Evergreen Golden Retriever Club Trial
June 12, 13, 2004
An outdoor trial on grass. Two rings, 600 runs per day. The forecast was for rain starting late in the afternoon Saturday and rain for Sunday. The forecasters were right, although the rain wasn't as bad as it could have been, the place was pretty wet on Sunday and there were a couple of torrential downpours.
I am forever optimistic about Al's agility runs and the runs this weekend, although they resulted in no Qs, gave me reason to believe that Al is going put together some really great runs soon. I say this because we have stopped making the same mistakes repeatedly, AND, the mistakes that are happening are ones that would not happen if Al had been handled better, and I had made better choices for us. The bobbles we are having (and it is usually only one per run) are a result of Al running fast. On his Std. course runs he is averaging about 3.1 yds/sec. and on his JWW runs he is moving almost 4.5 yds./sec. Every run I am learning a bit more about how to set up a jump or turn at speed, and eventually after I have made all the mistakes I can possibly make at least 3 times on different runs, I will have learned enough so that we can have some success.
Right now, my objective is to run Al as hard as I can within my capabilities, and see what happens. He has very good speed, and once my handling and our teamwork improve, he should be able to run even faster. I am not going to slow Al down in order to get clean runs, because I want to learn how to handle him at a speed that keeps him excited about the sport. That being said, it is still disappointing when you have a fast run and a lot of fun, and one little mistake costs us a placement.
Saturday Standard Course (Excellent A)
Al was raring to go and wouldn't sit or stay at the start line for me, when he had done it all over the site that morning, and had done it outside the starting area perfectly many times before we walked out to compete. Luckily I caught up to him by the A frame, and then everything went well until we hit the weave poles. I had two ways of doing it in my mind and opted for sending him into the poles rather than front crossing him into the poles. This was my mistake, because I didn't execute what I wanted early enough or far enough out from the poles to let him have a good look at them. The result was a refusal because I didn't trust Al to do what he could do easily. Everything was fine until the table, where Al was distracted by the flags, when I got his attention, I said "Al" and he thought I meant come to me and as a result we had a table fault. I could have prevented that too by just saying nothing and giving him the down signal. We had a hard judge who had allowed many Shelties to keep their elbows up, but she insisted in perfect form for Al which he eventually did. You'll notice that when I have problems on the table now, instead of getting up close to Al, I move away from him, and then he focuses on the task and then we are off the table. Yeah!!
The rest of the course was fine, although I could have run harder through the finish, and throughout the whole course for that matter. Al had a pretty enthusiastic celebration after the run, which I always love, and encourage!!
Al's time was 71.31 seconds. Standard Course time was 69 seconds (160 yds.) It looks like a slow time except he took a long time on the table.
Saturday JWW Course (Excellent B)
This was a funny run. Al had been sniffing the grass any time he had a chance as we walked around the site during the day. He was hunting worms and smelling something everywhere he went. I don't think it was stress, because he did it everywhere. Maybe they had used an interesting fertilizer of something. We had a decent stay at the start, but Al sniffed the ground between jumps 2 and 3 and after jump 3 he headed off course into the crowd and stopped right at Heather's feet, where she was filming our run!!?? Heather didn't know what to do. Al was interested in something on the ground, and was sniffing around the grass, then a bee flew out of the grass and he snapped at it and jumped around after it. Finally, after 14 seconds he rejoined me on the course!!! He finally got into it about the 6th jump, and had a decent run.
When we finished everyone said that we had a clean run!!! I couldn't believe it, but the judge decided that Al had not refused a jump, and so we ran the course clean!!
Al's time was 44.83 seconds. The course time was 42 seconds. If he had come out of the woods 3 seconds earlier we would have Q'd. If you took Al's 14 second coffee break out of his time, he would have had a time of 30.83 seconds and have placed 4th!!
Al's speed was pretty good if you take out the "coffee break" 30.83 seconds (137 yds.) is 4.44 yds./second.
Sunday Standard Course (Excellent A)
This was a tricky course, and the judge had placed the table right inside the horseshoe shape of the tunnel. I'd never seen this before as had most people, so I was dreading it. Al did it perfectly, taking the tunnel instead of the tunnel after jumping on the table. Al didn't run hard as it was raining, but he did a fast chute even though it was wet, and then a good sit on a wet table without first going into a tunnel entry on either side of the table!! Then we came to a jump that I was worried about, so I decided to "really work it" . Instead of trusting Al, I ran too close to the jump and as a result Al turned hard into me, and then I said the dreaded word. "Here" which Al did immediately, because I was right there beside the jump and that must mean take the jump again!! Right Dad!! Yippee!! After our, actually MY wrong course we went on to finish the run. In doing so I wasn't there, Al didn't get his Wiggle command early enough and as a result almost took the dog walk a second time before I called him into the poles where he entered the second pole for another fault.
When we finished Al was a very happy guy because he knew he did everything right!! I was really disappointed in myself for messing up by not trusting him to do what I know he could have done without all my "help". A clean run with Al's time would have placed third.
Al's time was 67.3seconds. Course time was 75 seconds (175 yds.)
Sunday JWW Course (Excellent B)
This is the kind of run that gives me hope!! The video starts at the third jump. The Start jump and the second jump were in line with each other and the third jump was a 90 degree turn to the right, although the dogs were being set up for a wrong course with a trap jump straight ahead of 1 and 2. Al did it avoiding the trap!! Everything went great until we hit the weave poles. I didn't hold back and let Al find the poles, but he did find the entry anyway, and then as he was going into the poles something scared him and he shied like a horse would and entered after the second pole. We restarted the poles and Al went on to have a good run, and I was able to run hard and get the front crosses in that I wanted. Al really ran hard on a very tricky course after we had our mistake on the weave poles. I hope that we can run like that more consistently in the future!! If you take out the 4 seconds that it took to redo the weave poles Al's speed was 4.6 yds./sec, which is where I want him to run his courses with me. If we had run clean at 32.6 seconds which we could have done, Al would have placed second!! Now that is something I can look forward too!!
Al's time was 36.60 seconds. Course time was 46 seconds, 150 yards.