World Wind Week

Its been a world wind week. In one week Ive driven from Columbia to Savannah. From Savannah to Perry Ga., then back to Columbia. Then from Columbia back to Savannah, changed cars and continued on to Orlando. Then Orlando back to Columbia. Wow!!  Thats a lot in a week. LOL

So after Christmas I drove to Perry Ga where Miley and I were entered just one day for USDAA Team. Im really not planning on going to nationals because Miley and I are so inconsistent but just in case, I thought I would try to get a team Q. (You need one team Q for nationals). The nice thing about team is you can make some mistakes on some courses and still Q.  Anyway, I was teamed with someone who has a sheltie who can be a little crazy like Miley. Plus she got her team Q last weekend so that took the pressure off for me.
When I got to Perry Ga that night it was 44 degrees but the wind was blowing like crazy. It made it freezing. Even though I had lots of layers on to walk Miley, it was freezing and I was miserable.  One time the wind gusted so hard it blew Miley's back end out from under her. Holy Crap!  I was staying in an RV with a friend and I told her I was thinking of going home. I cant stand to be this cold. The RV was swaying during the night. It was like being on a boat.  But the next day the wind calmed down and the sun came out.

First up was standard. Let me just say a lot of "big name" people from the east coast were at this trial. I wont list name but initials. So if you follow agility you probably will know them:  LM, AB, TS, SM, KH there was someone else but I cant remember who.

As you will see in the video , this run is horrible.  She was pushing her start line and I released her so she wouldnt break but really thats releasing herself. Then She didnt finish the weaves and I let it go. (not good dog training). Then the tunnel under the a-frame. Im not sure what was going on with that. What Miley did, coming back out of the tunnel, so did lots of other dogs. Even several of the "big name" seasoned dogs did it. Weird huh?  So anyway we got a big fat E.  I just wasnt expecting this run to go so bad. I only gave Miley a couple of treats afterwards.  She needs to learn the rules are always the same no matter where we are. And I need to be consistent with that.
As I was walking Miley around to cool her down, I thought "what the heck am I doing here?".  And "where is this journey with Miley taking me. What is the lesson Im suppose to be learning?". And then I just let it go. We are here just to have fun and I need to let everything else go.




Miley hadnt been exercised in 3 days. We were at my moms house and it had been raining a lot. Plus you cant walk the dogs in her neighborhood because people let their dogs run loose and other dogs have been attacked. And then it was so windy the night before that a long walk at the trial site was out of the question. I had recently read that good trainers dont need to wear their dogs out before going in the ring. But I decided that was not information that helped me and took Miley outside and made her fetch the ball again and again.

Next up Snooker.

Here was the snooker course. You could only do three reds. I went the easy way so I didnt get the most points, 31. But this was the best snooker run we have every had. To bad we dropped at bar on 6b. Ugh  My partner burned up this course and took 3rd place. (notice Miley's start line is much better. Just only getting a couple of treats or chasing the ball helped her?I dont know)

 

Next up was gamblers. It had a joker instead of a gamble which someone had to explain to me. As soon as you you hear the buzzer you had 17 seconds to do the joker and take the finish jump. If the buzzer sounded before the finish jump then you lost all your points. The joker was, take a jump then an obstacle, another jump and a different obstacle, another jump and a different obstacle ect.. the point added up as 2, 4, 6, 8 ect.. And the finish jump had to be taken after an obstacle, not a jump or you got whistled. 

We were doing well and were in the Joker part, when she didnt understand go into the tunnel.  I knew we were burning up time and so the buzzer rang just before the finish jump and we didnt get any joker points. Ugh!!  My partner again burned up the course and took first place. WhooHoo for her!!




After this run I was beat. I had worked several classes. It was hard to find workers because everyone was running a dog. So I worked championship classes. I worked the gamblers class. I was leash runner, bar setter and chute straightener all at the same time. Finally someone took pitty on me and did the chute for the last few runs. I was very happy with the people who started with the tire. LOL  Most people did the chute first. Like me. So I felt pretty good about my snooker and gamblers runs until I went to look at the score book. That made me feel bad about myself. Why did I look at that stupid book. Its the reason I dont watch my videos until after Im done for the day. If I felt a run was good, I dont want to see what it really looked like on video and make me feel bad. LOL

I had received a lot of worker tickets for the worker raffle. This very nice lady, who's husband was running a dog, filmed all my runs. How nice was that!!  I gave her all my worker tickets and told her I hope she wins something.  I left before the end of the day, so I dont know if she won anything but I hope so.

This was jumpers. I heard Miley hit the number 3 bar and thought it dropped . So of course I was thinking about that and we almost went off course going to 6. All of a sudden my brain kicked in and I went, "holy crap, cue your dog for the weaves".  Everything was good until 18 when I gave my dog NO indication to take number 18, so she ran by. I was able to save it and get back on course. So we didnt E and got a Q.  Several dogs ran pass the tunnel after 12 so I made sure I had Miley's head going to the tunnel.


Last up relay. Our team had been above the Q cut off line  until after jumpers. So we needed to do well on relay to get back above the Q line.

I ran the squares. I pushed her off the a-frame with a rear cross. Ugh. But it was just a refusal and time points.

 

I left right after this. It was a freaking long drive home. I think it took me 6 hours. Atlanta traffic is horrible!!  I finally got home at 11pm and saw an email from my friend that we Qed. Whoohoo!

Ashley, all these videos are taken with the ipad 3.