Tuesday, May 4, 2010

ASCA Agility Trial - Chino Valley, AZ

One word to describe this trial . . . WINDY! It was actually beyond windy. I can't think of a word to describe just how windy it was. We couldn't have our canopies up, so we were just left out to brave the flying tumbleweeds, sand and dirt. Yuck. The tumbleweeds were so bad, I couldn't even get into my van to leave at the end of the trial on Sunday. What a mess. Well, enough of how windy it was. Kaylie and Conor did pretty good despite the bad weather. On Saturday Kaylie qualified in her Elite Jumpers run, one of her Elite Gambler runs and one of her Elite Standard runs, and on Sunday, she qualified in both of her Jumpers runs and one of her Standard runs. I couldn't keep track of the placements of everything because of the weather, but she got all 1st and 2nd places. Conor only qualified in 3 of his Elite Standard runs, but he did get 1st place in all of those. What a good boy. He had a blast in his Jumpers run on Saturday - I think he took 10 extra jumps along the way. He was so enjoying himself taking jumps here and there. But that was his only really crazy run. The rest of his runs he did great but just had a small mistake here and there. Kaylie ended up finishing her Outstanding Elite Jumpers title, and Conor finished his Elite Regular title.
Poor little Conor getting attacked by the tumbleweeds!

Although the clouds looked really scary, we actually only got a few little sprinkles and a few little snow flakes.

Here are Kaylie and Conor posing in front of a beautiful tumbleweed back drop.

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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.