Memorial Day Madness 2010!!!

We had a nice three days of agility in Pearblossom. It was hot, though, especially on Sunday and Monday. There was a nice breeze some of the time so it wasn't all bad. The motel sucked most nights. Why must people be so loud? Usually we have our trailer, but we didn't this year.

Blue was good like usual, haha. She Qd 9/15 runs with no bonus Qs. There were only three to try all three days, ugh. I needed/wanted more tries. I swear, there have been so few bonus lines around lately, except at that one in April which had a line on almost every course. I think there were a lot on Regulars in February. We aren't going to qualify for SuperStakes at this rate, if judges don't pick courses with lots of lines. Just because we don't qualify doesn't mean the possibility of running it is totally out, lol. She did get super close to one in a round of Regular and still managed to Q. We just had a bobble so didn't get the bonus. She also only missed a couple jumps in a Jumpers try. We are getting closer and closer.

We only seemed to Q one Regular a day, lol. Need to work on discriminations, haha. It seems I must say "here, walk" to get the dogwalk on a discrim, rather than just walk and stop moving. I have noticed that lately. One run, I told her "here, walk" before the tunnel that was before the discrim, and then "walk, WALK" and stop moving, before the DW, yet she still goes in the tunnel. Argh. Well, that is now on our list of things to practice.

Oh, she got her NATCH-5! Onto NATCH-6. She got her NATCH-3 at this trial last year. She also had this smoking Tunnelers run with a yps of 8.09 and she had second place (not by much though)! She seemed a little slow in Jumpers and some other runs to me this trial. Maybe it was the heat or bad sleep in the motel, but it could be that she is just slowing down. She is eight years old. Besides, while she looked a little slow to me, she still effortlessly clears the jumps. We just have got to get those 100+ DRI Regulars soon. I think we might have gotten one this weekend. There was another one with yps that could have gotten 100+ in Jan, but now I'm not so sure.

Now, Truly was a little super star this weekend. She seems to becoming a lot more consistent Q, speed and distance wise. She Qd 13/15 runs. This is her one year NADAC anniversary, and last year at this trial she got like one Q each day, haha. For Qing all those runs, Truly received the Novice High in Trial award! She also finished her O-TG-N and S-NCC, so she got to move into Open Chances. Now she is in three Open classes.

Truly needs to work on staying in the weaves when there is an exciting tunnel ahead. She generally needs to work on everything. Still such a baby. She was 100% on her discriminations this weekend, unlike another dog I know. She had a couple instances of self releasing on the contacts. One where it looks like she just runs it, I told her "go, go" so I guess I told her to do that. I was planning on being able to early/quick release her contacts anyway, but haven't really tried it out at a trial. I haven't really worked it much on full size equipment at the field. I have messed around with it at home on a teeter plank though.

We don't have anything for sure until August, but I hope to hit a couple more trials before Aug. 1st, when Champs qualifications end. My mom doesn't think she will take Siri to Champs. She just isn't consistently up enough to even just be the entertainment. She just made a comment to me today about how it would be fun to see Tru run at Champs which got me thinking. She has been so consistent lately, that it doesn't seem that farfetched to run her at Champs. Only problem is there aren't enough trials to qualify from now till then. If I had been planning on it, I would have entered her more in Open. I just didn't think she had it in her when we were first talking about it. Maybe I'll enter her in Open at the next few trials and try to get some Open Qs on her, then send in an entry for the period where not fully qualified dogs can be allowed in if there is enough space. I really wasn't planning on putting the pressure to qualify for Champs on her this year. She has so many years ahead of her that I would be okay if she didn't go this year. Might be fun though!