourse tunnel in the opening. Our Jumpers run was last and we had a good run with 1st place again. There were quite a number of scratches on Sunday as the weather was cold (40 degrees) and cloudy most of the day.

With Skye's performance this weekend, we are now only 2 Gamblers and 1 Snooker Super Q away from our Performance ADCH.

Rip's Gamblers run was, if I do say so, rather unfair. It was not setup as indicated on the course map and instead put the dog coming out of a tunnel under the AFrame facing right at an offcourse jump. I tried to get ahead and grab him coming out of the tunnel and it was ugly, but I kept him off the offcourse jump, but when then sending him to the finish jump, he dropped the bar. We got the "hard part" but it was not a fair setup for young inexperienced dogs and/or handlers as it gave a high chance of collision between dog and handler, or just take the offcourse.

Rip's Snooker run was fairly shortlived as he did the 7pt weaves but after the first jump of the 4pt combo, he spotted a tunnel that he just HAD to take. He was rather giddy about it too.

We ran pairs with Jan and her border collie Meg who Rip really likes. Unfortunately, he picked this run to forget how to complete 12 weave poles. I got pop outs 3 times, so I just went on and took the "E" for the team. Every other set of weaves he did this weekend were perfect.

In Rip's Jumpers, we took 1st with a nice run. I need to learn to push him to go faster though - I want to bring out even more speed in the Starters / easier courses so we can be ready for the big 22" speed demon class when we make it to Masters.

So, all in all a good weekend. Rip did miss one AFrame contact, and we didnt do ANY dogwalks so no misses there :)

Videos to follow.

New agility pictures

I bought some great pictures of Rip shot by Kelli of Stover Photography as well as a picture of Skye from Tien Tran.

I love Rip's eyes in this one.

There's my long outstretched boy!

Floating over the AFrame

A little intense leaving the table!

Skye's runs from AKC FRAAD

Here's Skye's runs from the AKC trial

Skye's and Rip's AKC Report

We did the 3 day AKC trial at Castle Rock this weekend. Friday was Excellent only, so I left Rip home with Katrina who couldn't come. Skye and I ran Exc. A FAST and managed to get the distance challenge and enough points for 1st place. Skye doesn't do distance very well, so I am always happy when we get one of these or a gamble in USDAA.
We had a great run in JWW and got a Q and 10th place (of about 45). Our Standard was nice and Soooo close to a Q. I had to call Skye off the wrong end of a tunnel and he called off, but then didnt immediately take the correct end, so we earned a refusal.

On Saturday, I was running Rip in his first AKC trial as well as Skye, so I chose to not run FAST which would have introduced too many conflicts. Skye again had a great JWW run with a Q and 11th place, but we were only 2 seconds behind the 1st place dog Summit. Our Standard run was great Except where I bobbled the weave entry and caused Skye a refusal. We were otherwise clean.

Rip had a great run in JWW for his debut, and got 1st place. The surface was lousy as the outdoor ring they were supposed to use was a mud pit, so they setup the course on the packed dirt parking lot. I slipped a few times and I could see Rip slipping as well, but we did OK. Rip's Standard run was pretty good with a few oops's. He was called for his dogwalk contact, and also had a table fault and then he threw in a little offcourse by doing the chute a second time. He ran nicely though, and I really cant complain about his performance. He nailed two fast weave entries, unlike a lot of the Novice dogs.

Sunday was Skye's day with a Double Q, number 12 for us. He had a fabulous JWW run and earned us the most MACH points (15) in a jumpers run that we have earned to date. I think we were 7th place, but not far behind 1st. He had a nice solid Standard run too. We now need just 35 points to qualify for the 2010 AKC Nationals, and we have a 2 day and a 3 day AKC trial coming up before the cutoff.

Rip had a beautiful fast Standard run on Sunday. We again got called for our dogwalk contact, though I thought he was in, and that was our only fault. We were 10 seconds faster than the next fastest dog, though I think there were only 8 dogs in the class.
Our JWW run was going great but when we got to the weaves (I hate having only 6 poles!), he popped out at pole 4 so I brought him back to them (he grabbed a bonus offcourse jump in the process) and then he again popped out pole 4, so I ended our run there - dont want to reinforce the redo-the-weaves that I had so much trouble with when Skye first started competing. Up until that point though he was running nicely, with great startline stay and reading my rear cross.

All in all a great weekend at AKC.