Silaria
Forums Sage
On Saturday (9/25) we competed in our first USDAA trial. The trial was hosted by my Agility Club and, unfortunately, we were only able to be there 1 day.
I opted to run Edan in the Performance classes instead of the Champion classes. Why? I'm not planning on attending anything other than the 2 USDAA trials a year my club hosts (money is one of the main restricter here). So I figured I'd go easier on his joints by giving him 12 inch jumps instead of 16 inch (though he LOVES 16 inch jumps) and he'll also have to scale a lower A-Frame (5'8" I believe) instead of the 6 foot A-Frame.
We had a very successful day.
We ran all 4 classes offered on Saturday.
The first was Pairs Standard. For those unfamiliar with Pairs, you run the course with a partner and both of you have to qualify in order to earn a Q. This particular Pairs run was rather humorous for me. The team I was randomly paired with, a Mini Pincer, Edan and I ran with before almost two years ago in TDAA. Unfortunately, the Min-Pin didn't do so well at TDAA. (Video of that TDAA run: http://youtu.be/TL_hdq5uRy4)
This time was another story. The we both had decent runs. Edan, unfortunately, didn't want to run that day and the Min-Pin missed the Tire but we still managed to Q. We stored a first place because we were the only Performance 1 12 inch team.
http://youtu.be/kUuGdAe5xaM
Our second run was a traditional Standard run. I don't know why Edan wasn't in the mood to run on Saturday but we still ran fast enough to Q and the run was clean.
http://youtu.be/Ei90mO2RPwU
Next was Gamblers. This was a tricky course because all the contact obstacles were clustered back in the corner where my gamble started. There was also a tire jump back there. I like to plan my Gambler runs were I can stay reasonably close to the start of the gamble without being called for wasting time. With nothing but contacts in that corner and one lone tire jump that wasn't going to be easy. I managed to walk out a decent path that included Jump, Weaves, Jump, Dog Walk, Dog Walk, Jump, A-Frame, Tire, Tire, A-Frame, then a few near by jumps if I needed more time.
Well, Edan had other plans. For the first time ever on a "Handlers choice" course, Edan did something other than what I had planned. He decided to do the Weaves a second time; OK, fine, I can recover from this. Rather than call him off and waste time, I let him finish the 7 point weaves and turned him toward a jump in the direction of our gamble only to have the buzzer go off just as he finished the jump. Great! Can we be any further away from the start of our Gamble and me with an Edan who really didn't want to run that day and 20 seconds to complete it...
http://youtu.be/Xw0QQ2WKGdE
Final run for the weekend, Snooker. Snooker is Snooker, what can I say. Unlike CPE's Snooker which normally has 4 Reds, this course only had 3 and 2 of them were near the front of the course. In addition to that, the 7 point obstacle as a 3 jump combo which takes more time because its 3 obstacles. Could I have run it better? Perhaps. But I only needed 37 points to Q and 27 of those points would come from the closing if I had enough time to navigate obstacles 2-7 in order. So, knowing I only really NEEDED 10 points in my opening, I ran a more conservative course.
http://youtu.be/VquZat1psOM
Overall, we had a good time. I was just out to have fun; in fact I didn't know until the briefing how many points I needed to Q in either Gamblers or Snooker. Edan looked like he was having fun. All our runs were Clean - which was GREAT! Edan successfully completed the Gamble, which was a WIN in my book. Can ask for more than that.
Next trial up for us - 1 day at a TDAA trial in mid-October.
I opted to run Edan in the Performance classes instead of the Champion classes. Why? I'm not planning on attending anything other than the 2 USDAA trials a year my club hosts (money is one of the main restricter here). So I figured I'd go easier on his joints by giving him 12 inch jumps instead of 16 inch (though he LOVES 16 inch jumps) and he'll also have to scale a lower A-Frame (5'8" I believe) instead of the 6 foot A-Frame.
We had a very successful day.
We ran all 4 classes offered on Saturday.
The first was Pairs Standard. For those unfamiliar with Pairs, you run the course with a partner and both of you have to qualify in order to earn a Q. This particular Pairs run was rather humorous for me. The team I was randomly paired with, a Mini Pincer, Edan and I ran with before almost two years ago in TDAA. Unfortunately, the Min-Pin didn't do so well at TDAA. (Video of that TDAA run: http://youtu.be/TL_hdq5uRy4)
This time was another story. The we both had decent runs. Edan, unfortunately, didn't want to run that day and the Min-Pin missed the Tire but we still managed to Q. We stored a first place because we were the only Performance 1 12 inch team.
http://youtu.be/kUuGdAe5xaM
Our second run was a traditional Standard run. I don't know why Edan wasn't in the mood to run on Saturday but we still ran fast enough to Q and the run was clean.
http://youtu.be/Ei90mO2RPwU
Next was Gamblers. This was a tricky course because all the contact obstacles were clustered back in the corner where my gamble started. There was also a tire jump back there. I like to plan my Gambler runs were I can stay reasonably close to the start of the gamble without being called for wasting time. With nothing but contacts in that corner and one lone tire jump that wasn't going to be easy. I managed to walk out a decent path that included Jump, Weaves, Jump, Dog Walk, Dog Walk, Jump, A-Frame, Tire, Tire, A-Frame, then a few near by jumps if I needed more time.
Well, Edan had other plans. For the first time ever on a "Handlers choice" course, Edan did something other than what I had planned. He decided to do the Weaves a second time; OK, fine, I can recover from this. Rather than call him off and waste time, I let him finish the 7 point weaves and turned him toward a jump in the direction of our gamble only to have the buzzer go off just as he finished the jump. Great! Can we be any further away from the start of our Gamble and me with an Edan who really didn't want to run that day and 20 seconds to complete it...
http://youtu.be/Xw0QQ2WKGdE
Final run for the weekend, Snooker. Snooker is Snooker, what can I say. Unlike CPE's Snooker which normally has 4 Reds, this course only had 3 and 2 of them were near the front of the course. In addition to that, the 7 point obstacle as a 3 jump combo which takes more time because its 3 obstacles. Could I have run it better? Perhaps. But I only needed 37 points to Q and 27 of those points would come from the closing if I had enough time to navigate obstacles 2-7 in order. So, knowing I only really NEEDED 10 points in my opening, I ran a more conservative course.
http://youtu.be/VquZat1psOM
Overall, we had a good time. I was just out to have fun; in fact I didn't know until the briefing how many points I needed to Q in either Gamblers or Snooker. Edan looked like he was having fun. All our runs were Clean - which was GREAT! Edan successfully completed the Gamble, which was a WIN in my book. Can ask for more than that.
Next trial up for us - 1 day at a TDAA trial in mid-October.
Last edited:
I think Edan did excellent! Did you see a lot of other shelties there?
I entered a trial with a random draw with Justice. I so hope we get in.
