Tonight in agility class at ACA, Bailey stopped wanting to do agility. He ran the first course of the night OK, but very slowly and carefully. I figured he was just sore from all the agility over the weekend. For the second course, he completely refused to do any jumping, and he blew his contacts (not normal for him). I crated him up and we thought we'd give him another try at the end of class. I brought him out again at the end of class and the same thing happened. Refusal to do anything. We put the jumps down to 20" with the same result. Finally, at 16" we were able to get him over a jump a couple times. Claudia watched him closely and said he wasn't jumping like he normally does... he was jumping off his front end instead. He normally has pretty nice jumping, so that worried me a lot.
Thankfully Kim Bennett of Stablemate Massage was at ACA for the night and took a quick feel to see if she could tell find anything wrong. Bailey has a large knot in one of his hamstrings, but no other pain points along his back or neck. Kim thinks maybe his hips are twisted funny and suggested that I take him to a chiropractor. I couldn't run Bailey for the rest of the night. Kim and several chiropractors are scheduled to be at the Mid-Atlantic Agility showcase this weekend, so I plan to take Bailey down on Sunday to get adjusted and massaged. If that doesn't work, we're off to the vet...
Wednesday, March 31, 2010
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
Mattaponi Kennel Club AKC Agility Trial - March 28, 2010
This is the second day of the trial. It was another early morning and both of us were quite tired, but were able to make it through the day. Since Bailey had qualified (and titled!) the previous day in JWW, I could have moved him to the next level - Open. Instead, I opted to keep him in Novice just to have a fun run.
Course maps will be posted as soon as I get a chance to scan and upload them.
I'm glad I did, because we had quite a messy start on this run, which resulted in an NQ. I think Bailey also started hurting at some point during the weekend, so he was not nearly as enthusiastic as normal, even during warm-up.
Bailey knocked the bar on the second jump and then went off-course when he back-jumped #4. We NQ'ed. It didn't really matter though, since he titled in JWW the previous day. After the messy start, the rest of the run turned out OK though!
Again, we settled in for the long wait until the Novice Standard class. I started to get really nervous, because a Q in the Standard class would mean that he'd get his NA title this weekend too. The course looked pretty straightforward, with only a couple tricky spots. Nothing we haven't trained for and I knew we'd be able to handle it, so long as he didn't drop any bars or miss the table completely.
We were the very last pair to run in this ring and the entire ring crew was cheering, hooting, and hollering as we entered the ring. Everyone was watching us, waiting for the minute we cross the finish jump so they can pack up and head home.
SUCCESS! Bailey qualified, earned a perfect 100 score, and placed first with this run. I was especially proud of his perfect contacts and stellar table performance. He got a little distracted at the weaves, but thankfully weaves aren't faulted in in the novice class. He completed the course in 57.64 seconds (SCT was 69 seconds) and overall did a great job!
Bailey earned the third leg and his NA title! What a great end to the weekend, and just what I needed!
Course maps will be posted as soon as I get a chance to scan and upload them.
I'm glad I did, because we had quite a messy start on this run, which resulted in an NQ. I think Bailey also started hurting at some point during the weekend, so he was not nearly as enthusiastic as normal, even during warm-up.
Bailey knocked the bar on the second jump and then went off-course when he back-jumped #4. We NQ'ed. It didn't really matter though, since he titled in JWW the previous day. After the messy start, the rest of the run turned out OK though!
Again, we settled in for the long wait until the Novice Standard class. I started to get really nervous, because a Q in the Standard class would mean that he'd get his NA title this weekend too. The course looked pretty straightforward, with only a couple tricky spots. Nothing we haven't trained for and I knew we'd be able to handle it, so long as he didn't drop any bars or miss the table completely.
We were the very last pair to run in this ring and the entire ring crew was cheering, hooting, and hollering as we entered the ring. Everyone was watching us, waiting for the minute we cross the finish jump so they can pack up and head home.
SUCCESS! Bailey qualified, earned a perfect 100 score, and placed first with this run. I was especially proud of his perfect contacts and stellar table performance. He got a little distracted at the weaves, but thankfully weaves aren't faulted in in the novice class. He completed the course in 57.64 seconds (SCT was 69 seconds) and overall did a great job!
Bailey earned the third leg and his NA title! What a great end to the weekend, and just what I needed!
Monday, March 29, 2010
Mattaponi Kennel Club Agility Trial - March 27, 2010
This is Bailey's Novice A Jumpers With Weaves (JWW) run from Saturday. Once I get a chance, I'll scan in and post the course maps. They are tiny, so I'm not sure how well it will work, but I'll definitely give it a try.
We qualified and placed third with this run. Bailey was quite distracted at the tunnel, and that cost us 7 points... 5 for the refusal and 2 for time faults, since he took such a nice, long detour. I also did a really ugly front cross at the end of the weaves. I should have just let him go and done a rear there. He completed the course in 40.09 seconds (SCT 38 seconds).
Either way, a Q is a Q!
Bailey earned his third leg and the NAJ title!
We had a long wait before the standard course, during which I hung out and watched the other competitors run with their dogs and spent some time chatting with my friends.
A little bit before our standard run, I took Bailey out of his crate with the treat pouch to warm him up and get him ready. Since treats aren't allowed in the ring, I had to dump off the treat pouch outside the ring somewhere before we ran. Stupidly, I brought Bailey with me, so he knew exactly where I put it. I got him in the ring, he went over the first two jumps, then excused himself to go find the treats. Oh well! Clearly no Q there! Lesson learned!
We qualified and placed third with this run. Bailey was quite distracted at the tunnel, and that cost us 7 points... 5 for the refusal and 2 for time faults, since he took such a nice, long detour. I also did a really ugly front cross at the end of the weaves. I should have just let him go and done a rear there. He completed the course in 40.09 seconds (SCT 38 seconds).
Either way, a Q is a Q!
Bailey earned his third leg and the NAJ title!
We had a long wait before the standard course, during which I hung out and watched the other competitors run with their dogs and spent some time chatting with my friends.
A little bit before our standard run, I took Bailey out of his crate with the treat pouch to warm him up and get him ready. Since treats aren't allowed in the ring, I had to dump off the treat pouch outside the ring somewhere before we ran. Stupidly, I brought Bailey with me, so he knew exactly where I put it. I got him in the ring, he went over the first two jumps, then excused himself to go find the treats. Oh well! Clearly no Q there! Lesson learned!
Monday, March 1, 2010
Next Agility Trial
Things have been going swimmingly as far as our dog training goes. Bailey and I have been taking plenty of classes. So many, in fact that I barely have time to blog anymore!
I have entered Bailey into another trial coming up at the end of March - the Mattaponi Kennel Club trial. It will be held at Cedar Run Horse Center in Woodbridge, VA on March 27 and March 28. Bailey is entered in the 24" jump height for Novice A Standard and Novice A JWW both days. Wish us luck! And as always, we welcome spectators to cheer us on! :-)
I have entered Bailey into another trial coming up at the end of March - the Mattaponi Kennel Club trial. It will be held at Cedar Run Horse Center in Woodbridge, VA on March 27 and March 28. Bailey is entered in the 24" jump height for Novice A Standard and Novice A JWW both days. Wish us luck! And as always, we welcome spectators to cheer us on! :-)
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
Bailey helped!
We spent all day Saturday outside raking and bagging the zillions of leaves in our yard, and of course Bailey had to help us out!
He was happy as a clam!
He was happy as a clam!
Monday, November 9, 2009
CCCC Agility Trial Day 2
Yesterday was the second day of the CCCC agility trial at Cedar Run. I had a hard time sleeping Saturday night because my brain was still reeling from the success of the day. The fact that the Sunday judging started an hour earlier made for a very tired me! Nonetheless, we still had a great day!
Since the classes were run in the same order as the previous day, our first challenge again was the JWW course. The AKC requires that you earn each leg of your title under a different judge (or 2 judges for the 3 legs, can't remember which), so the judges had switched classes. Kim was judging JWW and Scott was on Standard. The Open JWW class preceded ours and seemed to go way too quickly! I had picked up the course map shortly after I arrived again, so had plenty of time to study and make a plan for handling the course.
The course map:
As soon as I picked up the map, I immediately noticed that there was not a single tunnel in sight! As the judge later said in her briefing, this is a true jumpers course with just jumps and weaves. My nerves felt much calmer today, until I started walking the course and decided that the best way to handle it was a rear cross between bar jump #7 and double #8. I've only recently been doing rear crosses with Bailey, since he was never really able to read them that well before. Do I dare try it in a trial and over a double, where if he picks his head up too high to find me, he might knock a bar and eliminate us? Earlier in the week, we had done some fantastic rear crosses in our video handling class, so I figured I might as well give it a try. It was into a pinwheel, which Bailey loves and has a very easy time finding the line. I figured if I was going to try it, this should be the spot. Lo and behold it worked! He read it perfectly and turned to the #9 jump without any issue at all! He took the turn between #9 jump and #10 jump a little wide because I think I pushed up too far into the pinwheel. I should have trusted him to find the line. He also did a great job when I sent him out over the #12 jump so I could get in position in front of the #13 jump for a front cross. We made it through the entire course with NO faults! CLEAN RUN! Yeah!
See for yourself!
JWW run
We were first into the ring in the Novice class and sure did set the bar high! Soon after we ran, the unofficial results were posted. We got a perfect score of 100 and qualified! Our time was 27.49 seconds, which meant that we came in well under the standard course time of 36 seconds. We beat the next best dog by about 1.5 seconds to take FIRST PLACE! Go Bailey!! Second leg of the NAJ title earned!
Again, we settled in for the long wait until the Novice Standard run. Bailey seemed much more settled and spent most of the afternoon napping in his crate. I picked up the Novice Standard map and spent a good chunk of time planning my afternoon run. I also ate some lunch, played some games on my phone, and watched my instructors run their dogs. While I was waiting, a classmate (and obedience instructor at ACA) ran with her dog Flynn and they earned their MACH! How exciting for them! I took some time out to sign her MACH bar (when you get a MACH, the sponsoring club usually gives you a jump bar as a memento - friends and fellow competitors often sign the bar). I grabbed some lunch and soon enough, the Novice Standard course was set up. I could tell Bailey and I were both getting very tired, so I was just hoping to make it though the afternoon run.
The standard course was, again, very straightforward.
The course map:
I had originally planned to do a front cross after jump #11, so I could have Bailey on my left for the closing. When I walked the course, I found that this would give the dog a really horrible angle to the teeter unless you brought the dog WAY wide on the turn. Bailey has had issue with teeters in the past, so I decided not to chance it. I kept him on my right for the teeter, then used the pause at the contact to do a front cross before #13 chute. The course itself wasn't that overwhelming, but I definitely felt the exhaustion of 2 days of early mornings and little sleep. We got two 5 point faults for table issues. For the first one, Bailey blew right by the table instead of getting on it. This was the first 5 points off for the refusal. Next, as we were on the table, I could hear the judge counting down from 5. When he got to 2, my brain somehow thought it was time to go, my body listened, and Bailey followed right along with me. Another 5 points for a table fault. *sigh* I was just so tired that my head wasn't thinking straight. Who goes on 2?!? You're supposed to wait for the "1 and GO" before leaving the table and that was totally my fault. Other than that, it was a nice run and Bailey did everything I asked of him, including sticking all of his contacts exactly like he's supposed to.
Here is proof:
Standard run
The unofficial results were posted and Bailey got a 90 and qualified. His time was 58.06 seconds, well under the standard course time of 64 seconds (even with having to do the table twice!). Because of our faults, we placed second, but still had a great run! Second leg of the NA title earned!
Overall, Bailey way exceeded my expectations and I'm looking forward to being able to enter him in some more trials in the spring. Hopefully, we'll soon be campaigning for our MACH too! :-)
Since the classes were run in the same order as the previous day, our first challenge again was the JWW course. The AKC requires that you earn each leg of your title under a different judge (or 2 judges for the 3 legs, can't remember which), so the judges had switched classes. Kim was judging JWW and Scott was on Standard. The Open JWW class preceded ours and seemed to go way too quickly! I had picked up the course map shortly after I arrived again, so had plenty of time to study and make a plan for handling the course.
The course map:
As soon as I picked up the map, I immediately noticed that there was not a single tunnel in sight! As the judge later said in her briefing, this is a true jumpers course with just jumps and weaves. My nerves felt much calmer today, until I started walking the course and decided that the best way to handle it was a rear cross between bar jump #7 and double #8. I've only recently been doing rear crosses with Bailey, since he was never really able to read them that well before. Do I dare try it in a trial and over a double, where if he picks his head up too high to find me, he might knock a bar and eliminate us? Earlier in the week, we had done some fantastic rear crosses in our video handling class, so I figured I might as well give it a try. It was into a pinwheel, which Bailey loves and has a very easy time finding the line. I figured if I was going to try it, this should be the spot. Lo and behold it worked! He read it perfectly and turned to the #9 jump without any issue at all! He took the turn between #9 jump and #10 jump a little wide because I think I pushed up too far into the pinwheel. I should have trusted him to find the line. He also did a great job when I sent him out over the #12 jump so I could get in position in front of the #13 jump for a front cross. We made it through the entire course with NO faults! CLEAN RUN! Yeah!
See for yourself!
JWW run
We were first into the ring in the Novice class and sure did set the bar high! Soon after we ran, the unofficial results were posted. We got a perfect score of 100 and qualified! Our time was 27.49 seconds, which meant that we came in well under the standard course time of 36 seconds. We beat the next best dog by about 1.5 seconds to take FIRST PLACE! Go Bailey!! Second leg of the NAJ title earned!
Again, we settled in for the long wait until the Novice Standard run. Bailey seemed much more settled and spent most of the afternoon napping in his crate. I picked up the Novice Standard map and spent a good chunk of time planning my afternoon run. I also ate some lunch, played some games on my phone, and watched my instructors run their dogs. While I was waiting, a classmate (and obedience instructor at ACA) ran with her dog Flynn and they earned their MACH! How exciting for them! I took some time out to sign her MACH bar (when you get a MACH, the sponsoring club usually gives you a jump bar as a memento - friends and fellow competitors often sign the bar). I grabbed some lunch and soon enough, the Novice Standard course was set up. I could tell Bailey and I were both getting very tired, so I was just hoping to make it though the afternoon run.
The standard course was, again, very straightforward.
The course map:
I had originally planned to do a front cross after jump #11, so I could have Bailey on my left for the closing. When I walked the course, I found that this would give the dog a really horrible angle to the teeter unless you brought the dog WAY wide on the turn. Bailey has had issue with teeters in the past, so I decided not to chance it. I kept him on my right for the teeter, then used the pause at the contact to do a front cross before #13 chute. The course itself wasn't that overwhelming, but I definitely felt the exhaustion of 2 days of early mornings and little sleep. We got two 5 point faults for table issues. For the first one, Bailey blew right by the table instead of getting on it. This was the first 5 points off for the refusal. Next, as we were on the table, I could hear the judge counting down from 5. When he got to 2, my brain somehow thought it was time to go, my body listened, and Bailey followed right along with me. Another 5 points for a table fault. *sigh* I was just so tired that my head wasn't thinking straight. Who goes on 2?!? You're supposed to wait for the "1 and GO" before leaving the table and that was totally my fault. Other than that, it was a nice run and Bailey did everything I asked of him, including sticking all of his contacts exactly like he's supposed to.
Here is proof:
Standard run
The unofficial results were posted and Bailey got a 90 and qualified. His time was 58.06 seconds, well under the standard course time of 64 seconds (even with having to do the table twice!). Because of our faults, we placed second, but still had a great run! Second leg of the NA title earned!
Overall, Bailey way exceeded my expectations and I'm looking forward to being able to enter him in some more trials in the spring. Hopefully, we'll soon be campaigning for our MACH too! :-)
Saturday, November 7, 2009
CCCC Agility Trial Day 1
Today we went to our first agility trial. The trial was held by the Capital City Cocker Club and took place at Cedar Run Horse Center in Woodbridge, VA. I entered Bailey in the 24" height division in Novice A Jumpers with Weaves and Novice A Standard.
Thankfully, I packed up the car last night so I didn't have to do it in the cold darkness of a November morning. Boy was it cold this morning! The only thing I'd forgotten was Bailey's jump height card, which I tore apart the house looking for and finally located inside the cover of a book I was reading a couple months ago. With jump height card in hand, I loaded Bailey and myself into the car and hit the road. After about an hour's drive, we arrived at the horse center and got a great parking spot. I was going to leave Bailey in the car all day, but after taking him on a quick walk around the agility rings, I decided to set up inside. He was acting somewhat nervous with the noise and activity level, so I thought that sitting inside all day would help him acclimate. I found a good spot near the jumpers ring, set up the crate, and settled in.
Jumpers with weaves was our first challenge of the day. At 9:30, they set up the Open JWW course. I think there were about 50 Open dogs and it took a little less than an hour for all of them to run. As soon as the Open class was done, an army of people set up the Novice course. I had picked up the course maps on one of my earlier walks around the building with Bailey, so I'd had plenty of time to study them and develop a plan. The course seemed pretty straightforward. We had about 10 minutes to walk it, then the runs started. They were running tall to small and Bailey was the last 24" dog to run. There were about eight 24" novice dogs, so we had a few minutes to practice some obedience to get him focused and ready to go. I was so nervous that I don't know how I kept myself together. However, as soon as we entered the ring for our run, my nerves disappeared. It was just me, Bailey, and the course. The run went very well and I did everything I'd planned during my walk through. Bailey did take one detour to sniff some of the pigeon feathers on the ground near the end of the course (they might be edible!). Unfortunately, this was counted as a refusal, but only 5 points off. Overall, we had a great run and my confidence was boosted a lot by this morning's performance.
The course:
Our friend Karen was kind enough to take some pictures of us on the JWW course with her iPhone.
Getting set up at the start line:
Bailey anxiously waiting while I lead out 2 full jumps. Most of the other novice competitors thought I was nuts for trying this, but I trust my dog and his stay! :-)
Nailing the weave entry:
After just a few minutes of waiting, the unofficial results were posted. We got a score of 95 and qualified! Even better, our time was 27.11 seconds, which meant that we came in well under the standard course time of 33 seconds AND beat the next best dog by six tenths of a second. FIRST PLACE! Yahoo!! First leg of the NAJ title earned!
The Standard run wasn't until the very end of the day, so we settled in for a long wait. Bailey spent most of the afternoon napping in his crate. I wandered around, fiddled with my new phone, studied the Standard course map, ate some lunch, talked to some friends, watched some other dogs run, studied the standard course map some more, and cheered some friends on.
About 4.5 hours after we finished our JWW run, the Novice Standard course was set and ready for the walk through. Again the course was pretty straightforward and I'd had plenty of time to develop a plan. Walking the course just confirmed that what I planned on paper would work for Bailey. I was also able to see a couple alternatives in case things didn't quite go how I planned. The same eight dogs were in this 24" class and we were last up. The run went really well and almost exactly how I planned. Bailey did take a detour on the way to the table to see if the table legs laying on the side of the ring were edible. That, unfortunately, was counted as a refusal for 5 points off. Other than that, he did a fantastic job. He hit all of his contacts, did a wide variety of jumps with no issues, had no issue with the start line timer at the entrance to the tunnel (he'd never seen that before, so I didn't know what to expect), and did a great job with the weaves getting and keeping the entrance. I left the ring VERY pleased with his performance.
The course:
Again after just a few minutes of waiting, the unofficial results were posted. Bailey got another 95 and qualified. His time was 58.57 seconds, well under the standard course time of 67 seconds. We beat the next best dog's time by about 1.1 seconds, earning us another FIRST PLACE! YEAH!! First leg of the NA title earned!
Bailey did a great job and surpassed even my best expectations for him. I'm exhausted and need to hit the hay, since we're back there again for another day of fun bright and early tomorrow!
Thankfully, I packed up the car last night so I didn't have to do it in the cold darkness of a November morning. Boy was it cold this morning! The only thing I'd forgotten was Bailey's jump height card, which I tore apart the house looking for and finally located inside the cover of a book I was reading a couple months ago. With jump height card in hand, I loaded Bailey and myself into the car and hit the road. After about an hour's drive, we arrived at the horse center and got a great parking spot. I was going to leave Bailey in the car all day, but after taking him on a quick walk around the agility rings, I decided to set up inside. He was acting somewhat nervous with the noise and activity level, so I thought that sitting inside all day would help him acclimate. I found a good spot near the jumpers ring, set up the crate, and settled in.
Jumpers with weaves was our first challenge of the day. At 9:30, they set up the Open JWW course. I think there were about 50 Open dogs and it took a little less than an hour for all of them to run. As soon as the Open class was done, an army of people set up the Novice course. I had picked up the course maps on one of my earlier walks around the building with Bailey, so I'd had plenty of time to study them and develop a plan. The course seemed pretty straightforward. We had about 10 minutes to walk it, then the runs started. They were running tall to small and Bailey was the last 24" dog to run. There were about eight 24" novice dogs, so we had a few minutes to practice some obedience to get him focused and ready to go. I was so nervous that I don't know how I kept myself together. However, as soon as we entered the ring for our run, my nerves disappeared. It was just me, Bailey, and the course. The run went very well and I did everything I'd planned during my walk through. Bailey did take one detour to sniff some of the pigeon feathers on the ground near the end of the course (they might be edible!). Unfortunately, this was counted as a refusal, but only 5 points off. Overall, we had a great run and my confidence was boosted a lot by this morning's performance.
The course:
Our friend Karen was kind enough to take some pictures of us on the JWW course with her iPhone.
Getting set up at the start line:
Bailey anxiously waiting while I lead out 2 full jumps. Most of the other novice competitors thought I was nuts for trying this, but I trust my dog and his stay! :-)
Nailing the weave entry:
After just a few minutes of waiting, the unofficial results were posted. We got a score of 95 and qualified! Even better, our time was 27.11 seconds, which meant that we came in well under the standard course time of 33 seconds AND beat the next best dog by six tenths of a second. FIRST PLACE! Yahoo!! First leg of the NAJ title earned!
The Standard run wasn't until the very end of the day, so we settled in for a long wait. Bailey spent most of the afternoon napping in his crate. I wandered around, fiddled with my new phone, studied the Standard course map, ate some lunch, talked to some friends, watched some other dogs run, studied the standard course map some more, and cheered some friends on.
About 4.5 hours after we finished our JWW run, the Novice Standard course was set and ready for the walk through. Again the course was pretty straightforward and I'd had plenty of time to develop a plan. Walking the course just confirmed that what I planned on paper would work for Bailey. I was also able to see a couple alternatives in case things didn't quite go how I planned. The same eight dogs were in this 24" class and we were last up. The run went really well and almost exactly how I planned. Bailey did take a detour on the way to the table to see if the table legs laying on the side of the ring were edible. That, unfortunately, was counted as a refusal for 5 points off. Other than that, he did a fantastic job. He hit all of his contacts, did a wide variety of jumps with no issues, had no issue with the start line timer at the entrance to the tunnel (he'd never seen that before, so I didn't know what to expect), and did a great job with the weaves getting and keeping the entrance. I left the ring VERY pleased with his performance.
The course:
Again after just a few minutes of waiting, the unofficial results were posted. Bailey got another 95 and qualified. His time was 58.57 seconds, well under the standard course time of 67 seconds. We beat the next best dog's time by about 1.1 seconds, earning us another FIRST PLACE! YEAH!! First leg of the NA title earned!
Bailey did a great job and surpassed even my best expectations for him. I'm exhausted and need to hit the hay, since we're back there again for another day of fun bright and early tomorrow!
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