A good weekend at FRAAD AKC in Castle Rock

We were in Castle Rock, Colorado Friday-Sunday. Three rings (Standard, JWW, and FAST). I did not enter FAST because of ring conflicts in a three-ring trial and I don't like the stress of keeping track of the three rings.

Friday was Excellent only. Both Summit and Sage had nice runs in jumpers. Summit won the class and Sage placed 4th. Summit had a nice standard run but dropped the third to last bar (double) when I called his name as he was clearing the jump. Sage had a wrong course.

Saturday Summit again won jumpers and Sage placed 4th (is that funny weird or what?). Sage NQ'd in standard (called for a refusal - I sent to a jump and didn't support it well enough and she turned off). Summit won standard that afternoon for a double Q with two first places AND earned his MX title! Needless to say I was pretty pleased with my young dog.

Sunday the courses were VERY technical. I will post course maps when I get them transferred to CRCD. I really liked these courses because they had challenges that you normally don't see in AKC. The challenges involved multiple 180 degree wraps, pull throughs, and serpentines. I was excited to run them. I also got some good feedback from my dogs' performance and have some training goals.

Sage ran the jumpers beautifully. It felt smooth and effortless and she handled the technical elements very nicely. She Q'd with 6th place in jumpers. We had a little more difficult time with the standard course but only on one segment of the course (most teams had trouble with this section) but we made it through and the rest of the course ran well. Sage got 3rd place and a double Q! I am not sure but I think this is either #16 or #17 towards her MACH. Getting close.....
Summit did not handle the challenges as well. Part of it was my timing was off as well as my location. But mostly he was just not ready to handle these types of challenges. So we have a whole new level of skills to work on at home.

I do train 180's, serps, pull throughs, etc. with Summit but what made it more challenging this weekend was that the dog was coming into these at full extension and the handler needed to handle these from behind with rear crosses. Rear crosses is a weak skill with both my dogs (since I prefer to be in front). I've been practicing more RC's in training but obviously have more work to do with Summit.

So not a bad weekend with two QQ's and a new title (darn! I forgot to grab one of those pretty purple new title ribbons).

This Thursday night, Jen and I are leaving for Fountain, Colorado for three days of USDAA with DAM team on Friday.

Sage is on a "Witchy Women" team (I did not come up with the name;-) with BC, Jane and JRT, Whim.
Summit's team is called "Red Hots" and very apropo as his teammates are red Cattle Dog, Rita and red Cattle Dog, Lucky!