We're going to go for it

Looking around online and on the USDAA website I can't find any Samoyed that has an ADCH. So I think Venus and I are going to push for it. I just have to keep my fingers crossed that she will measure under 21".
With that in mind we have a USDAA trial coming up August 29 & 30th. We have 10 runs between 2 days so we'll see what happens.

Weaves are still up and down and if she is going to do them and do them correctly or not. :(

Today's weaves

So I've come up with a plan on weave negatives and positives. We are working on both ends of the weaves here, entries and popping out.

1) No collection into the poles= lie down
2) Misses first pole and starts at 2nd= finish weaves with no encouragement & no reward
3) Entry good= "Yes! Go, go, go" to the end
4) Popping out of poles= lie down
5) No collection into pole 2 but continues at 3= no encourageent/reward
6) Perfect poles= "Yes, go, go, go" and big rewards at the end

I had a friend mention this and she may be onto something here, it makes sense that if Venus misses the entry etc, that if I pull her out of the poles it can increase our popping out issue. I also thing it makes her weave less independent and sh checks with me too often to make sure she is right. We will see if this seems to make a difference.

I finally got enough speed today to see the not collecting issue. It took until the 4th try for her to finally collect. We cross a big flat open field to get to the agility course. I left her in that field about 20 feet out from a jump. I called her over the jump and to the weaves and she had lots of speed. We'll try that again tomorrow.

The good and the bad

We've been working weave poles. Not a whole lot to update on that. Some days feel better and others feel the same. I'm nt getting much drive at all when practicing at home so I know there is no improvement when she needs to collect into the poles.

Videos from Concord like I promised.
I do love the twitchy excited move at the startline, she is ready!

Concord- Good and Bad

So we ended up with 1 Q out of 8 runs. Not a very good average but we had some very good runs.

We did get our last Open Standard Q! Venus now has her OA, yay. It took until Saturday to get it though. So here's a run down of our runs.

Thursday Open Standard- It looked like a tough course. Venus promptly NQd on the weave poles. We got to the A-frame which I knew was going to be a problem. It was A-frame and then the tunnel off to the right. Straight ahead of the a-frame was the off course table. Venus loves to suck to the table anyways. She decided she only needed to stride down the a-frame once and then leap off missing the yellow. She hit the ground and then leaped onto the table. We left the ring after that.

Thursday Ex JWW- Weave poles got us again. Other than that it was a nice clean run. I was very excited that Venus was running fast and listening. I planned a front cross but she ended up ahead of me so I had to rear cross the jump. I was afraid that would cause her to turn early and miss the jump further out. I had seen many dogs do that. After I crossed her head turned towards me and I said "out jump" and she headed for the far jump and took it! Yay Veni.

Friday Open Standard- Weave poles weave poles weave poles. Again. She did think about doing them though. She got in them and then stopped.

Friday Ex JWW- She was heading for the poles then stopped to wait on me. We also had a bar down but another nice fast run.

Sat Open Std- We Q'd by the skin of our teeth. She got her weave poles this time! he got a refusal at a tunnel, there was the table off to her left that she went towards and when I got her back she kinda spun at the tunnel. Then she got a table fault because she forgot to slow down while jumping on the table and slid off the other side. Her a-frame and teeter were close calls. She did end up with 1st place!

Sat Ex JWW- Weaves got us again. Otherwise it was a nice fast run. I sent her out away from me and she'd come close when I asked her to. I got lots of compliments on this run.

Sun Ex Std- By far one of our worst runs ever. We stayed at a hotel since Wednesday night. She didn't get much run or play time since I didn't have any other dogs with me. By day 4 of the trial she exploded mentally. At the warm up jump she was barking her head off and paying no attention to my movements. In the ring she ended up flying off the teeter, almost sliding off the table, not holding her dog walk contact, ignoring the weaves to take the more fun tunnel, skipping a few jumps, and knocking a bar. I almost took her out of the ring after the teeter fly off. I had her down and decided to keep going because she needed to run this out of her system. Best of all I have this run on tape!

Sun Ex JWW- Weaves and a bar again. Otherwise a nice run with her. I have this on tape.

Overall I am thrilled with our JWW runs. We have a weave pole problem to work on but other than that we're doing well. We've been nailing the complicated parts of the courses no problem. We've not have any refusals or wrong courses (except weaves) on any of the ex jumpers courses.

Confidence or Hormones?

I am hoping Venus' new found speed is confidence and not caused by hormones. I think Clover is coming in season and Venus might be reacting to that.

Here's some changes Venus and I are working on. I am talking less while running her. In a straight line I am expecting her to take the obstacles in front of her unless I say otherwise.
Only doing crosses when there is a turn. Before I have put crosses where they were convinent for me. Now I am trying to plan them when a turn is the next 1-2 obstacles away. We'll see if we can get adjusted to this and work as a good fast team.

A Whole New Venus!

Ok so I have been taking some lessons with Lynne Stephens and Karen Mielke at Dog Logic. Some of the things we have been doing there have helped Venus with her confidence I think. She is now very hyped up and running fast courses. The downside is that I have to relearn how to handle this dog but it will only be a temporary thing.

I have decided that she might not get her last open leg at the Concord trial because of this. My goal is to have a happy fast but controlled dog. I will require her to keep bars up, hit her contacts, and complete all weave poles. Other than that she might run by a jump or take an off course and we will just keep going. I am going to try to plan to handle her like a fast dog that needs a bit more direction than I usually do with her.
Normally a slight turn of my body will pull Venus with me in a split second but now it is taking more than that.


Concord will be 4 days, July 2-5. Venus is in Ex A JWW and Open Std. We'll see wat happens.

First USDAA trial

So we finally went for it, entered our first USDAA trial. It is 2 months since Venus was last in season which usually means she is hormonal and super velcro dog right now. Because of that I didn't enter pairs (didn't want to cost someone else a Q) and gamblers (no going to upset the velcro dog).

My plan was blown away when I didn't have velco dog and instead I had a kinda distance dog, distance for Venus anyways.

Anyways the outcome for this weekend:
(Saturday)
PI Standard- Q 3rd place
PI Jumpers- Q 2nd place
PI Snooker- NQ (down bar)
Performance Speed Jumping- Qualified for round 2 with a 3rd place

(Sunday)
PI Standard- Q 1st place
PI Jumpers- Q 1st place
PI Snooker- Q 1st place
Performance Spped Jumping round 2- 2nd place!

I'm thrilled with our runs and she had some nice times. Sunday she was less than 5 seconds off the fastest 2 dogs and in standard less than 1 second between her and the fastest dog. Both days she was around 20 seconds under SCT in standard and 9 in Jumpers. Go Bean Go!