Rip jumps 26"

It's likely that Rip's official height measurement will be somewhere over 21". In USDAA, this puts him in the tallest group of dogs where he would jump 26" in the championship division. I already have Skye in the Performance division, so I do want to compete with Rip in Championship. This is his first time trying any jumps over 22". He knocked a few bars as could be expected, but generally he did great and looks natural jumping that high.

I have also realized that we have an issue with running through a "box" of jumps. Rip wants to veer off and take the offcourse jump even though I am signaling him to continue straight through. We will have to work on this.

Rip's first trial is in a DOCNA show this weekend - I expect that he will do fine.

Wow what an AKC weekend.

Skye and I had an awesome weekend at the 3 day MHGRC (Mile High Golden Retriever) AKC trial at Castle Rock.

In a first for me, we went 6/6, earning 3 double Q's in the process.

This puts us at 7 QQs for 2010 Nationals, so we are qualified on the double Q front, but I still need about 100 points to reach the required 400.

We also earned our MX title this weekend! Very cool!

We are now standing at 10 QQs, so halfway to MACH. I am very happy with our progress towards our MACH, as we only got into Exc B in both Std and JWW last October.

In another first, Skye and I participated in a demo run of "Run and Done" or RAD, a new class that AKC is trying out. This was the first run of this class anywhere in the country. About 55 dogs participated. It's similar to USDAA's Steeplechase, in that the course is designed for speed, and you may need to do either the weaves or the AFrame twice. It's also open to entry regardless of what level you normally compete at (ie Novice and Open may enter).

We unfortunately had an offcourse jump after #3, but were otherwise clean in this run - it was pretty cool.

Here is the course we ran:

In another 1st, I decided to have Rip measured by our local AKC judge Beth G. while at the trial. The poor boy was so scared & stiff. We have a wicket at home and I have tried before to get him use to it with no success. We tried treats and massage and such but the boy just would not relax. She took a measurement that she knew was not right - at 19.5 inches. We were talking about tips to get a real measurement and how to get him use to this for a little while, and he did relax a bit so without him really knowing, she measured him again and got 21.5 inches (though the measure form had 19.5 written already). I am sure the 21.5 is much closer to reality as I've gotten 21" at home. Of course, at USDAA that will put him in the 26" jumping group. I havent tried jumping him that high, but he really is built for it, with his long/lean body. I may have to give it a try.

Finally, in a segment I will call "Oh, Come On!" (OCO)....

I mentioned above that I got Skye's MX this weekend. I usually am not too excited about the ribbons, but I wanted to get this title ribbon. I didnt see any in the self serve area so I asked, and they pointed me to them. Oh, Come ON!!! This cheezy, cheap-ass 8" strip of purple and white is my MX:

I mean really, there were over 1800 runs this weekend, and I paid an average $14 per run, so they took in over $25,000 for this trial. Yes, you have facility rental, judges, food worker coupons, and a host of other charges (I know, we run trials), but this is what you are going to pass off as title ribbons?? Cheap!

Back to your regularly scheduled program....

Rip height update

It takes two people to try and get a height measurement on Rip, one to distract him from the evil measuring device and one to do the measuring. Katrina and I did our best to measure him the other day. He is now 17 months old so he should almost be done growing.

As best as I can tell, he is right at 21" tall. Of course, it may be 1/4" either way. That puts him right at Skye's height, which is officially 21" on his AKC card, and 21.25" on his USDAA card.
If Rip comes in over 21", that will, of course, mean he would jump 26" in USDAA Championship division. As Rip is long & lean, that would probably be fine for him although I have never jumped him higher than 20" in training.

I'm still trying to build his confidence in using an actual measure wicket. I think he must have been attacked by one in another life.

Also, he still weighs 42lbs and looks like he could fill out a little more, but he's claimed that weight as his own.