The DOCNA Agility Championships were this weekend. They began on Thursday with a warm up trial, and then the actual Championships began on Friday. These were VERY LONG days, beginning with getting up 5 a.m. and then finishing up at the trial around 7 p.m., getting dinner and getting back to the hotel after 8 p.m. The pups and I are exhausted! But we had such a great time. Here's how it all panned out:
Thursday - Warm Up Trial
Kaylie - 1st Place in Standard
Conor - 1st Place in Jumpers
Conor definitely lived up to his "dog on crack" title in his Standard run. It was probably one of our worst runs ever!!! He was just nuts. And Kaylie took a wrong jump on her Jumpers run, but otherwise it was a very nice run.
Friday - Day 1 of the Championships
Kaylie:
Standard: I think she placed 9th
Jumpers: 6th Place
Traditional Gamblers: Can't remember where she placed, but she did get the gamble - YAY!
Snakes & Ladders: Can't remember where she placed.
Conor:
Standard: 4th Place
Jumpers: 1st Place
Traditional Gamblers: Can't remember where he placed.
Snakes & Ladders: Can't remember where he placed.
Saturday - Day 2 of the Championships
Kaylie:
Standard: 7th Place
Jumpers: 6th Place
Trigility: Not sure where we placed. Kaylie had to do the gamble portion, and she did get it!
North American Challenge: I think she placed 7th.
Conor:
Standard: 3rd Place
Jumpers: 2nd Place
Trigility: 2nd Place
North American Challenge: 1st Place - Western Region
Saturday they announced who made it to the Finals for Standard and Jumpers. I knew it was going to be close with Kaylie in Jumpers, as she placed 6th in both of her runs, but the dogs that finished ahead of her were not the same both days. The way they figure out who will make Finals is they take your times for both days, add them together and then they take the top 25% of each class. There were 20 dogs in Kaylie's class, so 5 got to go to Finals. Since the top 5 in her class were inconsistent (meaning the top 5 from Friday were different from the top 5 from Saturday), and Kaylie stayed consistent right at #6, she was able to squeak in and was actually in 4th place. YAY!! She didn't make it into the Finals for Standard though. Conor made it to Finals for Jumpers, but also did not make it for Standard. He had a small mistake on Friday's run (he didn't jump through the tire jump - he ran under it). Oh well - I was VERY excited to have them both in the Jumpers Finals. Jumpers is my favorite class anyway.
I was also very, very excited that Conor placed 1st in the North American Challenge. In this class, there is a Regional winner (West coast and East coast), and then they combine all the results from the West coast and the East coast to come up with National winners for each class. Since we had finished so late Saturday, and the east coast people had already gone to bed, they couldn't announce the National winners - we had to wait until Sunday. Ugh!!! I so wanted to know how we fared against the East. I didn't think I'd be able to sleep, but I should have known better - the minute my head hit the pillow, I was out. Guess it wasn't on my mind THAT much! LOL!
Sunday - Day 3 of the Championships
Kaylie:
Jumpers Finals - 3rd place. If we were going to place, I knew this was going to be the highest we could place, unless the other teams totall messed up. I didn't watch any other runs of the dogs in my class, so I didn't know how other teams did. Apparently though we actually finished 2nd place in this run. They don't give out ribbons for this run, but this time is added to the other two times from Friday & Saturday. It all worked out that we finished 3rd! Pretty darn cool for not even placing in the semi-finals. This happened to us last year too, but last year we were able to squeak through with a 2nd place. I just have to remember to not count myself out - I was so sure we weren't even going to make it - the competition was VERY tough!! Darn Border Collies! :)
Conor:
Jumpers Finals - 2nd place. I knew I was going to have to run clean to finish in 1st. We were doing fantastic until at one point I turned a second to fast and I pulled him off a jump, and then he went over the next jump before I could call him off. Oh well.
Then they finally announced the National winners for the North American Challenge. I couldn't believe it when I heard Conor's name announced as the 20-inch Competition Intern level winner!!!! I was so incredibly shocked. I knew he ran well, and we couldn't have done any better. And best of all, his entire class was just Border Collies -- that's right -- all Border Collies and he was the lone Aussie. Very, very, very cool!!!! I do have the Wonder Dogs!
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Kaylie - The True Wonder Dog
At our last DOCNA (Dogs on Course in North America) agility trial in Prescott, Kaylie did fantastic! We are trying to be the first team to earn the MEX (Merit of Excellence) who started in the Beginner level. We are getting VERY close. All the other teams that have earned the MEX were grandfathered in at higher levels. Kaylie was just starting her agility career when DOCNA was created, so we had no choice but to start at the beginning. And as it is, I believe there are under 20 teams that have even earned the MEX to this point.
Well, going into the trial at Prescott, we needed 2 Specialist Gamblers legs and 2 Specialist Standard legs. In DOCNA, there are two types of Gamblers runs -- Traditional and Strategic Timed Gamblers. Unfortunately, we have only earned 3 Traditional Gamblers legs -- one from the Beginner class, one from the Intern class and one from the Specialist class. All the other Gamblers legs have come from the Strategic Time Gamblers. So, I knew going in that the chance of getting that Traditional Gamblers leg on Saturday was slim. We walked into the ring, and I knew Kaylie was on fire and ready to go. The Gamblers class is usually the first class of the trial, and Kaylie is usually absolutely wild in the first run. Well, this was no different. She was incredibly fast, and I was not -- I kept getting in her way, and things just fell apart. At 30 seconds, the buzzer rang, which meant I had to get to the gamble portion of the course. I sent her over the jump to the tunnel -- she took the wrong end of the tunnel, then came right back to me over the wrong jump and that was the end of that. No MEX for us this weekend. BUT, she did qualify in the two Standard runs she needed, getting First place both times, and she got her Strategic Timed Gamblers leg on Sunday, earning a Second place. Wooo hooo Kaylie!!! Out of 10 runs over the weekend, we qualified in 8 of them, placing 1st, 2nd or 3rd in all but one run -- our Jumpers run on Sunday. I got lost on the course and just got confused. Luckily, Kaylie can read the numbers on the cones (that's the only explanation I can come up with) because she ran the right course despite my mess ups! Hence the name "Wonder Dog." So we still Q'd, but got 6th place. Still, not too bad!!
So, our next DOCNA trial will be in Pinetop the end of August. Hopefully we'll get our MEX there! Just one Gambler leg to go.
Well, going into the trial at Prescott, we needed 2 Specialist Gamblers legs and 2 Specialist Standard legs. In DOCNA, there are two types of Gamblers runs -- Traditional and Strategic Timed Gamblers. Unfortunately, we have only earned 3 Traditional Gamblers legs -- one from the Beginner class, one from the Intern class and one from the Specialist class. All the other Gamblers legs have come from the Strategic Time Gamblers. So, I knew going in that the chance of getting that Traditional Gamblers leg on Saturday was slim. We walked into the ring, and I knew Kaylie was on fire and ready to go. The Gamblers class is usually the first class of the trial, and Kaylie is usually absolutely wild in the first run. Well, this was no different. She was incredibly fast, and I was not -- I kept getting in her way, and things just fell apart. At 30 seconds, the buzzer rang, which meant I had to get to the gamble portion of the course. I sent her over the jump to the tunnel -- she took the wrong end of the tunnel, then came right back to me over the wrong jump and that was the end of that. No MEX for us this weekend. BUT, she did qualify in the two Standard runs she needed, getting First place both times, and she got her Strategic Timed Gamblers leg on Sunday, earning a Second place. Wooo hooo Kaylie!!! Out of 10 runs over the weekend, we qualified in 8 of them, placing 1st, 2nd or 3rd in all but one run -- our Jumpers run on Sunday. I got lost on the course and just got confused. Luckily, Kaylie can read the numbers on the cones (that's the only explanation I can come up with) because she ran the right course despite my mess ups! Hence the name "Wonder Dog." So we still Q'd, but got 6th place. Still, not too bad!!
So, our next DOCNA trial will be in Pinetop the end of August. Hopefully we'll get our MEX there! Just one Gambler leg to go.
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2 comments:
Nice job!! WOO HOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Wow congrats on the showing at the DOCNA Champs. I stumbled upon your blog doing a search for 2009 Champs results. We went last year but skipped it this year for various reasons, though some of our friends went (Linda and the huge dog Teddy, along with Lorrie with her Maxx and Storm). I wish DOCNA would publish the results somewhere!
Greg
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