1 week, 3 bronze, what a good boy!

Today Peso and I headed to Spot On for our last trial before Nationals. We earned our Expert Bronze titles in Gamble and Steeplechase. Poor Phoenix has a lot to live up to. She spent the day practicing remaining calm around the ring, circle work, waiting and turning tight at the practice jumps, recalls to my side etc, etc. I'm pretty sure she would rather have been in the ring but she handled herself well and gave me some great tugging. Tomorrow I am going to try and videotape some of Peso's runs so hopefully I will have something to post.

Keeping It Simple

After a long trial this past weekend in which I ran 13 runs my brain was not co-operating with me when i tried to plan my training session tonight. So what to do with a tired body and a mind that's taken a leave of absence...take the night off? grab a beer, a good book, take a long bath, all very tempting but Peso's big brown eyes gazing at me tell me I need another plan. Solution, a relaxing, laid back session that will be full of success and reinforcement for the dogs but require minimal effort from me - Jump Grids!

After doing a number of intense handling training sessions I abolutely love going back and working on excercises that I know the dogs will have fun with and get tons of rewards along the way. With jump grids every effort is rewarded with a game of tug and I find them such a great relationship builder while giving the dogs a chance to practice proper jumping form with minimal interference from me. So now that we're feeling refreshed and connected we're ready to tackle some more difficult challenges next session.

Hmmmm....now where's that beer?

The Demons Have Surfaced

This weekend Phoenix and I attended our last trial of the summer together. I’ve decided her skills are not yet proofed enough to be in the ring so we’ll take a few months off of trialling to work on them. Phoefers did some great stuff this weekend and overall I’m very proud of the little girl but my decision to pull her was reinforced by a few missed weave entries, one flick and by the vulture that was staring back at me when I looked back to the startline from my lead out position. Phoenix really has not been in very many trials so I’m hopeful that I have not rehearsed behaviours I don’t want enough times that they’re going to be problematic for me in future, I know, I know one rehearsal is too many but hey we all must live and learn.

The most startling discovery of the weekend is that my little girl has moved from what was an occasional whine/scream around the course to full out growling. During the first jumpers I thought it must have just been bad timing or something on my part but no the demons reappeared in the second run and Miss Phe growled her way around the course. Maybe the intensity level is getting a tad bit too high for the little red devil. On a positive she did put in some really nice course times!

Peso had another awesome weekend and came away with his ExJ Bronze title. His contacts were really good and he nailed every weave entry including a really, really, really tough one – you can probably tell I’m super thrilled! He gave me a scare with a colossal teeter flyoff, the first of his career, but he took it all in stride, landed on his feet and dove into the chute. I think part of the problem is that for Phoenix I say “Teeter, Touch” and for Peso I’ve always said “Teeter, Tip it, Touch”. I’m thinking it probably shouldn’t matter but I know I didn’t say tip it and then was thinking that so I was late on saying touch and next thing you know he’s in the air, it also didn’t help that the teeter had a way different tip point then the one we practice on.

One of the absolute best things about this past weekend though was that some of my friends made their debut with their young dogs. I was so proud of them all – they really did great and should be thrilled with both their dogs and themselves. Way to go guys!!!! Peso’s breeder was one of the people starting with Peso’s half sister Ponder, I was really impressed with how comfortable Diana looked in the ring, especially with her whole entourage watching, it really was impressive how many people came to see her run! Peso’s Mom also came out to watch and we were able to get a picture of Fiesta and Peso together for the first time since my boy’s been grown up.

Today I am grateful for a fun weekend spent with friends, both two and four-legged.

A Sad Day

Yesterday I received some sad (for me) but not totally unexpected news that my friend and training partner is moving to Ottawa. I know this is a great opportunity for her and I think her heart and mind have been there for awhile now anyway but I still can't help but feel a little sad for what I'm going to be losing. It made me think of how much my life has changed over the last few years and how happy I am to have found the path I'm on.

Shona was instrumental in getting me as involved in agility as I am today and while my bank account may not be very happy about it I certainly am. I've been in a bit of a funk all day thinking about how much I'm going to miss seeing my friend every week. But then I remembered that we live in a cyber world and I'm sure we'll be emailing each other every day and how much more fun it will be now when I see her at a trial. So I'm putting on a brave face and stepping into the world of weekly agility training minus my teacher and friend.

Today I am grateful for the time Shona and I have spent together over the last few years. I'm also grateful we live in a world that will allow us to stay in touch so easily so that our friendship is not ending, just entering a new phase.