Our First AKC Agility Trial!
Yesterday Faith and I went to our first ever AKC agility trial to try Novice Jumpers With Weaves! We made three mistakes, so we did not qualify. But they were all my fault (as per usual).
The trial site was pretty nice. At first I couldn't find our ring! There were two rings and they were in different buildings. I easily found the Standard ring, but when I opened the door to the other building where I assumed the JWW ring was, it was all dark and quiet inside ! Little did I know that there was glass that was tinted very dark in between the first door and the ring. The embarrassing thing was that the glass was not tinted on the other side (how do they do that?!) so that people inside could see me open the door and peer with confusion around and then leave again. But I figured it out after I saw another guy walk into the building.
I was afraid it was going to be scary for Faith because it was indoors, but it wasn't at all. It was inside at a sports center where they play soccer, so the ground was this artificial turf stuff. There were stands, but they were tiny and set off to one side, and the ground they rested on was at the same level as the field (so it wasn't like the field was in a valley like it is at the Salem Civic Center, which is where she got freaked out at Star City's match in February). It wasn't too crowded and I never had to hang out with Faith in an area where dogs were jostling (although I did have to keep a sharp eye out for a few people who were chatting and letting their dogs wander).
I also didn't understand how the armband things worked! NADAC doesn't have armbands, and at our rally trials they have given us the arm band when we check in. But I checked in and there were no arm bands and I had to ask someone where to get them. It turned out you were supposed to get your armband yourself from a binder in the other building, oops.
I watched a lot of agility because we got there too early, and that was fun. There was an Afghan hound running in Open JWW! Pretty cool.
Then it was time for our course. Faith was the last dog to go, so we had awhile to wait. The course was okay. It was a vaguely curved line of jumps->tunnel->jump->weaves->then a pinwheel of three jumps, then a sort of pinwheel the other way, then a line of jumps to the end. I handled this in the worst way possible! It was awful! First I sent Faith into the wrong end of the tunnel. The dog could see both tunnel entrances from the jump before, and my plan was to do a half front cross to tell Faith that the right entrance was the one closest to her but not in her direct line. But I waited too long and she had already decided which was right. No biggie, whatever, so we went on, and Faith did weave pretty well! I think she did not get into them right the first time, but she did them great the second time. We just have to work on getting into the weaves at speed because Faith doesn't know how to slow down enough to wrap around them. Then came the pinwheel, and my brilliant (not) idea was to rear cross sort of in between the pin wheels. That might have worked okay, but Faith was going straight for the tunnel again, so we got another off-course. This was the only mistake where I felt that Faith should have been able to realize that the tunnel was wrong, but maybe I was pushing her out that way and I didn't realize it. Then all would have been well and okay if I had thought to do a front cross while she was in the off-course tunnel, but my brain wasn't working at all, so I tried to race Faith to show her to turn, and well, I sort of crashed into my poor dog. Ack! Who does that?! It is never a good idea to try to outrun a poodle. I should have listened more carefully to Renee when she explained that two things cannot occupy the same space. Then we did the last jumps. What a disaster! I am not even posting a picture of our course because it was too embarrassing to show all my mistakes.
Things Faith was great about:
Also, towards the end of our journey there, my Tom-Tom GPS thingie (to whom I refer as "Tom") led me to a weird windy little two-lane road that was not on my Google directions or the directions that were given on the premium. When I saw that we were stuck behind a big truck and our turn wasn't for twenty miles, I cursed Tom for leading me astray! Then we passed FAITH LANE and I knew that Tom must have done it on purpose.
The trial site was pretty nice. At first I couldn't find our ring! There were two rings and they were in different buildings. I easily found the Standard ring, but when I opened the door to the other building where I assumed the JWW ring was, it was all dark and quiet inside ! Little did I know that there was glass that was tinted very dark in between the first door and the ring. The embarrassing thing was that the glass was not tinted on the other side (how do they do that?!) so that people inside could see me open the door and peer with confusion around and then leave again. But I figured it out after I saw another guy walk into the building.
I was afraid it was going to be scary for Faith because it was indoors, but it wasn't at all. It was inside at a sports center where they play soccer, so the ground was this artificial turf stuff. There were stands, but they were tiny and set off to one side, and the ground they rested on was at the same level as the field (so it wasn't like the field was in a valley like it is at the Salem Civic Center, which is where she got freaked out at Star City's match in February). It wasn't too crowded and I never had to hang out with Faith in an area where dogs were jostling (although I did have to keep a sharp eye out for a few people who were chatting and letting their dogs wander).
I also didn't understand how the armband things worked! NADAC doesn't have armbands, and at our rally trials they have given us the arm band when we check in. But I checked in and there were no arm bands and I had to ask someone where to get them. It turned out you were supposed to get your armband yourself from a binder in the other building, oops.
I watched a lot of agility because we got there too early, and that was fun. There was an Afghan hound running in Open JWW! Pretty cool.
Then it was time for our course. Faith was the last dog to go, so we had awhile to wait. The course was okay. It was a vaguely curved line of jumps->tunnel->jump->weaves->then a pinwheel of three jumps, then a sort of pinwheel the other way, then a line of jumps to the end. I handled this in the worst way possible! It was awful! First I sent Faith into the wrong end of the tunnel. The dog could see both tunnel entrances from the jump before, and my plan was to do a half front cross to tell Faith that the right entrance was the one closest to her but not in her direct line. But I waited too long and she had already decided which was right. No biggie, whatever, so we went on, and Faith did weave pretty well! I think she did not get into them right the first time, but she did them great the second time. We just have to work on getting into the weaves at speed because Faith doesn't know how to slow down enough to wrap around them. Then came the pinwheel, and my brilliant (not) idea was to rear cross sort of in between the pin wheels. That might have worked okay, but Faith was going straight for the tunnel again, so we got another off-course. This was the only mistake where I felt that Faith should have been able to realize that the tunnel was wrong, but maybe I was pushing her out that way and I didn't realize it. Then all would have been well and okay if I had thought to do a front cross while she was in the off-course tunnel, but my brain wasn't working at all, so I tried to race Faith to show her to turn, and well, I sort of crashed into my poor dog. Ack! Who does that?! It is never a good idea to try to outrun a poodle. I should have listened more carefully to Renee when she explained that two things cannot occupy the same space. Then we did the last jumps. What a disaster! I am not even posting a picture of our course because it was too embarrassing to show all my mistakes.
Things Faith was great about:
- No apparently problems jumping 24", which she did for the very first time at the practice jump at the trial. No knocked bars or anything.
- Not weirded out by the new environment.
- Didn't get upset or hold a grudge because of our collision (she is such a good dog and tolerant of my mistakes)
- Good single-stepping weaves.
- Not distracted by other dogs.
- Did not lead out too far like at our last trial.
- Fed cheese at the end.
- That's all.
Also, towards the end of our journey there, my Tom-Tom GPS thingie (to whom I refer as "Tom") led me to a weird windy little two-lane road that was not on my Google directions or the directions that were given on the premium. When I saw that we were stuck behind a big truck and our turn wasn't for twenty miles, I cursed Tom for leading me astray! Then we passed FAITH LANE and I knew that Tom must have done it on purpose.