Christmas and trials

For Christmas, well the weekend before Christmas, we drove to Savannah.  Everyone in our family had things they wanted to do for Christmas, so they wanted to meet the weekend before. That didn't quit work for me but we made it work. I had to cancel my seminar on Saturday with Loretta Mueller. Than to beat all, I woke up vomiting on Friday, and had to cancel the one day of the seminar that I could do. Ugh!!! 
The drive to Savannah was rough. It usually takes us 3 hours and it took us 5 with traffic.  We had a good time. We played a  game called "Heads Up" with Stephanie's cell phone. It was fun.  We didn't really buy gifts. But we did do a white elephant exchange.   We left that night to drive home. My son had to work and I left the dogs at home.  (both my  nieces brought their cats, so its a good thing I didn't bring my dogs).   It was a rough drive home. We kept having to switch drivers, but we made it.

Then actual Christmas , we spent at home.  Our neighbors invited us over for Christmas dinner. It was very nice.

Then  on Friday, I went to Perry Ga for a USDAA trial.  Last year the trial was freezing and windy. So windy , it almost blew Miley's feet out from under her. I remember thinking, "What am I doing here?".  But this year is was warm. It felt so nice outside.

 I entered Miley in Team. On Friday we started at 7:30am. We walked team standard and Team gamblers and then ran both.

 

Miley was awesome and took 1st place.   She took 2nd in gambles.   Of course I some how deleted my videos for Saturday. So no video's of any Q's.  That figures.  Java had a pretty Advance jumpers run with 1st place. I cant remember what happened in Miley's PIII Standard run but we didn't Q.   Java missed the DW contact in standard. (Ive  been changing Java to a 20/20 , but she didn't stop on any contacts at the trial. She didn't even think about it).   We had Steeplechase, I just entered Java.

 

 

We were awesome on this run.  So many dogs went into the tunnel after 5 but Java read it perfectly.  Then I messed up. I was so worried I was going to push to hard after 8 and send her off course to 2, that I didn't push hard enough and she missed 8 and then took the backside of it. Ack!  the rest was perfect.  She probably would have taken first place if I hadn't screwed that up. Ugh!!  (Im so mad that I deleted this video. )    I actually think we ran Grand Prix first and then steeplechase. 

Here is the grand Prix course map.

Lots of people ran the outside of the tunnel. But I figured I could never beat Java to the end of that. So I  FC between 2 and 3 and it worked fine.  Our only mistake was she missed the dogwalk contact. ACK!!



We left at 8:30 pm and some people we still running. what a tiring day. But they put a lot of classes into the day. So if you didn't enter all that , it wouldn't be bad.

Then next day started again at 7:30am again.
First up was Team Snooker and Team jumpers.

 Miley was doing great and then for some weird reason, after she finished 6B and I was sending her to 6A and she flew off to the tunnel. Tweet. Silly Miley.

Then was Team jumpers.

The hard part was 10 to 11. many dogs went off course into the tunnel, including Miley. I was planning to front cross after the broad jump. I started to drive in for the FC and then chickened out. so my rear was late and she took the tunnel. After watching the video, I could have made it. I wimped out.  And then E'ed.  You never want to E in Team. It kills your score. Better to drop bars, miss contacts and get refusals, that only adds time to you score.

Talk about dropped bars....   Miley DID NOT drop one bar all weekend. Whoohoo!!!!!  I have no idea why sometimes she drops bars and other times doesn't.  But she was on fire this weekend.



PIII standard, no Q. Ugh!!  I have not idea why she freaked out and ran a loop around the ring. Once she came back, she was perfect. Ugh!! So he called a refusal on me but  he wasn't calling a lot of refusal. I saw some sheltie spin and not take the jump in front of her 3 times (the same jump) and he didn't call a refusal. I thought maybe you don't get refusal in team . My friend sitting next to me said the same  thing. Then we saw the next dog get a refusal, so who knows. 

Java ran  starters standard on Sunday.  She gets to the table and just stands there.  She has been trained to do an automatic down on the table. She wouldn't down. Then you see my arms go up and I said "really" to her. LOL, after that she went into a down.  I really thought she hit the dogwalk contact but he called it . ugh.  Well never get out of starters. LOL

Next was Biathlon jumpers.

Oh yes and Java's big accomplishment  was no broken start lines. Whoohoo.  It was 30 feet from jump #1 to jump #2. I even asked someone else how far they thought it was and they said about 30 feet.  I went almost to the second jump before I released her.  That's the biggest lead out that Ive done with her. Yay Java!!! I thought I had her coming over Jump #2 and I turned my head and she cut behind me. Ack, so off course. Bummer.

This was a tough little course.   missed the weave pole entry and the dogwalk contact.  Then off course after 18. I wanted to front cross after 16 but didn't make it.



Last up was team Relay.  My partner E'd but Miley rocked her side. Whoohoo!!  It was the  hardest Team course Ive seen so far.  Sorry, I cant find the map.
We finished at 7:30 at night. I really wanted to go home. It was a rough drive. There is one part of the drive, about 1 hour, that is back roads.  It had rained and there was fog. A trucker passed me on a two lane road, double yellow line, up hill. I was doing the speed limit of 55. I thought we might get killed. You couldn't see if someone was coming because we were going up a  hill and then into a valley. Dumb trucker.  I slowed way down and no one came in the opposite direction, thank god.   I had to stop at a rest area around 10:30 and slept for 15 minutes. That still didn't help. Then I stopped at an all night McDonalds.  Thank goodness, that helped. I got home a MN. Safe and sound.

Lots of good things happening with my dogs as far as agility.  Im going to another trial this weekend. What was I thinking???  I feel like Im still not recovered from this pass weekend. Oh, well. Off we go!

Ground hog day

I love that movie, "Ground Hog Day".   That's how I feel right now. Same day over and over again. Ugh!! 
Ive been thinking of backing off all the stuff I do with the club. I don't want to teach classes anymore. Most of our group, the co-op class, has fallen apart. 3 people have moved and there are really just two other people that come all the time. Others only come if its warm.   Its a fun class. I set up a standard course and we all try to run it. Then we help each other on the places were things go wrong. Not sure why more people don't come.   If we have time, we change the course and run it again.  You can run more than one dog.  Anyway, who knows why people don't come.
I was at the field for a class last Wednesday and no one showed up. Some of the people I knew they weren't coming. But the one lady, who always comes, didn't show up. Usually she text me and lets me know.   It was ok, I ran my dogs and worked on areas that I needed to improve.  I finished early and these people start showing up. So I told them that we usually have a class at the field  on Wednesday but it just so happens , no one showed up. They were kind mean about the whole thing. Telling me that  "so and so" at the club told them they could use the field. They are having a class. I tried to tell them that Ive had this class here for the past year, every Wednesday night. But they were just kinda rude about the whole thing.  So I contacted everyone in the class and we decided not to have class again until January. So I sent the one girl a  message that we canceled our class on Wednesdays , so they can have the field. She never answered me. Geeez! You're welcome!

Ive been thinking about dropping Miley down to 8 inches. Here is a video of her running 8 inches. I just don't want her to get hurt crashing bars at 12 inches. Do you think she looks better jumping 8 inches?




Here are some pictures I took last month. Im not sure if I posted them on Facebook or not.

Mickey has had a skin infection since the beginning of October.  It has gotten better. He started with sores all over his body.  I think I washed him every day in October with this special shampoo. And I think it went into November.  Now its the middle of December, and it never completely went away, but now its getting worse again.  The places that didn't heal, were under is arms,  his abdomen and groin area.  So I took him back to the vet. Back to washing him everyday. This time we are doing oral antibiotics. (Last time he got two shots , two weeks apart).   Now his has to take 1 cc of antibiotic three times a day. ( for the next 6 weeks).   They decided to check his thyroid since he cant get over this skin problem. His Thyroid level came back low. It was .5.  They had to order his dose, I guess because he is so little. It suppose  to come tomorrow.   All I do is give medications. Here is the schedule.
5am: Mickey 1 cc of antibiotic
         Miley  eye drops
7am : Mickey 1/2 a cc of phenobarbital
          Miley eye ointment
          Miley  1/2 of tablet of Oxybutin
          Guiness 1/2 tablet of synthroid
4pm: Mickey 1 cc of antibiotic
8pm : Mickey 1/2 cc of phenobarbital
           Miley 1/2 tablet of oxybutin
          Miley 1/2 tablet of Amitriptyline
          Miley eye ointment
         Guiness 1/2 tablet of synthroid.
10pm: Mickey 1 cc of antibiotic

Wow, its a lot. Plus give Mickey a bath. Ack!!

Not sure

We had a nice hike today. It was freezing outside but I went anyway.  My fitbit has been acting crazy for some weird reason. It says I walked thousands of step when Im in my house doing nothing. And then after hiking for 2 hours, it said I didn't do anything.  Ugh.  But that was on the Fitbit Dashboard on my phone.  When I took the fitbit out and looked at it, it said I walked 10,000 steps.  The Dashboard said I was 15,000 steps before I even hiked. SO I think I got it fixed. At least I hope so.

I know I haven't been blogging  much. I keep meaning to and then I just don't seem to. So over the last month I've made some jumps.

I also rubberized my dogwalk. Ugh, what a pain that was. Removing all the paint and then sanding it down. The slats on the dogwalk are imbedded in the plank.  Which makes it hard to get the rubber to stick to the slats. Ugh. I did the ramps one at a time.  The first one, I didn't do a good job on. So there are gaps around the slats, between the rubber and the plank. So the next one I did a better job on. I cut 1/2 pvc poles up and put them on each side of the slats. And then tied them down with bungee cords and put weights on top.

If you look to the ramp behind this one. And look to the right, you can see the gap that formed around the slat.  It didn't happen with this new method. LOL

 

 

Its finally finished and out of the garage. Just in time for it to be freezing cold outside. And now my car is back in the garage.

See that dark, depressing sky. Yea, we've had a lot of those days. Ugh.  Im struggling to stay happy or at least not depressed.  I think Im spending to much time alone.  My husband works all the time. I havnt talked to him in several days.  My son is here but he isnt much of a talker so it feels like you live alone. And I work a job where Im in a office all by myself.  Its down the hall and inside another office. So I don't see anyone or hear anyone.  Don't get me wrong, my job is much better than it was last year but  its still lonely.  The girl that took over my old job has a second nurse with her almost always. I hardly ever had a second nurse when I worked there.. Even when I was seeing 50-70 kids a day. Ugh!!

Then we were going to go to my mom's house for Christmas.  My sister sent me an email saying could we go the weekend before Christmas and that my brother is going to go that weekend.   Well I cant go because I signed up for a Loretta Mueller seminar. So I guess I wont see them for Christmas. If they had told me sooner. Ack!! 

Then, Im already feeling really bad about my handling of  my dogs. I just feel like Im not getting any better. Plus I started working on some foundation stuff and not around agility equipment. Ive been doing it in my house. Some how it effected how my dogs did at the show I just went to.  Java, who only has ever done a down on the table, did a sit and wouldn't go down (on Saturday). And Miley did the same thing. WTH??  And Java was very unsure of herself. You will see in the video, she keeps head checking.   Someone who is an agility teacher in the area, came to the show on Sunday. She was there to get her dogs a message.  Well this guy says to  me, "Is Meagan here to run you dogs?" and was kind of smiling and small laughter. I felt like he was saying, Because you suck, you had to ask Meagan to run you dogs.  Im sure he didn't mean it that way but it was so hard not to take it personally. I know I need thicker skin. Then this person came to the field last night. I was suppose to have a class that Im in charge of. I set up a standard course and then we all help each other with problem areas.  Well no one showed up. I worked my dogs on some things. Then this person shows up and said they are having a class. (they aren't suppose to be holding a class because my class is suppose to have the field. but that's another story).  We start talking and she has a really good dog she wants to start training for agility but there is no way she would take a class from anyone at our club because they all are horrible. Gee thanks.  I think Im good enough to train foundation stuff and the beginning of handling.  So that hurt my feelings. She mush of realized what she said and tried to back pedal.  She said the only person she would take a class from is A. C.  I did tell her that that person is thinking of teaching so maybe she will get to work with her.

 

 

I went to an agility trial about 3 hours from home.  Its an indoor trial but its in a barn and kinda cold.  They have heaters but they are only one side of the barn. Its the opposite side of where you crate your dogs.  Saturday was cold and rainy.  I put Java in FAST and ISC jumpers.  So I could pull her if she broke her stay. She didn't break. Yay!!   ISC jumpers was fun with Java. (I should have set up my video camera but I didn't. Shoot. I will do it next time).

 

 

Miley's run was horrible. She dropped 3 bars and crashed  jump #8. So I stopped the run. Its kind of a dark arena. If you look at the video, its really grainy. Which makes me think there isn't enough light for Miley.  (On Java's video, her ISC standard run was filmed using a tri-pod. It looks much better. Not grainy). 

Java's run was much better. The only thing that happened was I stayed to the right of 1-3. I thought she wasn't reading coming into me over Jump 3. So I really decelerated to a stop and then I was late going to 4. I think she either went around the jump and then back jumped. I cant remember. But after that , she was perfect. Well, she was perfect , I wasn't. I was able to send to the tunnel and really get ahead of her coming out of the tunnel. I should have  FC or Blinded. But I didn't. And I was so far ahead, that my RC was late and she turned to the left and had  turn around and go right.

 

So after Miley did terrible in ISC jumpers, I was worried she was hurt.  But she ran Master Jumpers perfected and Qed.  It made me think, either there wasn't enough light in the morning or I didn't warm her up enough. Her and Java's runs were really close together. Plus it was really cold.  And I know I didn't give her enough of a warm up.

 

 Miley Qed in JWW. Then we ran standard. It was weave poles, chute and jump. Up to that, she had been perfect. And she is almost done with the poles and I thoght, "Hey we might double".  Bam!!  she pulled out of the poles. LOL, that's what I get for loosing concentration.

 

Java's jumpers run was weird. She just head checked so much. I wasnt sure how to handle the line of jumps to the tunnel. So I was late after sending her to the tunnel and how she knew to go to the weaves with me running at her, Ill never know. She should have turned left with what my motion was telling her. It was a weird run and she missed a jump.

 

 

 

 

ISC standard

I ran Miley first.  She went off course into the wrong tunnel entrance. Most of the dogs did. There were only 2 q'S out of everyone who ran.   So with Java, I had to plan to shape her turn over #5. They blast out of the chute and are heading away from the jump. So when they turn to come back to you, it sets a perfect line to the wrong tunnel entrance. (I don't know why I cant see this stuff before I run). So with Java I was going to shape the turn so that she it going to the correct tunnel entrance. And I shaped it to much and she took the a-frame. LOL


The next day ,when I came in early, it seemed kinda dark to me in the barn. I noticed the lights over the bleachers aren't on. I wonder if they weren't on yesterday morning when Miley had so much trouble keeping the bars up. What was the difference  that caused the problems. She ran ISC jumpers and dropped lots of bars and crashed. Then in the same ring, ran Master jumpers and she didn't have any trouble. I went and talked to the person in charge. I asked a bunch of questions. Are the lights on timers (no), were the lights over the bleachers off yesterday morning when we first started running (he didn't know. but he manually turns the lights on). Maybe they were off and someone turned them on during the day????  He did go turn the rest of the lights on before we started running. Did it make a difference?  I don't know. She dropped one bar in Master JWW and one in T2b.  So  Im not sure.  Someone elses dog to a bad crash in ISC jumpers too. Could it had been the light. You see how grainy the video is.

Im putting in this run with Miley because I liked how when I took the leash off and she is just looking up a me waiting. (No trying to break a start line , like she usually does).





Being on facebook can also sometimes be depressing. Just some of the post and stuff. Then did you see where AKC put out their possible agility changes?  Its going to cost the club money if it goes through. We will have to buy two new 20 inch tunnels, since dark tunnels will be out.  (I don't get this change at all. They say because dogs have trouble with dark tunnels. Well what about the chute?  Its really dark and they cant see at all????)  Then changing the broad jump to 8 inch boards. Well of course we have 6 inch boards.  Then this one is just recommended. Jumps with out the wings attached. Whats up with that. If they make that one, not just a recommended change, that will cost us a fortune. After reading all this, it gets me all upset. I know it silly but it does. The club doesn't make a lot of money off trials. We use to but now with lots of clubs having shows and upping the amount of shows clubs can have, we just don't make much.

P.S My husbands ears must have been burning because he just called.

UKI trial

I went to UKI nationals. It was held in Fletcher, NC.  So only a couple of hours from my house. The people putting on the trial are friends of mine. They asked if I would be willing to have a job for the trial. I told them sure.  I took on the Hospitality stuff. Which actually was a pretty easy job.  Just making sure there are food and drinks out of all the workers. Making sure the judges are taken care of. There was another lady helping me who wasn't running dogs. So she took over the judges stuff.  The biggest thing was keeping the coffee going because it was freezing cold!!    I drove up on Wednesday and it was 70+ degrees.  We started set up that afternoon. The next morning it was starting to get cold.   I helped with set up.  I was using a rubber mallet to put the jumps together and missed and hit my finger. It started to bruise right away but I kept working. Then I noticed it was bleeding.   Then more bleeding. I had to stop and go take care of it. Ugh.  Then after washing it, it really started hurting.   Its still not healed. 
 This year was very different then last year.  Last year you were divided into Nursery/starters  or Masters/Championship.  They didn't do that this  year. Everyone ran together on all the same courses.
Because there were so many people coming, they started Thursday night instead of Friday. There were 4 rings, two inside and two outside.

First up was Power and Speed. I guess Ive never run this type of course before.

You had 36 seconds to run the first part of the course (the black circles).  If you faulted, while running the black circles, you had to leave the course.   I decided to run NFC.  That way, no matter what happened, I got to run the whole course.  It was a good decision. Java was up first and broke her stay.  Boy was she shocked when I made her come back and start over. LOL  Miley decided stopping on any contacts was not needed. So I at least  I got to fix all that stuff.
Then next day, Thursday,  a cold front came it.  It was now 19 degrees and the wind was brutal.  My husband was going to stop by on his way to Cincinnati. He was going to visit his family. So I called him and asked him to bring me my hoodie. Its one of those hats that can be a hood, a neck warmer and/or cover you face.  I needed my face covered from the wind. It  was so cold outside. The poor judges who had to work the outside rings.  They put theses big tarps up around the rings to block the wind. It did help but was still cold.  Miley didn't like the tarps that were flapping in the wind.  It was freaking her out. But once in the ring, she seemed ok. They had heaters that were next to the timer and scribe but that didn't help the judge.

How the day started was with walking courses.  Everyone was divided into 5 groups. Then you rotated into walking the courses. We walked all 4 courses and then everyone started running.  There was always one group not running so they could work the rings.

This was our first course and I was the very first dog in the ring. Not a good position to be in because you cant see how it runs. LOL

This was a hard course.   Miley and Java both missed the weave pole entry.  Java actually went through the broad jump. I think they poles for the broad jump confused her visually. So couldn't see actual weave poles were.  Since they all looked the same and were the same colors. I kind of don't think that's a good discrimination for a dog but I guess if I was a better handler, it wouldn't be a problem.

The hard part was running down the line from 7-12.   Miley went off course after the  #11  tunnel and took the #13 jump.  So when I ran Java, I called her while she was in the tunnel, which I shouldn't have done but because of what Miley did, I thought I needed it. Ugh, so Java came out and took the #14 jump. 

Next up was the outside rings. Brrrr!!!

 

Miley ran first. She of course, went off course after the #8 jump and took the tunnel. Ugh!!  Im not sure why she did this. The rest of the weekend, she kept pulling off tunnels that I did send her to.  

Because Miley did that, I over handled Java and almost cause  her to over off course.  I have to remember not to do things with Java, just because Miley goes off course. 

 

Im going to say one negative thing about the trial. It was hard to find out your scores.  At the beginning of the trial they announced a website that you could go to , to check scores. But I wasn't somewhere that I could write it down. Then when I tried to find it by going to  FB, I couldn't find the website anywhere.  I asked multiple people but know one knew.  So I finally found someone who knew.  When I checked Java's score, we had a fault  this run and our names were greyed out. So I thought that meant we couldn't run the next day. So the next day I missed my run because I thought we didn't make it into that run.  But I guess that was wrong. And someone else checked my name in.  Bummer.

 

 

This was our next run, also outside.  Im glad I had thought to bring a hard portable crate with me because I needed it.  My dogs were to close together, in the running order, that I didn't have time to go into the building and switch them out. Besides that they needed to be warmed up and cooled down. And since it was freezing, I wanted to make sure they were warmed up.

It was kind of dark in the outside rings. Not for me or most dogs but for Miley.  She landed right on top of two bars in this run.  It made me wonder if that's what was going in.  She didn't drop a bars on the inside run.  Im sure it had to hurt when she hit these bars. The bars in this ring were thick. Ive never seen bars this thick before.

Both dogs got called on their teeter and Java missed her DW contact.

 

 The next day Miley fell head over heals in the outside  ring when jumping the double. She got up and her face was covered with dirt. Poor Miley. I stopped the run and decided she wouldn't run outside for anymore runs. I think it was just not light enough out there for her.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Some  of Miley's runs. 

 Our 4th run that day was snooker. I hate snooker but this course seemed like a easy snooker course as long as your dog got the right tunnel entrance.

I decided to do all 7's.  Which lots of people did.   As long as your dog was fast, you wouldn't have trouble making it to the end.  Miley went off course after  3 in the closing. Java went off course after 5 in the closing. My fault.  Our group was the last to run snooker. When I checked the scores, they had Java listed in 2nd place.  Then later that night , when I was at the hotel, then had Java listed as 1st. (remember we were the last group to run) I thought it was weird since we didn't make it to the end. But thought, oh well I guess its possible. Lots of dogs had 51 points but her time was faster.  Well the next day, I found out there was a mistake in the scoring or the website or what ever and she was actually 20th.    (see the website scores again a problem)      Then I found out you had to be in the top 50% of the class to be able to run gamblers.   Java made it but Miley didn't.    The lady who was crated beside me didn't know that in snooker you should make sure you cross the finish jump and to run as fast as you can to the finish jump to get the fastest time and get your points.  So she didn't make the cut off.





Saturday night we ran Gamblers. 

Sorry this is hard to read.  The gamble  was for 5 points you could run 3 tunnels and the last jump  or for 10 points, you could run all 4 tunnels and that last jump.  You couldn't start the gamble until you heard the buzzer.  And the gamble  had to be done in 13 seconds.

 During the walk thur, several people were timed running all four tunnels and the jump. They just made 13 seconds. So that meant you had to time your dog perfectly.   I knew I couldn't make all four tunnels so I went for 3.
The big dogs started first.  Lots of people went for  4 tunnels but just couldn't make the time. If you didn't get over the finish jump before the buzzer, you lost all your point.  There was lots of cheering when the person was going for the gamble, so I think it was hard for the dogs to hear their handler saying tunnel. Lots of dogs checking in and looking or spinning.  If any of that happened, you didn't make the buzzer.
 While waiting, I changed my plan multiple times.  (From the time Gamblers started , it was 3 hours before we ran) What I walked, seemed like it wasn't long enough. So I didn't run what I walked.  When I was waiting to go in, there were all these world team people all around me in line. It started making me nervous. Ugh!!  Our run wasn't awesome. If Java had sent to the tunnel, we might have had a chance of making time.  She finally went in to the tunnel, I looked back and she didn't take that first off course jump at the end of the tunnel. But when I turned my head to look were I was going, out of the corner of my eye, I saw her take that other off course jump before the next tunnel. Ugh.  LOL  It was still a lot of fun!!



More later!

Another Trial

What crazy weather we had.  I tried to get into an indoor trial but got wait listed and my friend forgot to enter. So then we decided to do an outdoor trial.   Last weekend it was 85 degrees.  Saturday is was 35 degrees and raining when I woke up.  All around us people were having snow. My friend , who live just below me but still in Columbia, sent me a picture of her yard covered with snow.   We decided to go anyway. When we got to Charleston, it was cloudy and windy but no rain.  Well, until we were done setting up our stuff.  It never poured but it was raining on and off.

 

This was taken Sunday.

 

Anyway, our runs were ok on Saturday.   Java had weave pole problems. Not sure why.  She had a nice jww run but popped the last pole. Then a nice T2B run and again popped the last pole. I forgot to go back an fix it. Ugh.

 

 

The weather was miserable.  I didn't stay for the B-match. I think only 4 people entered the b-match. Even in the regular trial I was the only 12 inch dog and there were 3- 16 inch dogs. Most people left. The contacts weren't rubberized. I didn't realize this until walking the course and the equipment was wet. Plus on the dogwalk, the down ramp supports, kept coming loose. Sometimes you didn't see it until dogs were running. Ugh.
It was windy and jumps kept falling over.  Dogs were dropping bars all over the place.  Even on Sunday. I didn't see a lot of slipping.  Then on Sunday I notice that the bars seemed short on some of the jumps.  Plus the PVC jumps were sometimes coming loose , which made the bars barely touch the jump cups. I kept seeing people pushing the jumps together. On one of my friends runs, the bar was uneven going across, and her dog dropped that bar. Someone noticed it after her run. They went out there and pushed the side pole down into the 5 way connector. Then the bar was straight across.

Granted  your dog shouldn't be touching the bars but it seemed like it didn't take much for them to fall. One person came out of the ring, her dog had dropped multiple bars. She said to me, this is so weird, my dog never drops bars.   It was crazy.



Im only showing Miley's runs for Saturday.  Sunday was terrible ,with both dogs. The weather was much better. Sunny, no rain.

This trial is at a  huge park. They have a big dog park. I took the dogs in there first thing in the morning so they could run off some energy.  There were a few people in there but they were all near the lake, where there is a big beach area.  I Stayed far away from them. Then all of a sudden I heard a huge dog fight.  I saw multiple  trying to pull big dogs apart. I quickly leashed up my dogs even though we were no where near them. Then, they didn't even leave the park. They all stayed there. Crazy.

So Sunday I had entered FAST. That way I can work on the teeter and weave poles.

 

Both dogs did the weave poles twice in my run. They were perfect. I even left Miley in the weaves and moved off to the #10 jump. Java Qed.  Miley dropped the bar in the send. The sun was coming through the tress , so there was sun and shade right there where that jump was. She jumped weird. 

But then in Standard both dogs couldn't do their weaves.  I corrected Java with a "no" and she then did them perfect. Didn't help for Jumpers, she still popped out.  Miley, I made a mistake and also said "no" , when she popped the poles. Bad me. She stressed and ran around the ring, which hasn't happened in a long time. I felt terrible.  Ugh!

 

 

 

 

I felt pretty bad when I left Sunday. We sucked.  Ugh. And in 2 weeks we go to the UKI nationals.  Man, we aren't ready for that and now I wish I hadn't entered.  Every time I think things are coming together, they fall apart.  Java's teeter is looking so much better and now she it popping poles.  I don't know why she dropped those bars in the last jumpers run.  The one after the weaves, she didn't get any lift off her rear end.  Maybe she slipped but I couldn't see it because her back end is kinda covered by the jump stanchion.

Mickey is still covered with sores.  It is getting better but it still looks bad.

Wordless Wednesday