Agility Weekend

(What other kind of weekend is there? Ah yes, a Schutzhund weekend, or an obedience weekend, or maybe a hiking weekend...)

Another three day agility weekend, this one in the lovely town of Lakeview Terrance. Did you see the movie? I did. And there are no neighborhoods like that around this park. It is horse country. Makes me jealous, it does. The old home fires still burn for the horses, as much as I am involved in the dogs now...

I already wrote about Fancy's Mach 3. Did I post the video? Here is the link.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bRdmTBm9RfQ

In addition to her Mach, she got not one, but two third places, and another non-placement. As I wrote, Fancy isn't the fastest dog, so placements are rare for her.

On Sunday, I ran both Pie and Fancy like I should. Meaning aggressively and doing lots of front crosses, because that keeps me ahead of them and keeps them moving. Front crosses require better timing, which I lack, so lots of times I wimp out and do rear crosses. On a rear cross, the dog must be a head of you. Therefore, if you are faster than your dog, you have to slow down to let them get a head, and then you get sucked into the vortex of "you go, no you go" kind of like when kind stranger holds the door for you, but their hands are full and you are trying to hold the door for them... Another reason I wimp out of front crosses is sometimes I'm afraid of by running where I need to get to do the front cross, my dog will ignore the turning cue and instead take off course jumps. And, sometimes I do complete a front cross, but don't trust my dog enough to come with me so instead of doing my cross and taking off running, I do the cross and wait for the dog, to make sure she turns. Which again defeats the purpose. But for whatever reason, I was able to let go of my reservations and run the way I practice. And it worked well. Both dogs qualified in both runs with decent times. Now I just have to let go of the fear of my knee(s) popping out at random times. If you notice on the video, I'm running funny. I think it is especially obvious while Fancy's going up the dog walk. I'm consciously trying to run fast but carefully. Is that possible?

To recap the weekend: Fancy got her Mach Three, One QQ and a Q for a total of 34 points and two third places.

Pie got two QQs and an extra Q with two second places, a third and a fourth and a non-placement, for a total of 64 points. She now has 650 out of 750 points and 10 out of 20 QQs for her Mach.

Overall, a successful weekend for the ResQQ gang!

Fancy is not too thrilled to pose with her ribbons.

She'd rather run through the tunnel. Wheee!

Pie is always thrilled to do anything. Fancy thinks it is because she is small minded, but I think it is because she is good natured.

Pie is even more thrilled to do THIS pose! What fun for The Pie!