Agility Comeback / Agility Debut

This past weekend, we took a road trip all the way up to Edmonton to compete in a CKC agility trial.  I thought it would be a good first trial back for Maggie, because she only has to jump 20" in CKC agility opposed to 22" in AAC agility that we usually compete in.  I also thought it would be a good trial for Bosley to make his agility debut, as CKC novice courses are generally nice, short courses that flow very well.

Our road trip turned out to be well worth the all the kilometers that we drove.  The weather in Edmonton was perfect - very cool and cloudy all weekend.  We got a great spot to bench, right next to the agility ring, and I didn't get lost trying to find the trial site or my hotel.

Maggie had an awesome weekend.  She brought home 2 Q's - one in Intermediate Standard and one in Intermediate JWW.  She earned both of these Friday on her first 2 runs - so it was a great way to start the weekend.  She didn't earn anymore Qs, but I couldn't have been happier with the way she ran.  On a couple of her runs, she was way faster than I expected so I didn't get my cues out in time and she had a couple off courses, where she added extra jumps in, just for good measure.  Her last run on Saturday, after a very long day, was a jumpers run.  Usually at the end of a day, she is very pokey, but not this time.  Her jumpers run was amazing.  The course was very open and fast and she flew through the run, nailing her weaves and weaving as fast as she does in practice.  She knocked a bar coming down the home stretch, but I was so thrilled with that run, I didn't even care.  I don't ever remember her having such a strong run right from the first obstacle all the way to the finish.  It felt great!

Now to Bosley's weekend.  We showed everyone that big dogs can play agility too!  Bosley ran great all weekend, and I was very impressed with his focus.  He Q'd both his runs on Friday and all 4 of his runs on Saturday, earning both Novice titles.  He had perfect scores on all his runs except two - he had a refusal on a jump because he ran past it to get to the table quicker (he loves the table) and he had a refusal on the dogwalk because he stopped to sniff a chair.   He placed 1st in four of his runs and 2nd in 2 of his runs. He had some nice times too, one of his jumpers runs he did in 28 seconds!  On Sunday, I moved him to Intermediate.  He did an excellent job on these runs too, but no Qs.  On his standard run, I was racing him to the teeter and he missed his up contact for a NQ, but the rest of the run was perfect.  On his jumpers course, he nailed a difficult weave entry, but my handling caused him to have a refusal on a tunnel later in the course.  I know it was my handling, because Maggie had a refusal on the exact same obstacle.  Instead of sending to the tunnel, I ran right up to the tunnel mouth and stopped.  Both dogs put their head in the tunnel and then came right back out again - bad me!

I am glad a made the trip to Edmonton.  I am so happy with both my dogs' performances this weekend.