Oh Yeah, You Blend

Well the 2016 Invitational is in the books, and an awesome time was had. My girls did the best they have done to date, Nina was awarded the 2015 Top MACH Dog award at the banquet on Friday night, what a great experience with great friends and a really wonderful and positive crowd in Orlando Florida.

Checking out a tree on the way to Orlando!

We rented an agility field on Thursday for practice.

Arrival at the Orange Country Convention Center!

Sue and I all set up in our shared crating space early Friday morning.

Catching some rays out front of the West building at the OCCC

Nina’s slide at the banquet for 2015 Top Agility Vallhund, so proud of her! Picture courtesy of Wendi Pencille

Here it her certificate!

The Royal Canin fairies came in the night bearing gifts!

Zhora and Nina both qualified in Time 2 Beat on the Friday (Nina coming in 9th, Zhora 19th), and Zhora went on to run clean through three rounds, holding on to 19th place out of 139 dogs before I made a stupid mistake in an otherwise perfect Round 4, which I elected not to go back and fix, thus earning us a zero (we needed to go clean to win the breed medallion or be in contention for the finals). Since 11 8″ dogs go to the finals, we were genuinely in contention for the finals, and it was just amazing to have people come up and comment on how well she was running and ask if we’d made the finals after round 4.

One of the talking points read over the loudspeaker for another dog really touched me, the handler said that every time she and her dog ran they won, they either qualified, or they learned something. I am trying to take that to heart going forward.

“Official” videos to follow, Zhora’s Round 1 didn’t get taped on my camera.

Nina Friday Time 2 Beat (Q and 8 points):

Zhora Friday Time 2 Beat (Q and 7 points):

Nina Saturday Round 1 Jumpers With Weaves (NQ, I turned my back on her at the start which caused the bar down, and pulled away in the weaves which caused the pop):

Zhora Saturday Round 2 Standard (Q, 24th place):

Nina Saturday Round 2 Standard (NQ, I pulled her off the panel jump by over-rotating and she didn’t send out when I tried to layer the jump at the end):

Nina Round 3 Hybrid (Q, 16th place):

Zhora Round 3 Hybrid (Q):

Nina Round 4 Jumpers With Weaves (NQ, crowded her in the serpentine and mishandled the jump after the broad jump so she read it as a rear cross):

Zhora Round 4 Jumpers With Weaves (NQ, heartbreaker, I rushed my front cross in the weaves and made her pop the last pole, I didn’t fix it because it wasn’t her fault and she had run so beautifully all weekend, I decided to take the zero score):

On our way home, we took a detour to American Beach on Amelia Island like I did last year – so worth it to walk on the sand, put our feet in the ocean, ground ourselves again, and let the dogs just run around and be dogs for a while….

On to Nationals in March, and the 2017 Invitational next December!!!

Here’s an awesome video of Lobo (Alkemi Beowulf del Roble LS CDX PT RATM CGC) and his mom Jan trying for his second UD (Utility Dog) obedience leg. He didn’t pass this time (he has one UD leg already, he needs three for his UD title) but I have no doubt he will get it soon. This is a very tough title, the runs are long and involve a lot of different skills (he has to heel, perform skills at a distance, discriminate an article Jan has handled from a bunch of articles, and he has to do this with different materials). Jan is a wonderful (and very experienced!) trainer and she clearly has such an amazing bond with her Lobo, the bit where they look at each other while they wait for the judge to place the discrimination article, and there is so much love and trust obvious between them…that does my heart good both as a breeder and as a dog person, we should all have that kind of bond with our dogs!

This was our third time showing under judge Alex Davis. She is a lovely person, always wants people to do well. Her courses were tough! Zhora picked up QQ’s # 37 and 38, just two more to go to MACH 2! Nina had some lovely runs, picking up an awesome JWW Q and a Premier JWW Q. This was her last weekend to qualify for nationals, she just needed two QQ’s to go, but sadly it was not to be. I am adopting a new strategy to try and fix the bar knocking – after pretty thorough video review and discussion with friends who have watched her run for years, the problem seems to be that she sometimes just doesn’t bother to add a stride when she should (it’s faster to just take the long spot and knock the bar – this is NOT Early Takeoff Syndrome), and instead opts to just plow through. So I am taking a two-pronged approach, a Vallhund owning friend (Hattie, who owned the late and sadly-missed Vaasa, who was so much like Nina) said she started just pulling her dog with the same problem when she knocked bars, and it solved the problem. So I am doing this (unless, of course, I think the bar was my fault). I am also SAYING “jump” before every jump to remind her to jump – I have always been someone who prefers to run with as few verbal cues as possible, and I do generally believe that showing the dog which jump is next is my job, but actually JUMPING the jump is the dog’s. But at this point….after so many NQ’s for bars throughout her career, I am willing to try almost anything. It did seem to be helping, I did pull her several times this weekend, and she did seem to leave bars up when I told her to jump (it’s an adjustment for me and I do forget to actually say jump sometimes).

Nina Friday Standard (NQ but SUCH a nice run, and I love the “AWWWWW” from the crowd when we NQ):

Zhora Friday Standard (Part 1 of QQ # 37, third place, 28 points):

Nina Friday Premier Standard (egregious teeter NQ but gorgeous run):

Zhora Friday Jumpers (Part 2 of QQ # 37, third place, 16 points):

Zhora Saturday Jumpers (Part 1 of QQ # 38, fourth place, 16 points):

Nina Saturday Premier Standard (going well till the bar…):

Nina Saturday Standard (tough weave pole entry got us because I can’t leave her on the table, nice run otherwise):

Zhora Saturday Standard (Part 2 of QQ # 38, second place, 30 points):

Nina Sunday Premier Jumpers (second place):

Nina Sunday Jumpers (fourth place, 21 points, Jessie Westover and her CRAZY FAST Papillons were there today, which is how you get a fourth place in Erie with a whopping 21 points in JWW!):

Zhora Sunday Jumpers (16 points again! At least she’s consistent!):

Zhora Sunday Time 2 Beat (9 points):

Zhora Sunday Standard (LOL at her on the table!)

Candy Nettles designed some tough courses! Zhora broke out of her QQ slump with # 36 today. Nina had some lovely runs but only one Q. One more trial (next weekend) before a two week break and then the Invitational!

Nina Saturday Jumpers (NQ was my fault, nice run):

Zhora Saturday Jumpers (third place, 16 points, I learned my lesson after Nina’s NQ at the tunnel, I made sure to really connect after the triple):

Nina Saturday Standard (NQ, nice run):

Zhora Saturday Standard (NQ, nice run):

Nina Sunday Premier Jumpers (very happy with the first half of this run, she slipped really badly turning to the weaves in a known “slippery spot” on the turf, so then it was experiment mode):

Nina Sunday Jumpers (second place, 18 points):

Zhora Sunday Jumpers (part 1 of QQ #36, third place, 15 points):

Zhora Sunday Standard (part 2 of QQ # 36, second place, 27 points):

Fave judge Mary Mullen couldn’t save us from yet another no QQ weekend! Some wonderful runs but…I blame the election results.

Nina Saturday Jumpers (nice run, NQ):

Zhora Saturday Time 2 Beat (first place, 10 points):

Zhora Saturday Standard (third place, 26 points):

Nina Sunday Jumpers (second place, personal best 24 (!!) points):

Zhora Sunday Time 2 Beat (first place, 10 points):

Zhora Sunday Standard (second place, 26 points):

New judge to us Elane Rice. She sure likes turnbacks out of the weaves and trick finishes….

Zhora’s QQ streak had to end some time! She had two JWW Q’s and one Standard Q but handler errors cost us doubles.

Nina Friday Premier Standard (NQ):

Zhora Friday Jumpers (fourth place, 18 points):

Zhora Saturday Jumpers (fourth place, 18 points):

Nina Saturday Standard (NQ but look at those independent weaves!):

Nina Sunday Premier JWW (NQ):

Zhora Sunday Standard (fourth place, 27 points):

Nina Sunday Standard (first place, 33 points):

Judge Barbara Bounds designed some tricky courses. Fun to run though! Nina managed a Standard Q and had some really nice runs, including an awesome Premier JWW run with one lousy bar (I am reminded of Léon: “always like this”). Zhora managed another two QQ’s (#34 and 35), which officially means she has not only lapped Nina in the MACH race, she has passed her (Nina has 14 towards her MACH, Zhora has 15 towards MACH 2), she is just awesome. I cherish every run with both of them, even if Nina’s QQ drought is getting more than a little old.

Nina Friday FAST (Q, first place, 38 points):

Zhora Friday Standard (part 1 of QQ #34, second place, 30 points):

Nina Friday Premier Standard (such a nice run but NQ):

Zhora Friday Jumpers (part 2 of QQ #34, third place, 18 points):

Nina Friday Premier Jumpers (OMG ONE LOUSY BAR!!!):

Zhora Saturday Jumpers (Part 1 of QQ #35, third place, 17 points):

Nina Saturday Standard (Q, third place, 34 points):

Zhora Saturday Standard (part 2 of QQ #35, fourth place, 31 points):

Zhora Sunday Standard (Q, fourth place, 29 points:

Some really challenging courses from judge Alexandra Davis. Zhora had a perfect weekend in the classes that count, picking up QQ’s #31, 32 and 33 towards MACH 2! Nina had a perfect NQ weekend but wow is she running well. At one point I was chatting with Alex about Nina taking the wrong end of the tunnel in Jumpers today, and she asked how old Nina was, I told her she was 9, she said “OH! I thought that was your puppy….” LOL. I love every run with her regardless. And I am trying hard not to be spoiled by Zhora, but I will tell you that it’s sure a nice change to run a consistent dog, because there were MANY weekends I’d come home with one Q or even no Q’s before Z Dog came along!

Nina Friday Standard (NQ but so close and such a nice run! Layering!):

Zhora Friday Standard (part 1 of QQ # 31, second place, 30 points):

Zhora Friday Jumpers (part 2 of QQ # 31, fourth place (the top 4 dogs were within 8 100ths of a second of each other!), 15 points):

Nina Friday Premier Jumpers (NQ):

Zhora Friday Premier Jumpers (NQ):

Nina Saturday Jumpers (NQ):

Zhora Saturday Jumpers (part 1 of QQ # 32, second place, 18 points):

Zhora Saturday Premier (NQ, nice run):

Zhora Saturday Standard (part 2 of QQ # 32, third place, 29 points):

Nina Sunday Jumpers (I SO thought we had it….but no…and someone asked me during the walkthrough if many of the big dogs had taken the wrong end of the tunnel after the weaves and I said no…so Nina decided to show me what that looked like, training mode after that):

Zhora Sunday Jumpers (part 1 of QQ #33, second place, 17 points):

Nina Sunday Standard (ANOTHER soooo close, really loved this run though):

Zhora Sunday Standard (part 2 of QQ # 33, third place, 26 points):

Judge Windle Ewing (who it turns out knows Debbie Spence, my first agility teacher from back in Texas) designed some seriously tricky courses for us this weekend. He was the judge under whom we earned our first double double Q last year. It was ALMOST a repeat this year, but then an absolute heartbreaker of a standard NQ today happened. I reminded myself right after that this is just agility, we aren’t curing cancer and world peace does not depend on it.

Zhora earned QQ’s # 29 and 30, halfway to MACH2 already! Nina ran beautifully. It was fun. We are off for two weekends now and we need it.

Nina Friday Time 2 Beat (Q, first place, 10 points):

Zhora Friday Standard (part 1 of QQ #29, second place, 28 points):

Zhora Friday Jumpers (part 2 of QQ # 29, third place, 12 points):

Zhora Saturday Time 2 Beat (Q, second place, 8 points):

Nina Saturday Time 2 Beat (Q, first place, 10 points):

Zhora Sunday Jumpers (part 1 of QQ #30, third place, 15 points):

Nina Sunday Jumpers (Q, second place, 17 points):

Zhora Sunday Standard (part 2 of QQ #30, second place, 20 points, holy moly this course….only 2 8″ dogs qualified):

Nina Sunday Standard (HEARTBREAKER, on a double Q no less, the LAST BAR of the LAST JUMP….OMG…):

OMG I might just have a new favorite judge! Pam Johnson designed courses that Nina would have designed if Pam hadn’t done it first (and if Nina could use Clean Run Course Designer…), flowy, fast, RLH (that’s Run Like Hell), no need for pesky deceleration, just speed. They were LOVELY courses, with one single exception, the opening of yesterday’s Standard course, which gave most of us fits because of handler errors that were all too easy to make. Nina was SO CLOSE to a double, knocking the LAST POSSIBLE BAR today, which was at least partly my fault, since I didn’t decelerate where I had told myself to.

Nina was a Standard specialist last weekend, and a Jumpers specialist this weekend. She is running beautifully, faster than she ever has, got all her contacts, just JOFT (that’s Just One Little Thing, where “little” is now replaced with an f bomb….). She just needs TWO doubles to qualify for Nationals….just two….

Zhora was a rock star, earning two Time 2 Beat Q’s and double Q # 28 today plus a Jumpers from yesterday.

There were very few 8″ dogs, so I only had a few between them, so I was puffing!

I decided to post the good, the bad and the ugly this time.

Nina Saturday Jumpers (Q, first place, 21 points, 5.532 YPS):

Zhora Saturday Jumpers (Q, second place, 17 points, 4.893 YPS):

Zhora Saturday Time 2 Beat (Q, second place, 9 points):

Nina Saturday Standard (wow…I just did not handle that tunnel/aframe properly at all, needed to pull way over to show her the line):

Zhora Saturday Standard (aaaaand then I did exactly the same thing with Zhora….):

Nina Sunday Jumpers (Q, first place, 21 points again, 5.261 YPS):

Zhora Sunday Jumpers (Part 1 of QQ #28, Q, second place, 17 points again, how weird is that, they both got exactly the same points yesterday and today! 4.671 YPS):

Zhora Sunday Time 2 Beat (Q, first place, 10 points):

Nina Sunday Standard (ONE FREAKING BAR!):

Zhora Sunday Standard (Part 2 of QQ #28, first place, 25 points, 3.627 YPS, I did NOT like this dogwalk entry, and I did not handle it as carefully as I could have, so she slipped and I had a bit of an EEK moment):