PAC/GSDCO AKC Agility - St. Pat's Weekend

Leo has been getting to play agility fairly regularly lately. Of course I've been too busy to keep his records up-to-date and with a third weekend in a row bearing down, I just have to do it. So here goes.

Two weekends ago we were at the Clark County Fairgrounds for a co-hosted AKC agility trial. With our teeter "issues," Leo was just running JWW. He'd moved up to the Open level for that trial so 12 full weaves. In theory shouldn't be a big deal since he earned his OAJ title a while back before switching to Preferred/4".

Saturday's Course:
The first sequence was straight-forward; I planned to just handle from the right. While Leo was in the tunnel I figured on making a front cross and moving out toward the #5 jump. I then planned a FC between 6 & 7 and another after #8 into the weaves since we still don't have off side weaves. We then just needed to move out into the pinwheel, complete it and run straight out to the finish. Something funny happened though....just watch. 

SCT: 48
Yards: 121
Leo's time was 40.09 which was 3.02 YPS. Funny...did you see the "watch" part I was talking about? Here's what happened....

We were in the middle of the pinwheel, just after the third jump from the weaves, I think. All of a sudden, Leo wheels to a stop and looks at the back wall. I could NOT get his attention for the life of me. On the other side of the wall is where we were crated.... Here is my assignation of Leo's internal dialog/thought process:

Leo: "What? Wait! Sissy, is that you? Are you okay? (listening....) Oh! You're just throwing a fit. Okay, well I'm going back to play with mom now."

It was too darn funny. Yes, Vegas is known for her crate temper tantrums. And Leo loves her. So what can you do? Lori Sage, our judge and a friend felt badly about having to give him a refusal. I certainly assured her there was no reason to be. We still qualified, it was caught on video, and the degree of truth in my dialog makes for a fun story. So that's how Leo earned his first Open JWW Preferred leg. On another note - I love, love, LOVE how enthusiastic and fast he did his weaves. That's the way he weaves in practice and he just dove right into them.

Sunday's Course:
I liked that the weaves were right off the bat and didn't involve a front cross as I could simply handle from the right. From there I planned a front cross after 3, another after 6, and one after 11. Let's see how that worked out for me...

Funny thing is...I was so pleased with his weave performance (two days in a row) I almost forgot how to
handle afterward. Fortunately Leo was solid and worked with my bumbling.
SCT: 48
Yards: 121
Our time was 34.09, a YPS of 3.55. Much better without the "stop and check on sis" bit. :-)

So that was our second OJP leg. We'll have an opportunity to finish it off and move into Excellent this weekend. So happy with my little man!