OKC rally

[Calliesmom]

Ob/Rally Trial thread from Nov..

after Dixie's poor showing in SC, I'll be entering her in a trial in LA in Jan. it's indoors but no rally so we'll do Pre Novice there. just for the indoor environment exposure for her. Cran doesn't really care if it's indoors, outdoors, grass, dirt......

it doesn't look like I posted anything about Dixie's indoor PreNov trial. she didn't bark as much as she did at the rally trial in SC but she also didn't heel well or sit. her stand for exam was the only exercise where she didn't lose any points.
her recall was nonexistent and her stay wasn't great either.

so this past weekend, we went to the Okaloosa Kennel Club show. There was conformation, obedience and rally at a nice indoor trial site. the obedience/rally ring was in a separate area but not far from the conformation which I thought was nice.
so it was the first time competing in Rally Excellent. Cranberry was entered Saturday and Dixie was entered Sunday. The course for Saturday had a couple of the excellent signs that we are not yet good with. It also had a couple of the Stand signs- Moving Stand, walk around dog and Halt, Stand. Cran did both of those - we just had some trouble with a few of the other signs. and he barked- so we did not qualify.
The Sunday course I thought was easier- less of the signs that we can't do. so we did have to retry a few but Dixie only barked once and managed to qualify and get first place. pic to come.....
I'm pretty sure that Cran would have qualified on the Sunday course and I'm pretty sure that Dix would have had the same issues with the Saturday course.
I think that our worst sign for the weekend was the backup 3 steps.........

 

[fuzbuttsheltie]

Cranberry is holding his stands!?! This is excellent news!!

Also congrats for Dixie in limiting her barking and her first place score!

Dani
OTCh Staymat Magnificent Journey UDX, OM3
Blackmyst Poker Face CDX, RN
Double Dare Derrick CD, RAE
Armitage Dazzling Spun Gold CDX, RAE - retired

 

[trini]

Good job on Dixie's part....congratulations.

You mention that Cranberry's barking took him out of Rally placement...is barking an automatic disqualification in Rally?

Trini

 

[Silaria]

Congratulations on your weekend. Cran's improvements with the stands is definitely something to celebrate; they are surprisingly difficult stations for the dogs, especially the Stand, Walk Around Dog one. Dixie shined with that first place finish!

I think that our worst sign for the weekend was the backup 3 steps.........

We have trouble with this station also. When practicing it, it got to the point Edan started shutting down on me both during practice and in the ring. I came to the conclusion I'd just make our best attempt at it, take the points hit, and move on. It wasn't worth stressing him out over a station we actually don't see all that often. Funny thing is, he's actually gotten better at it since we stopped continually working on it.

You mention that Cranberry's barking took him out of Rally placement...is barking an automatic disqualification in Rally?

The penalties for barking are at the judges discretion. It can be a 1-10 point deduction in points so, yes, you can NQ for barking but it is not an automatic elimination. (AKC Rally Rulebook bottom of page 20.)

 

[Calliesmom]

Good job on Dixie's part....congratulations.

You mention that Cranberry's barking took him out of Rally placement...is barking an automatic disqualification in Rally?

Trini

you can lose 30 points and still qualify. he lost 10 at the backup sign- tried twice (if you mess something up, you can try again for only a 3 point deduction if you do it correctly the second time), lost another 10 on the down from 6 ft away. he acted like he'd never heard of down so we'll front instead....
I believe that we retried at least one other station and with the more than one bark.... we lost more than 30 points so no qualifying score for that course.

 

[Calliesmom]

Congratulations on your weekend. Cran's improvements with the stands is definitely something to celebrate; they are surprisingly difficult stations for the dogs, especially the Stand, Walk Around Dog one. Dixie shined with that first place finish!

we have worked pretty hard with the stand signs. Cran would stand but not wait until I could walk the whole way around him so we have gotten much better there. one of the other exhibitors said something about all the stand signs and I joked since it was with a conformation show that all the dogs would know how to stand

We have trouble with this station also. When practicing it, it got to the point Edan started shutting down on me both during practice and in the ring. I came to the conclusion I'd just make our best attempt at it, take the points hit, and move on. It wasn't worth stressing him out over a station we actually don't see all that often. Funny thing is, he's actually gotten better at it since we stopped continually working on it.

I had that philosophy with Dixie too- I wasn't going to practice it at all there at the show but then we did and I think it might have discouraged/frustrated her a little. I think her attitude in the ring would have been better if I didn't even try it before going in. we took the 10 point hit anyhow so probably should have left well enough alone......
This judge usually always has that sign so we had done some practice for it but you couldn't tell that by our performance.
he also had the broad jump and send to jump on Sat and told me we wouldn't have the broad on Sunday. I told him that my other dog would thank him.....
and then he changed the send to jump to handler runs by on Sunday- none of the exhibitors complained about that....
not that my dogs really have an issue with that one- we send to jumps all the time in agility.... it was funny listening to the others asking questions about it. I always thought it was pretty straightforward and he even put tape down so you knew where you could be....

 

[Calliesmom]

Cranberry is holding his stands!?! This is excellent news!!

Also congrats for Dixie in limiting her barking and her first place score!

Dani
OTCh Staymat Magnificent Journey UDX, OM3
Blackmyst Poker Face CDX, RN
Double Dare Derrick CD, RAE
Armitage Dazzling Spun Gold CDX, RAE - retired

Thank you

 

[Silaria]

we have worked pretty hard with the stand signs. Cran would stand but not wait until I could walk the whole way around him so we have gotten much better there. one of the other exhibitors said something about all the stand signs and I joked since it was with a conformation show that all the dogs would know how to stand

My problem with the Stand, Walk Around Dog was Edan would move his back end as I walked around him. We've lost at least 5 points on that in the past. He's gotten much better since I've been actually doing weekly Rally training with him. (World Cynosport Rally (WCR)/APDT rally but rally none the less. WCR is actually much more difficult than AKC.)

I had that philosophy with Dixie too- I wasn't going to practice it at all there at the show but then we did and I think it might have discouraged/frustrated her a little. I think her attitude in the ring would have been better if I didn't even try it before going in. we took the 10 point hit anyhow so probably should have left well enough alone......

I think the worst you can do if you attempt it and the dog moves back but either doesn't do 3 steps or goes crooked is loose 5 points. That's better than 10 for not doing it at all. This station showed up on our Excellent course at Nationals and he actually did it fairly well all things considered. Edan kicked out to the right a bit but did take three steps. We definitely had larger mistakes than this station at Nationals.

I don't get the confusion on the Send Over Jump either. Its really not that difficult since you are still moving forward and, if you've trained, even if it's just rally, the dog should understand the job of "jump". Your forward motion will keep the dog moving forward. And really 6 feet is not a huge lateral send.

Honestly, I have a bigger issue when we have to walk past a jump and NOT take it. Silly agility dog.

 

[Calliesmom]

I don't get the confusion on the Send Over Jump either. Its really not that difficult since you are still moving forward and, if you've trained, even if it's just rally, the dog should understand the job of "jump". Your forward motion will keep the dog moving forward. And really 6 feet is not a huge lateral send.

Honestly, I have a bigger issue when we have to walk past a jump and NOT take it. Silly agility dog.

Dixie had that in a trial last year in adv- the jump was on one line and then you went back past it. The judge said in the walkthru that if the dog took the jump the second time, it would just be an out of position. One of the other exhibitors didn't hear that and when her agility dog took the jump, she thought that they did not qualify.... she was very happy when they got a qualifying score.

It`s really only 3 ft laterally.

 

[2GoodDogs]

Congratulations on what went well, and the blue ribbon! Sure wish we were closer, I would love a trial buddy.