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!