Walking into the Clarion and starting to warm up before the trial.
Here I am looking nervous before going into the trial ring. It's been since Summer of 2010 since I was in the ring with Magoo and Bri. Leon has not been in the trial ring in 5 years, and we have only gotten to three matches before this trial.
I had signed up three weeks ago, where he looked ready. However, we had not been to a match yet. First match, he looked great. But then on match 2 and 3, he seemed began going down hill. He gets nervous when he can't spot Robert (who I have with me to video tape or his brother Boris). On match 3, he unfortunately realized he could leave the ring for a treat bag that a competitor had left out (and he must have been thinking about all the way to the recall). You will see the result of that realization at the end of our trial. Sigh.
So we had this trial that I had already signed up for on March 2nd and had realized that I was not going to "fix" this by March the 2nd. Then I realized I had signed up for the wrong date and though "Whew, so they will throw out the registration". Usually this show gets filled up, and I figured that Leon and I had gotten a lucky break. But in a "Murphy's Law" moment, the trial secretary had fixed our registration and gotten us through. I figured we would go anyway, and get in an expensive match anyway. Good practice for Robert being around and filming, and Leon needing to focus on me instead of looking for Robert. It was a shame we were not ready yet. This year is the first year that we have had adequate matches in the area in order to see the holes. So next year if I am trialling around this time of year and the dog training places that put these on are still in business, I will have the luxury of seeing the holes. Also, it was a mistake not to be practicing in public areas without Robert around before. I had not realized how much this would effect Leon.
Here is the actual trial.
Pretty obvious where all the work is needed.
- Leon is not required (by me) to do auto sits due to his knees. But I want him to at least stand in the correct position if he is not going to sit, and obviously sit to my left side even if not perfect. So that all needs more work for the trial setting.
- His heel was not horrible, but there were a few times where he was interested in the floor or fencing. Couple of lags although he did catch up. I want that to be a lot tighter than it is. We could probably get a leg with that heel, but I really want to learn how to point as well as possible. I need to figure out how many points come off for no auto sits in order to estimate what the best is that we would do should that occur (ie his knees are sore).
- Stand he followed the judge a couple of steps when she went away. I need to practice with other people who smell like food with that. It's usually me doing the exam for stand for exam when we practice. I am going to need to be more diligent in getting volunteers.
- Recall, obviously stopping with in front, and staying to do the finish instead of looking for Robert or the hotdogs everyone is treating their dogs with would be nice. Going to need to be very creative with this (finding places with gates, and setting up food items and Robert/Boris outside the gate). He does not try this at the fields et that we go to.
Luckily, we now have until mid April for the next trial with 5 matches between then and now:) We should be well ready for that. I have never been to this particular trial before though, so I really need to work on my before trial jitters. It never helps out for the handler to be nervous before the trial.
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