This weekend was my own club’s (Skyline Agility) NADAC trial. With the typical NADAC-style open courses and long yardage, running 2 dogs in a NADAC trial is exhausting enough, running AND working doubly so! I’m blogging about it now because frankly I’m too tired to do anything else :)!
Once again, we had a mixed bag of weather. It wouldn’t be a proper Skyline trial if we didn’t have some rain, but considering some of our past “monsoons”, we lucked out.
This year we offered a “traditional” format trial with something for everyone. If you entered every class, you’d have run 4 runs of Regular, 2 Chances, 2 Jumpers and one each of Touch and Go, Hoopers, Weavers and Tunnelers (and spent a small fortune on entry fees!) I only entered about 4 classes per day per dog and that was more than enough for me!
Jayda Recap
Jayda and I did pretty well, earning 30 points in Regular, 10 in Jumpers and 10 in Chances. I was very pleased with her in Regular on Sunday. She was moving as fast as I’ve ever seen her go, and after one of her runs she actually acted HAPPY and bounced up for her treats, which earned her a bonus run to the food tent for something REALLY special :)! (You have to understand that Jayda normally just wants to go back to her crate!) We failed to Q on her 2nd jumpers run because it was the end of the day – with everyone packing up, she was just too stressed. I can’t wait to move her up to Open jumpers, which is never at the beginning or end of the day, but I’ve come this far towards her triple superior, so I might as well stick it out. She only needs 15 pts in Regular, 30 in Chances and 50 in Jumpers, so hopefully by the end of the year!
Pictures, pictures?
There are some good photos of Jayda on the trial photographer’s site, especially a nice series of jump photos that starts here and two from her Regular class that start here.
Bryce Recap
Bryce and I didn’t have our NADAC “mojo” together this weekend, only managing a 5 point Q in one regular run, 10 points in elite jumpers and 10 in hoopers with a 1st place to finish his Novice Hoopers title. Hoopers is kind of like Snooker in the sense that Bryce doesn’t LIKE it but he’s GOOD at it. (I think Jayda would do well in Hoopers, but I don’t think she’d enjoy it either.)
Bryce was being weird about the dogwalk in his regular classes, refusing it and going across much slower than usual. I don’t know if it was because the ramps were bouncy or if it was something else – the black rubber contacts? Doing only the little dogwalk all winter in CPE trials and “forgetting” the full sized dogwalk? He was fine with the a-frame. There were other dogs that didn’t like that dogwalk, but few if any of them with his considerable experience.
His elite jumpers run was his last run of the weekend – a gruelling 22 obstacle course. I could tell he was kind of tired, but he was able to keep up a decent pace throughout the course nonetheless. He was definitely feeling well all weekend.
Tunnel Relay (and links to Bryce pictures)
The photographer got a few cute pictures of Bryce in our tunnel relay event. Our tunnel relay is an annual fundraiser we do to raise money for United Hospice – a volunteer organization which cared for one of our beloved Skyline members in her final days. Most teams dress up in silly costumes to run (my team was a last-minute entry, hence the cheesy cardboard clock on my back!). It’s a lot of fun, and in the 4 years we’ve been doing it, we’ve raised over $21,000 for the organization!
During my down time, I took Raven out to play. At all our trials, whenever the practice jump (or in NADAC the practice jump, weaves and hoop) are vacant I’ve been taking Raven over to them to do little sequences and play with her “ratty”. Hopefully that will lessen the shock for her one of these days when I actually put her in the ring!
