This weekend was Monica's USDAA trial at the Forrest County arena in Hattiesburg, MS. Thursday was a Team and Master level classes only day. I drove up Thursday afternoon late to run on Friday and Saturday.Thursday evening I arrived around 6:30 pm in time to join all for dinner, at least that was my plan. Instead I learned how to scribe for Snooker and was still at the score table in the Master Snooker ring until almost 9:30 PM. Tracey and I snacked for dinner, did a last call with the dogs, and went immediately to bed in her RV.
Both Friday and Saturday Bern was entered in Standard and Jumpers. I could not get a clean set of 12 weave poles out of him either day. On Friday he took an off course in Jumpers and knocked the bar in front of the tunnel on Saturday. Georgie thought he slowed up and flattened out when he saw the tunnel. She says it is a common problem to knock bars before tunnels. I've had knocked bars after tunnels when he couldn't get himself gathered up from coming out of the tunnel to get over a close jump but this is a new problem. Bern looked happy and ran fairly well considering we hadn't been to the agility field in almost a month to practice on the contact equipment. I also spent time on Friday learning how to scribe for Standard courses (which carries over into Jumpers) as well as running the timer for the first round of Steeplechase.
Grace was entered in Jumpers both days with a Gamble run on Friday and Snooker on Saturday but in 16 inch Performance vs. the 22 inch Championship height class. In Jumpers, she smashed the last jump on Friday I think because I got too far from the end of the tunnel when she came out before the last jump. I stayed right with her on Saturday and she pulled a nice Q with a 2nd place. During the Gamble run on Friday she happily did the dog walk twice and the A-frame once in the opening... no gamble but I didn't really expect it yet. Saturday she took off in Snooker really running fast. My staying right with her handling strategy failed me on that run because I got too far behind her when she shot out of a tunnel so that she back jumped one of the red jumps. We managed 10 points before we got whistled off...not quite the 37 we needed to Q yet. I think she is ready to move to her Championship height of 22 inches for the next USDAA trial.
All in all I had a good time over the weekend. I was very pleased with Grace's effort and attitude over the weekend. She has learned to love her new game. Bern, on the other hand, needs weave practice if we are ever going to get another Q out of him on the Standard course in USDAA or either Jumpers or Standard in AKC. There is an AKC trial in mid-August which gives me some motivation to really work weaves the next few weeks. Next weekend, however, Grace is entered in an obedience trial to start work on her Rally Advanced title so we need to squeeze some obedience practice in this week as well.
