Friday, November 20, 2009

DOCNA trial this weekend

Did somebody say agility?




 I shall dominate the 20" Vet class.



Shhh, nobody tell her she's the only one in the 20" Vet class.

I'm entered in a million classes and the trial is full so it's going to be some long days.  DOCNA has a lot of classes.  Too many classes.  Why did I enter so many?  And I didn't even enter them all.  But it's not like I have to get up early for work on Monday so what the hey.

It's Strum's first shot at the Intern or Advanced classes so we'll see how that goes.  I didn't realize he'd gotten his Strategic Time Gamblers title at the last trial and I'd already emailed the trial secretary to move him up in Standard.  Had to email her again to move him up in Strategic Time Gamblers then realized that I think I can move him up in Traditional Gamblers too even though he has only one leg because DOCNA combines Gamblers classes for your Gamblers title, doesn't matter which class they come from.  But I was too embarrassed to email the secretary a third time and I figure with only one Q he's probably not ready to move up anyway.  I also realized he needs only 1 Jumpers leg to get out of Beginners so hopefully we can pick that up in the first Jumpers class so we don't have to hang around until who knows when for the second one at the end of the day.  I remember running at 7:30 p.m. or so last year.  Ridiculous to think he's still in Baby Jumpers but he keeps knocking one bar.  Argh.

I'm feeling more confident about his contacts for this trial.  I shouldn't say that because now they'll be a disaster but he was so good last trial and he's been doing well at the practice field, nearly 100% on the dogwalk and I think 100% on the A-frame.  I don't do many A-frames and I don't typically practice them on their own so I don't keep proper records of them but I can't remember him missing any lately and he was perfect at his last trial.  Weaves are still a work in progress.  Still not getting those 2x2's at the practice field.  I've got an idea of what to try next but that doesn't help me for tomorrow.  The goal as always is to work on him keeping his head and the same for me.  If we can both keep our brains in focus the agility will follow.  I'm also focusing on my handling, in particular my deceleration cues.  Joy was helping me with this the other day and in my rush to keep up I sometimes forget to slow down where I need to.  Going to try to keep the flailing arm under control too.

Lola will give me whatever Lola feels like giving me and that's fine.  I signed her up for probably too many runs and I may need to pull her, we'll see how she's feeling.  I love running her in DOCNA so I'm looking forward to her runs.

The trial is only 20 minutes away so I can sleep in a bit which will make the long days not so terrible.  Should be nice weather so I can crate outside, at least until the sun goes down and it gets too cold, so Strum will have a chance to relax in the car and his brain will stay in his head.  At least that's the fantasy I'm laboring under.

On a totally different subject here's a video of a guy who's got some crazy mad dog training skilz.  Riding his bike through town and on urban biking/hiking trails with 16 dogs in tow.  I told Jonny we need to get 13 more so I could try this out and he thought that was a fabulous idea.  I'm a little concerned though that this guy isn't carrying any poop bags.  Unless he's also taught them not to poop out on their rides in which case he surely is a dog training genius.

7 comments:

  1. Good Luck Elayne. Docna is fun! I hope to Q to go to Nationals next year. Maybe we will see you there.

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  2. Have fun this weekend! Where is the trial? We'll be hiking in Boulder this weekend.

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  3. The trial is as Boulder County Fairgrounds.

    Have fun hiking, should be a beautiful weekend.

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  4. And yeah, I'm planning on going to DOCNA Champs. I'm sure Rift will get his Q no problem.

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  5. Ok, Im pretty impressed with the guys dogs. I showed it to my husband and we were laughing. We cant even pass bicycles when we are on foot without our dogs going ape-s$$#%$ crazy. My husband said maybe we need to start carrying a big stick.

    Good luck at your trial. Diana

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  6. Wow, 20 minutes from home?! How cool is that! Glad Jonny's up for another 13 dogs. I'm sure you've got the time for them, too. Too many classes--CPE has 7 different classes but they allow dogs to sign up for only a max of 5 a day no matter how many the club offers. There's a lot of sense in that logistically, but those of us with insane dogs would love to have more runs per day. Hope the weekend went well.

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  7. I don't think there's a stick big enough to handle my crew.

    DOCNA also has 7 different classes. There were 6 runs offered on Sat. and 5 on Sunday, they don't put limits on runs per day. But 5 is about my limit. Strum had 5 runs on Sat. and Lola had 4 and they both had 3 on Sunday and today I'm oh so tired.

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