Spirit Joy

I was thinking more of the actual runs than the collision:winkgrin:

Cranberry and I collided as he came out of a tunnel once.... we did not Q in that run...........
 
I haven't even looked at it myself, honestly. I'm actually kind of surprised that the collision didn't throw us off. And she did excellent start line waits!!!!! The Standard Course Time for her Jumpers run was 44 seconds, and Spirit's time was 27.72 seconds. Not bad considering we lost a few seconds in the collision.
 
Whoo Hoo!!!!!!! A Q and a 1st at your debut! That's awesome. Even really seasoned dogs blow their contacts at trials. At least she's consistent in practice, which is more than I can say for my lil monster.
Can't wait to see the video:pop
Good luck tomorrow. I kept thinking about you guys when we were in class this morning and wondering how it was going.
 
Thanks Lanie!!!!! Another successful day in the books today, with a perfect Jumpers run (Standard Course Time of 43 seconds, Spirit's time was 25.02 seconds), for a q and first place. She was the fastest novice dog out of all the height classes - she even beat out the 20" dogs. For Standard, the course was actually laid out PERFECTLY to be able to skip the teeter and a-frame but do almost everything else. She refused the dog walk once and didn't do a 2o2o, but she did stop in the contact zone and waited until I released her. So we kept going. I also had to run like crazy to get a front cross in after the chute and before the weaves, and I was pretty sure I wasn't going to be able to do it, but I did.

All in all, a really fun day, and can't wait to do it tomorrow! If she q's again in Jumpers tomorrow we'll be Open :eek2:
 
Cara Sandler said:
Thanks Lanie!!!!! Another successful day in the books today, with a perfect Jumpers run (Standard Course Time of 43 seconds, Spirit's time was 25.02 seconds), for a q and first place. She was the fastest novice dog out of all the height classes - she even beat out the 20" dogs. For Standard, the course was actually laid out PERFECTLY to be able to skip the teeter and a-frame but do almost everything else. She refused the dog walk once and didn't do a 2o2o, but she did stop in the contact zone and waited until I released her. So we kept going. I also had to run like crazy to get a front cross in after the chute and before the weaves, and I was pretty sure I wasn't going to be able to do it, but I did.

All in all, a really fun day, and can't wait to do it tomorrow! If she q's again in Jumpers tomorrow we'll be Open :eek2:
Click to expand...

Congrats on another great jumpers run:yes:
glad that your standard course was a good one for you to do what you wanted to work on.
 
Cara Sandler said:
Thanks Lanie!!!!! Another successful day in the books today, with a perfect Jumpers run (Standard Course Time of 43 seconds, Spirit's time was 25.02 seconds), for a q and first place. She was the fastest novice dog out of all the height classes - she even beat out the 20" dogs. For Standard, the course was actually laid out PERFECTLY to be able to skip the teeter and a-frame but do almost everything else. She refused the dog walk once and didn't do a 2o2o, but she did stop in the contact zone and waited until I released her. So we kept going. I also had to run like crazy to get a front cross in after the chute and before the weaves, and I was pretty sure I wasn't going to be able to do it, but I did.

All in all, a really fun day, and can't wait to do it tomorrow! If she q's again in Jumpers tomorrow we'll be Open :eek2:
Click to expand...

I'm so so glad that you did her standard run and just modified it. I've been thinking a lot about proofing the contacts when they're only blowing them in trials, or in our case, league runs and I don't know how in the heck to proof trials without actually running in trials. I'll be really interested to hear your trainer's input on this. Do you just slow down and babysit the contact obstacles, yelling "TOUCH!" every time until it's ingrained at trials? I really think the high energy and nervousness in the handler kind of makes them lose their little minds.
Big congrats on her JWW runs. What an awesome debut!
 
Spirit finished off the weekend with a 3rd Q in Jumpers, a clean run, first place,and her Novice Jumpers title! Only 4 dogs out of 20 in novice even qualified, and Spirit had the fastest time of all. She came in 18 seconds under the Standard Course Time (she's been incredibly consistent in that, all 3 times coming in about 18 seconds under) - the course time was 43 seconds, her time was 24.28. She had a little too much fun in Standard - even though I modified the course again to skip the teeter, I let her do the dogwalk and the a-frame. Where she proceeded to blow BOTH contacts without even a pause. To be fair to her, the judge had set up a tunnel after the dogwalk, which I thought was very tough for a Novice course. But we have no excuse for the a-frame. Spirit just raced right by me. Honestly, I think she was high as a kite before even starting the Standard run and we didn't have a prayer of Q'ing. Lesson learned - those contacts need to be proofed MUCH better. Even though she's very consistent in class, she couldn't hold it together with the excitement of the trial.

The good news is that Spirit did allow me to leash her right back up after both runs, and I'm honestly probably more excited about that than I am about the title. It's really important to me that she remain under my control at all times - more for safety than anything else, so I'm thrilled beyond words that she didn't run off at the end. We played the "leash" game before going into the ring (I gave the "leash" command, she stuck her head into the collar, she got a very high value treat) several times, and that seemed to make all the difference.

All in all, I couldn't be any prouder of this little girl. Just 18 months old and blowing away the competition, earning titles and working hard. I am so, so incredibly lucky to have her, and I love her to the moon and back.
 
Congrats- that's pretty awesome that she was able to do so well in Jumpers:yes:
Standard does seem to be more challenging but I know that you'll get there.

I am also impressed that she allowed you to leash her after the run. I'm hoping that I can get Destin to do that next weekend:fl
 
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