The Boys are Back in Town!

What a fun weekend... our 1st agility trial in over a month! It was a nice break, but definitely felt great to be back running the 2 black dogs again :)

Dylan was such a good boy all weekend. Just 1 error in each run, but he did beautifully and had so much fun. He just looks super happy. He did a fantastic job and held every single contact and I couldn't have been happier. Unfortunately, it was my fault that we messed up 1 of the runs... but it doesn't matter, he still rocked and we both had a great time.

Rumor also did really well. On Saturday he Qed in Open Std to finish his OA title. His JWW runs weren't quite as put together, but he certainly had some very nice parts. It was fun to finally play with the "big boys" on Sunday in Std. He did a nice job. We missed 1 jump (my fault) and he didn't get the weave entrance (tough entrance), but other than that I think he did very nicely. I'm still holding contacts a lot with him so our times are super fast, but I think it will be worth it down the road.

It was a weekend of MACHs! Liz/Ruby, Marty/Kit, Tammy/Lexi all got their MACHs and Jacquie/Flash were 1 bar away. It was a wonderful weekend... lots of nice runs and some great friends/fun times were had. It's good to be back

DockDogs - Dubuque, IA

The boys and I headed to Dubuque this weekend for the DockDog event there... the weekend was a blast! The weather was a little suspect Saturday morning, but was very nice the rest of the weekend. Made me realize the boys and I all need to get used to the heat/humidity and get into shape!

Dylan had a very good weekend... he did a few Big Air waves and 1 Speed Retrieve wave. For Big Air, he had a jump over 17' that put him in 1st for the Amateur Finals in Big Air. In the Finals, he ended up in 2nd place by 1". I was so happy with him... another jump over 17'... what a good boy.

Rumor also had a great weekend! He had some descent Speed Retrieve times, but his 7.363 second time wasn't enough to get him into the Finals. He did, however, have a new personal best in Big Air of 22' 7" -- woohoo! Seems like the little man has finally figured out what's going on. He had a couple jumps over 20' and a couple more over 21'... but only this one over 22'. The good news is that put him in 8th place for the Pro Finals. That was Rumor's 1st time in the Pro Finals. It was very exciting, but he was definitely the underdog. He jumped just a bit over 21' and ended up in 7th place, but I was very proud of the little guy. As it turns out, the Semi-Pro Finals were much more competative and had numerous dogs jumping 22+ and Vader jumped over 24'.

Overall, it was a really fun weekend... now it's time to get back to agility :)

Ely, MN... vacation and DockDogs

Chris convinced me to go to the Ely, MN event with him this year... and I'm so glad I did! Since it is 10 hours away, I wanted to make a vacation out of it... so I took my 1st *real* vacation in over 4.5 yrs!

We stayed at White Iron Beach Resort and had a blast there... we BBQed, made bonfires, went pontoon boating, played with the dogs... also saw the North American Bear Center... the International Wolf Center... and saw the Vince Shute Bear Sanctuary in Orr, MN... it was great!





DockDogs Northern Stars put on a great DockDog event in Ely... so many nice people and the event was just a blast. I was very proud of both black dogs! They both had new personal best records... I think all the swimming/conditioning they did really made a difference.

Rumor didn't start out very strong on Friday... he wasn't jumping well... I think his Speed Retrieve was over 9 seconds and his Big Air was under 15'. Dylan, on the other hand, did very nicely! He had a Speed Retrieve time under 8 seconds... and he set a new personal best (by far) in Big Air of 18' 7"! Before that, his best was 17' 11" set 2 years ago.

Saturday, Dylan had another nice day. 1 jump in Big Air over 18' and he was a bit slower in Speed Retrieve... mid/high 8 seconds. Rumor was like an entirely new dog the 2nd day. He stopped doing the "chase" for some reason... he kept stopping on the dock. So, I tried the place and send... he jumped 22'! I couldn't believe it... after that, all of his jumps were well over 20'... most over 21'. I was also thrilled with Rumor's improvement in Speed Retrieve... the little boy busted out a 6.66 and won the wave.

Sunday I pulled Dylan from the Speed Retrieve Finals because his times were getting worse and he was #8... some new friends were #9 and I wanted them to have the opportunity to play in the Finals. Rumor was #1 and so I wanted to focus on him more instead of running between the 2 dogs. Dylan was in the Senior Big Air Finals... he didn't jump all that well so he finished 6th, which was still fine by me. He had fun. Rumor won the Speed Retrieve by a couple hundredths of a seconds and and he finished up 3rd in the Masters Big Air Division... he had a jump of 21' 2". The winner had 22'... a 1st time dog... pretty impressive.

Overall, it was a wonderful weekend! I was very impessed with the DDNS club and they ran a very nice event. I'm so glad Chris talked me into taking the trip... it was well worth it and now I want to go back next year! :)