May 26, 2001
AKC Tail Blazers
Howdy Ho, Everyone,
What do you do on a rainy Saturday? Go to an agility trial because if you do
not get out of bed at 5am, then you won�t until noon.
Off Elaine and I went.
The venue is AKC. (Yeah my favorite�not.)
Elaine and I also discovered where I get my craziness from. About half an hour
before Crumpie and I were to run, my parents and older sister showed up to watch
their grand-dog and nephew-dog run in the pouring rain. If we were doubting our
own sanity, we have a new opinion of theirs. : 0 My younger sister escaped the
family genetic curse and was smart by staying home.
Glad you guys could make it on such a dreary day.
There have been a few things that I have noticed in the last few weeks of
trailing and in training. I did go back and tried out some of the jumping
practices out in the yard. Single, double, and triple jumps were tried over and
over again and I noticed that Crumpie was really starting to get height over
them. I even had a few comments about it last week at the trial. Hummmmmmm,
the wheels in my puny and lacking human brain started to turn. Why was Crumpie
dropping �easy� jumps?
Last weekend I ran Crumpie and started to watch my own handling. Hum for a
second time.
In my mind both Fred and Crumpie just had a bar-knocking jumping style. Harry
on the other hand got height, so I have been handling him with more risk in
mind. Last week, even Harry was knocking bars. Now we have a problem.
What I discovered in watching myself is that I am �flicking� my shoulders to
fast and too hard to get a sharper turn from Crumpie (and Harry & Fred). This
is causing the guys to see me out of the corner of their eyes change direction
FAST and they do so, dropping the bar.
Soooooooo, this weekend is not about Qing, (Lord knows we have not done that in
a looong time) but about how �quiet� and fluent I can keep my shoulders, yet
still give the subtle direction.
We go.
Excellent A Standard
Crumpet
I
will say that I did not like this course. It had three segments that I did not
like and factored in a downed bar for each.
I
elected to do a two jump lead out because I needed to be in position to block
the Tip. Crumpie can screaming off the line and we start to haul. We got to
the first Left, Jump and I kept myself from throwing my shoulders. It worked.
He got the DW contact, did the jump, out-jump, here-jump with no problems. I
kept my shoulders in a straight line while Crumpie was out. He lost focus for
the table and got on, did the sopping wet Chute, weave entry and does a few more
jumps. Up over the Frame and over the last jump�������..all bars up, contacts
made, and I am celebrating.
�Yes, yes, yes and FINALLY!�
�No, no, no, no� a voice said. Pat with Mr. Moe came out of nowhere. The judge
gave Crumpie a Refusal at the Table.
NQ
Tomorrow is another day. Gosh darn it, I am getting tired of saying that. The
good thing is that I was really able to be praise Crumpie the way I like him to
be. He got the �Q� celebration at the end that does not happen because I
usually know that we NQ. It is not that I am not happy, the praise just is not
the same as a Q.
I
later found out from the Peanut Gallery hanging out under our tent : ) that
Crumpie had knocked a bar. Ok. Then I find out that it was a bottom bar of the
jump and not the top one. We have a new type of jumping situation. How does a
dog do that? The judge did not call it as knocked and to be honest, neither do
I.
Rain drops were fallin� on our heads��..
Excellent A Jumpers
Crumpet
I liked this course, but it had its moments and was not as easy as it might have
looked. It was wide open for most of the course, but very tight in others, plus
it had a �serpentine� of jumps. This is something I have not practiced in a
while and botched last weekend.
This was also a great course to keep my shoulder handling quiet.
I did another two jump lead out and Crumpie hauls. I have no idea of what I was
doing for the fourth obstacle, the weaves, but Crumpie saves my butt and gets
in. We haul and I am keenly aware of my handling and where Crumpie is. We get
into the serpentine and I turn as slow as I can. Crumpie turns at Mach
6�.right, left, right and we have one tunnel and two jumps left.
Tunnel, jump, left jump and���over the finish line. The crowd goes wild.
Feeling that there had to be a refusal some place on this course, I am reserved,
but Elaine and a few other people rush the gate. No hands from the judge and we
think it is a Q���..
Q and I have no idea of what the placement is.
We were wet and wanted to go
home. Will find out tomorrow. Twelve seconds under course time.
Our first leg. It only took since last October.
I feel guilty about the bars. I think a majority of them are my fault. Not that I
have said that before, but now I am going back over all of those runs and well,
guess what? Crumpie was the honest one.
Better to find that out now and not two years from now. I just need to watch
what I am doing�while trying to not fall in the mud.
For those who know��.
Elaine & Nan ran in DOWNPOURS for both runs. Considering that Nan hates being
wet, she ran for Elaine. Elaine in turn did a really good jump in working the
course, but to no avail. NQs for both.
Karen & Mr. Mozart were at the trial, but I was not able to see either of their
runs. Will have to report on that later.
Dolores & Treffie NQed in EXB Standard and we left before the Jumpers run.
Hope your dreary and soggy Saturday was as eye opening as mine was.
Joyce, totally water logged
&
one wet Little Dude.
Dum dee dum dee dummmmmmmmm
Howdy Ho, Everyone,
Day Two of the Memorial Day Classic.
The morning looked as if it was going to be a repeat of yesterday�s rain fest.
This time, I admitted to myself that the rain was going to come down and I
pulled out Mike�s motorcycle rain riding suit. What was that about Murphy�s
Law? In this case, it worked for us and the rain stopped as soon as we got to
the tent.
The other thing that was awesome was Elaine�s idea of how to deal with the rip
in the roof of the tent until we get it fixed. A towel thrown over the rip
served as a siphon and the inside stayed dry.
Unfortunately, my family had to come yesterday in the rain and not today in the
sun. Well, at least Nan would not have to run in the downpour and Crumpie would
not get stuck in the mud.
Ok here we go���.
While walking the course, I find out that Crumpie took 1st place in yesterday�s Jumper�s run.
Excellent A, Standard
Crumpie
If I thought that yesterday� course had its moments, then today�s was even
worst. I really did not like the angles of more then a few of the jumps &
contacts and the course offered the odd occurrence of being able to run the
weaves, frame/tunnel combo, and DW on either side. There was no discrimination
for slow or fast dogs�.just bar knocking ones.
The opening is a jump, weave, slop to the left jump, hair pin jump, Tip.
Crumpie handles the first three with ease, but when it comes time for �left,
over�, he eyeballed the frame/tunnel combo.
Believe it or not it was the Frame
he was fixated on and not the tunnel. Call back just in enough time and back on
course. As he is halfway on the Tip, I realized that I had planned to be on the
other side. Yikes. To be honest, this screw up on my part worked out so much
better for a jump RIGHT jump combo.
I thought Crumpie was going to jump off the Table, so I called his name to get his
attention. It worked and he stayed on. He kept out of the tunnel under the
Frame, kept two more bars up, and took the tunnel without eyeballing the Frame.
He got the DW contact while maneuvering for a hard left, jump then on to a
flowing right jump�.over the finish line.
The crowd goes �wild�.
Part of me knew that it was a Q, but I was still working on yesterday�s unbelievable Table Refusal.
�Yes?� I called out. No one responded except for cheering. �Yes????� I
called out again. One voice sounded out above all the others.
�YES!!!!!!!!!�
Pat under her tent a few away from the gate, was sitting in her
chair rocking it, stamping her feet, and cheering. She was raising such a hoot
that the judge stopped the next run to find out what was going on. Once she
heard Pat�s response that it only took a long time, did the judge confirm what
we were all cheering about. It was a Q. The crowd wildly cheered again when
they heard that Crumpie finally had his third leg and his fourteenth title, the
AX.
It may not have been �the wave� ending, but Pat single handedly stopped the
judging.
Wow wee.
Pat you are the best. : )
Q, 3rd leg and the AX title.
We even got a nifty �New Title� rosette
to add to the wall.
�Yeaaaaa,� Mike says. : 0
We do not Q for eight months and Crumpie does twice in two days. The aliens have abducted my dog.
Excellent A Jumpers
Crumpet
Oh boy. The jumps were all at odd angles, which forced me to put Crumpie over
the jumps at angles. This was also a course where I could practice my shoulder
handling. To make matters worst, I had this odd, pounding headache over my left
eye.
We go and Crumpie clears all four angled �direct line of sight� jumps, but I
forget what I am doing (literally) and he drops the Triple and refuses the
poles. Not on him as it is hard to move when mom is not calling commands. Once
he missed the poles, I snapped out of whatever I was in and we both pulled it
together.
I remembered to slow my shoulders and Crumpie ran with such focus and precision
that I could almost not believe this was him. Despite my momentary lapse of who
I was, Crumpie was willing to compensate for his mom. It was one awesome run.
NQ
Elaine pointed something out that I watched for during the Jumpers run. She said
that one of the reasons that Crumpie had eyeballed the Frame in the earlier run
might be due to him being used to me �flicking� my shoulders hard. He ran out
because there was not sharp movement from me.
Hum.
After watching myself (in
my head) run the Jumpers course, I think she might just be right. This may be
another reason why Crumpie is paying extra attention to me now.
The awesome thing is that his time is dropping when I would think that it would
start to increase (and get closer to course time). He is wasting less time
reading me and just doing. Interesting thought.
Thanks Elaine. : )
For those who know���..
Elaine & Nan did an awesome job on the ExA St. course. They 1st
place Qed for their first leg, but NQed in EXA Jumpers. That was also an
awesome run!!!!!
Karen & Mozart were to run in ExA, which means they Qed and Titled somewhere�..
HOORAY!!!!!!!!!, but Karen was not there today. Send in the info to Diane!!!!!
(Hope everything is OK, Karen..)
Dolores & Treffie were not there either.
Karen & Skeena were there for Novice, but I did not get a chance to see either
of their runs. Hopefully they Qed as Karen does a super awesome job with Skeena.
(IF you guys did, send along the info to Diane too.)
Well, that was my Sunday. I came home and headed out to my younger sister�s new
apartment to hang out at her first family social. : ) A good time was had by
all. Hurray for me, but not for Crumpie. He had to stay home. Thanks, Chris.
: )
Tomorrow is the last day, so the Memorial Day Classic Continues��.
Joyce, I remember saying I was determined
And
Crumpie, I have got to stop doing stuff to get mom going.
Day Three of the Memorial Day Agility Classic
I would be
lying if I said that I was ready for a Day Four. After three days of varying
weather and extreme temperature fluctuation, going back to work on Tuesday was a
god send.
I am sorry
that this email is going on Tuesday night again. Monday night was packed with
things to do when we got home�..family and friend get-togethers.
Thank god the
trial was organized so that each of the three days, we were able to be home
before 4pm. That is with the hour drive home. It made it possible to have a
social life this past weekend.
|
I learned
something very silly Monday morning. I learned about the Worms in my back
yard. They are special worms, ones that can jump over sneakers when you almost
step on them. This is the second time I actually saw a worm leap into the air
over my foot and dive into the ground. (Mike was witness to the first one and
said that they are capable of such feats�.as we had observed.)
I have Agility Worms.
I thought the first one was a mutant or a fluke. Now, I think I
have a lineage of Jumping Worms living in my backyard. I bet they would keep
the bars up. Or would they? If we complain about the Corgis being long and
low, what would we say about the worms?
Hum.
Leave them where they are. I cannot get involved in the worm sports.
Here we go.
Excellent B, Standard
Crumpie
Now that we have moved up, the rules have changed. Excellent A and B are run together on
the same course. The only difference is that in �B�, the run HAS to be clear.
No refusals and no off-courses. We also need to Q ten times for the AKC
�Masters Agility� (MX) title.
Sit back and relax, this is going to take us forever.
I was
nervous. The 12� class for Ex B has some stiff competition. There are about
four women who run Nationally ranked dogs and they can haul just as fast as
Crumpie can. I felt comfortable because I knew we could do this, but was
uncomfortable because the routine had been broken and the excitement of working
towards the MX was there. The one thing that I was happy about was that I had
nothing at stake. There was no �one more leg until we can move up� hanging over
my head. I was free from that �want and desire� pressure.
One deep breath and we walked into the ring. The world melted away and the only thing
that existed was Crumpie and the course.
The course itself was horrible on paper and horrible to walk it, but once we started to
run, it really flowed. Fine by me. Crumpie managed to pull a few difficult
segments off without any problems. He kept his butt out of the tunnel and kept
the bars up. He handled some distance work (Gambling) without any incident. We
get to the table and Crumpie Downs. I take a few steps out and call him.
Between the time I called the �over� command and when Crumpie came off the
Table, I saw him spy the Chute that was directly behind me, the Purple cloth
flapping in the breeze, beckoning, calling�. �Crumpieeeeeeeeee, choose meeeeeee.�
Such temptation for a Corgi.
�Cruuuuuump!�
�Oh ok.� He heads back to the jump, refuses it, and bolts for the Chute again.
�Cruuuuuump!�
�Grumble, grumble, grumble�dumb jump.� He takes the jump like a kid dressed up for Cousin
Ray�s wedding and being made to behave. On to the DW.
He did drop a bar after the DW, but again, I did not call a command. Something new to
figure out.
Cross the finish line and a five people outside of the ring cheer. : )
NQ
Excellent A Jumpers
Crumpie
We Qed for
our first leg on Saturday and that gave me a little more confidence in running.
There is something about having the confirmation that you �can do this� when you
have one little Q. I was starting to doubt we belonged in Ex A since we had not
Qed in eight months of running in it.
The course
was wide open and NADAC like. This was another course were I could focus on my
handling without too much concern about Crumpie. So far, I am really pleased
with the results of my handling experiment, but cannot shake the feeling that if
I had figured this out earlier, we would have been further along. As Elaine
said, we had a whole bunch of issues that were going on (like the DW contact,
weaves & table refusals) that it is unfair of me to take the total blame. I
still feel that way though.
Anyway, we go.
As we were
running, I suddenly realized how slow the run was going. It was more of a Corgi
type run then it was a Border Corgi run, but at least it was in control.
Crumpie was getting height over the jumps and was trying to concentrate on me.
I lost him a few times because of my quiet shoulder handling and once because he
thought we were done (the one jump was close to the finish line and would be the
last jump�once we got through the pinwheel of jumps), but we both worked on this
together.
Crumpie�s
tongue was dragging in the grass after the run, but the glint in his eyes let me
know that this was his job and that he would not trade it in for anything. The
glimmer in my eyes showed him the same thing.
To make the feeling even better? We Qed.
Q and a first place.
The irony of this Q? I am back to sitting on needing one more leg for a title/move-up to the
Jumpers B class. So much for running without pressure. Am I complaining? NO!
So our
weekend outing was fruitful in Qs. Six runs, three Qs, and one Title. When it
rains, it pours. The best is that I think I have a new handling direction to
help keep those bars up and hope that this is the right way. Time will tell.
The odd
thing is that before now, I seriously thought that there was no chance for
Crumpie to EVER GET the MACh (Master Agility Championship). To be honest, I
still think that the requirements are too tough for us and I do doubt it will
ever happen, but what I am seeing from last weekend and this past one, the Devil
might be packing snowballs one day. Hey, there is no problem with having a
little hope now is there?
One thing at
a time and we need more practice at my changing handling philosophy.
For those who know��.
Elaine & Nan had two NQing runs. Nannie-poo had decided to visit another planet even thought
Elaine worked those courses. There is nothing worst then when the handler does
an awesome job, but the doggie is off in space.
Dolores & Treffie NQ'ed in ExB standard and I believe did the same for Jumpers. I could be
wrong on the Jumpers run.
Karen & Mr. Mozt were not entered today�.and are fine. Karen elected to not come on Sunday
due to rain in the early morning hours. Mozart finished his OA on Saturday in
the pouring rain. Congrats once again to you guys!!!
I did not see anyone else entered.
That
concludes the adventures for this past weekend. Next weekend, in the same
location, we have the USDAA trial. For this trial, Crumpie and I are on a team
for the DAM (Dog Agility Masters) Team Tournament. Last year we were on a team
with Dave/Caly and Elaine/Nan.
In sadness,
Dave has retired Caly from competition.
In joy Elaine�s son is getting
married next weekend.
In loneliness, Joyce found a new set of teammates.
Pat with Mr. Moe, the Portuguese Water dog and Paul with Franny, the Chinese Crested are this
year�s team. Since Franny is a hairless dog and Moe is a water dog, the team name
is��.
�Naked, Wet,�n Wild�
The rules
for this team are the same as they were for last year. Run with fun, support
each other no matter what, have a blast, and hopefully we will not come in last
place.
Last year,
we achieved all of these goals. We ran with fun, supported each other, had a
blast, and after hanging on to 27th place for the weekend, we ended
up 36th out of 37 teams. We did NOT come in last place.
Hope you all
had a great holiday weekend! You know that Crumpie and I did.
Joyce
|
Last Updated on April 21, 2007
|