The Barking Lot: Echo's 1st Agility Trial

Echo competed in her first agility trial June 19th - 21st at the RAT formerly known as Lacey but has now been name Largus trial at Argus Ranch in Auburn Washington. I started her out in NADAC which is my venue of choice; we will also do some AKC starting next year. Echo was beyond phenomenal this weekend. I entered her in Hoopers and Tunnelers Friday night; 2 Regulars and a Jumpers Saturday; and a Regular, Jumpers, and Tunnelers on Sunday for a total of 8 classes. This ended up being the perfect number of classes for the baby dog.

I was so nervous Friday night before Hoopers that I could hardly stand. I do not remember being that nervous with Hershey or Kant but I felt so many more expectations put on me now. Novice dog after novice dog ran around the ring or out of the ring or would not start and then it was Echo’s turn. To the line we go in Hoopers; sit stay and I lead out past the 2nd non-test hoop, release her and off we go with incredible speed and beautiful directionals. We got our non-test hoops with our two tests done in 18.52 second, our first agility Q, and first place.

Tunnelers was just as wonderful with just a little too much here and pulled off a tunnel but still finished in 26.39 seconds with another Q and 1st place. She ran Tunnelers in 5.42 yards per second.

Saturday we started with Jumpers and Echo was running so fast I got caught standing there watching in amazement of the speed and forgot to direct her over a jump so she went and did her own. I got her back on course and we still finished 5 seconds faster than the other dogs in the class. Our first Regular run was awesome with just a little too much speed in to the weave poles and we had to try a second time earning our first Regular Q with 1st place. We got over the top excited by the dog that ran in front of us on Regular Round 2 and I did not get her focus back on me. The second obstacle was a dog walk with a big yellow tunnel right next to it, Echo took the tunnel. She pretty much will choose any non-stopping obstacle over a stopping one. We ended up with another off course in Regular 2 again because of speed and obstacle focus and not so much teamwork. Echo slept very good Saturday night.

Sunday we started out with Jumpers and I learned from Saturday to direct that speed and we had one of those runs that brings tears to your eyes. The course was 105 yards and we did it in 16.18 seconds earning our 4th Q with a run that was 6.49 yards per second. Next we ran Tunnelers and Echo did not take my turn and ended up in an off course tunnel but there were lots of places for her to choose not to listen to me and she did listen to me, over all I was very pleased with the run. Our Regular run had another dog walk/tunnel discrimination and Echo took the tunnel even with me call from way back with total body turn. Right now I am not worried about the discrimination stuff because she had a perfect start line stay at every run, incredible speed,

great contacts,

beautiful weave poles, and wonderful obstacle focus. I learned there are two things I will be working on: obstacle discrimination and finish line routine. I could not have been happier with Echo this weekend and I got a lot of great comments. It was a great start to her agility career!

We cannot forget about Kant. She also started the weekend out great getting a Hoopers Q

and a Tunnelers Q Friday night. Saturday we got a Weavers Q.

Kant knocked one bar in Chances, both Regulars, and Jumpers but had very nice runs in all of the classes. Chances was difficult and Kant did all the hard part but knocked a bar. Six more months and she will be a Veteran dog and able to jump 12 inches, hopefully that will help.

Saturday night was Fido Follies which is a three dog/handler team that runs in costume on a specially designed agility course. Each year the theme changes, in the past it has been board games, jungle, etc, this year it was The Circus. I was on a great team with Adele and Beau and Anne and Zuni and we were the Flying Furballs. Adele made great t-shirts with pictures of our dogs and gold metallic capes with gold metallic bandannas for the dogs and Anne provided top hats for us to wear. Kant and I started with the first 7 obstacles and we could get 10 bonus points if I wore clown shoes; which of course I did because I needed as much help as possible. Anne and Zuni had the next section which consisted of two 40 foot tunnels (2 20 foot tunnels hooked back to back), a couple of regular tunnels, and a set of weave poles. She did not have any bonus given on her section but how fun to run a 40 foot tunnel, twice. Adele and Beau ran the last section and she had two bonuses; one if she wore these HUGE white Mickey Mouse gloves and two if she ran from this narrow long marked box (tightrope) which of course she did both. There was an additional 20 point bonus given if your dog went in to the “lion’s cage” captured the lion and drug him out of the cage. The cage consisted of set of six weave poles set in a box formation with the corners open and the furious lion was the size of a beanie baby. We all decided to try it because again we needed as much help as possible and Kant amazingly went out on the first try and captured that lion and drug him out of the box. Anne also provided brownies to bribe the judges, did I mention we needed as much help as possible. All of our bonuses, bribes, and great dogs worked and we ended up 3rd out of 22 teams, much to the shock of the three of us. Our prize was a book of Circus Dog Tricks. Great fun!!

Sunday Kant got a Touch’N’Go and a Regular Q.

She knocked a bar in Regular 2 and knocked most of the bars in Jumpers. I would like to blame that on the rain and the slick grass but that would just be an excuse, Kant was just plowing through the jumps. She did not want to redeem herself in Tunnelers and choose not to listen to me or my body position and take an off course tunnel. Not one of Kant’s better weekends. She ended up with 5 Q out of 13 runs.