USDAA and Patriots

Last weekend we were at a USDAA trial at the Boulder County fairgrounds. Since I grew up in Massachusetts, I've remained a Patriots fan, even though I live in Broncos country. The Patriots - Broncos game was on Saturday, so I wore my Pats logo t-shirt to the trial. I did catch a lot of grief being nearly the only Patriots fan among a sea of blue and orange, but it was all in good fun. I was one of the few happy football fans the next day after the Patriots blew out the Broncos.

Anyway, onto the agility!
Rip and Skye were entered in everything - the trial was extra crowded and was originally supposed to be a 1 ring trial that turned into a 2 judge, 2 ring trial due to high turnout - seems everyone in Colorado is trying to qualify for USDAA Nationals now that it's going to be local this year.

On Thursday before the trial, Rip came up limping on a back leg. He probably slipped on the ice - not sure. I figured I would end up having to pull him from the trial, but come Saturday morning he seemed fine. I did run him the whole weekend, but Sunday night he was back to holding the leg up again. Looking at his runs, he is maybe a little slower than he should be - he knocked 3 bars all weekend, which isnt great, but not excessive. He's been on rest mode since then and isn't happy about it! He seems fine now, but I will keep him from running at all until at least this weekend.

As for how we did, Rip only got 1 Q this weekend, but it was a Grand Prix Q, so that's a good one to get! That was the 2nd one we needed to qualify for Nationals.
Rip ran a nice Standard course on Saturday, but he had 1 bar down on a wrap jump. He also did really well in Gamblers, and if he had succeeded in getting the gamble, he would have had 2nd place in the 22" group. He did give me a really nice distance teeter, but wouldnt push out to the next jump and took the trap jump instead.

In Steeplechase, the run was going well, but I somehow pulled him off his line to the AFrame. By the time I put him back on it and we finished, we had taken too much time to make it to round 2. Then in Pairs, I thought we ran a good course - turns out I didn't walk the course correctly and took a jump from the 'normal' side when it was supposed to be a threadle, but we were clean on MY course!

In Sunday's Standard run, I did a run-with and he knocked the 2nd jump and then went in the wrong end of the tunnel, though the rest of the run was good. We had an OK snooker run, though not a planned! The 7pt was an AFrame, but there was the #4 tunnel under the frame. We could do 4 reds, so I planned for the #2 tunnel, and 3 AFrames. On two of the frame attempts, Rip actually ran into the tunnel instead! That wasn't going to be good for a superQ! He ended up hitting the bar in the part B jump of the #5 sequence as it was a slice, so not enough points to Q.
Finally, we were having a nice jumpers and I did a Rip taboo move. I rotated too soon on a front cross, giving too much of a collection cue and brought Rip to a stop before the jump he was supposed to take, so we incurred a refusal. Except for that, he ran it nicely.
Here are some of Rip's runs



Skye had a pretty good weekend. On my quest for PDCH-Bronze, we just need Gamblers and Pairs Qs. As it turns out, we Q'd each of them this weekend! That leaves just 2 more Gamblers and 1 more Pairs needed.
Skye Q'd both of his Standard runs this weekend. He had been missing all of this AF and DW contacts at our last AKC trial, so I had been reinforcing contact behavior over the past week. This really paid off, as Skye did not miss any contacts all weekend, though he gave me a couple of the slowest AFrames he has ever done!
We also Q'd Perf. Grand Prix, giving Skye the 2 Q's he needs to qualify for Nationals. That makes him fully qualified for Perf team, grand prix and steeplechase.
As mentioned, we Q'd pairs - we ran with Katrina and Baby again and we were the 1st place performance team.
He did a real nice job getting the Gamblers Q. Skye has a good distance teeter, and I was able to get him to push out to the correct jumps to finish the gamble.

Though Snooker is usually our game, I underestimated a pull through and Skye ended up taking a #1 followed by another #1 very early in the run for a total of 4 points!
In jumpers, he knocked 1 bar, so we didn't get that Q either, but overall he ran really well for me!

We are playing more USDAA in a little over a week - this time with DAM team. I still need to get Rip qualified in team, so hopefully we will get it.

Skye's runs