Dottie ran JWW first and the GO! work I've been doing with her paid off. She took 4 jumps and ran ahead of me to the weaves...oh wait.... she was running towards what she thought was a toy lure but turned out to be a drill. That's ok. She came back, did the weaves, then finished up nicely.
In Standard she stopped on her A-frame contact when I asked her to and did fine up until the table. The tunnel was after the table and she tried to bypass the table to take the tunnel. I called her back to the table, but it was a run out so she got one refusal there. She drove to the end of the teeter and I did a front cross (late) at the end of the weaves. Then it was jump, jump end and since my fc was late, I ended up behind her on the last 2 jumps. I told her GO! and she went! I was so happy! Unlike Pie, she doesn't know that she can pick up her leash at the end. I'd like to work on that because after GO!ing so nice, she didn't get a reward and looked kind of lost.
To recap: The "go ahead of me" work I did with the toy paid off in both our classes today and she drove ahead and didn't stick right by me. I need to continue that work. At one point she saw a drill on the side of the ring and thought it was her toy and drove to that. Good news is she didn't pick it up. She got a first and a third. Since she does not ever get to run to her actual toy in competition, I hope I can continue to get her to go ahead. My next goal is to get her playing with her leash because that is in the ring at the end of each run. Pie figured that out pretty quickly, once even picking up and extension cord that she thought was her leash.
Little Dottie and her ribbons from today. Someone asked me why I run her in 24 inches. Because she is 22.25 inches tall! (The cut off is 22 inches and the .25 might be generous. There is no tricky measuring that would get her under 22 inches to run in the 20 inch class.) Because she is so slight, she appears much small than she is. Some people think Pie is very large, even over standard for a female. But Pie is 23 and some and the standard for females is 24 inches, with disqualification occurring if the female is over 25. So she is in the upper end, but she is not huge. When you put Pie and Dottie next to each other you see they are close to the same height and Dottie is not as tiny as she appears. Yet her 4o pounds to Pie's 60 makes Dottie appear to be a mini-Mal. (Disclaimer- Dottie may have gained weight. She feels much heavier than usual when I pick her up to shove her in a crate.)
Dottie is sleeping on the couch with Fancy and I, tired out after her big day of agility, pestering Pie when we came home, then practicing tracking articles.
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