April USDAA Trial

Philip and I went to a USDAA trial this weekend. These don't happen very often in our area, and it's nice to do something a little different for a change :)

The trial offered 4 runs each day, and Philip ran everything at the Advanced level since he finished his Starters title last time. We practiced 12" jumps in class for the last two weeks, and Philip had done alright with them, so there was good hope for not knocking all the bars down :)

We did have a pretty good weekend overall, so here's a quick overview of our runs!


Saturday - Advanced Gambler:
This was the first run of the morning and it was nice for a change since Philip got to warm up without having to worry about being on course so much. He ran fast, and cleared the bars with room to spare, but launched off of the dog walk missing the contact. I took him back over it and slowed him way down, so he got the contact on the second try. We easily got enough points, and Philip did the Gamble with ease (it was a jump to a tunnel straight ahead, then a left turn along the line to a teeter and another jump. We got a Q with 47 points total.

Saturday - Advanced Jumpers:
This course was nice, but I let Philip play a bit too much beforehand so he was pretty tired, and unfortunately knocked two bars down :( Otherwise he ran clean, so it was totally my fault for not stopping him from playing. Needless to say, I made him rest after this run.

Saturday - Advanced Standard:
The Standard course had a couple of tough spots, and I was sure that Philip would fail with a wrong course or something else silly. I made sure he slowed down to get his contacts, and surprisingly he got both of the hard parts correctly. He then almost skipped an easy tunnel, but got it with a little assurance from me, and since there are no refusal counted in Advanced level, we got a Q! I totally didn't expect this one, so that was nice :)

Saturday - Advanced Snooker:
For our Snooker run Philip did great with the first two red-color pairs, but after we got the 3rd red, I had him do a jump-tunnel sequence. He needed to go around the jump after taking it in order to get to the tunnel, and I think I flinched toward the jump too much, so he ended up taking the jump again instead of going around - whistle and NQ for us.


Sunday - Advanced Gambler:
The gamble portion of the run was very similar to Saturday's, the only difference being that it was mirrored to go right instead of left, and the dog had to take a different side of the tunnel than before. I though we'd do well, but I got overzealous during the opening, so we ended up on the other side of the ring when the gamble buzzer went off. I rushed Philip back, meaning for him to take a jump towards the gamble, but he got sucked up the A-frame instead. The put him in a bad position, but time was ticking so I have him go to the gamble anyway. He took the jump, but was facing towards the teeter instead of the tunnel, so I had to stop him, and after that I couldn't get him into the tunnel. Strange since he usually loves tunnels, but oh well - no gamble and NQ for us this time.

Sunday - Advanced Jumpers:
The jumpers course was very nice. It had just enough interesting turns, but wasn't so hard that it makes your head hurt. It was warming up outside and Philip was really tired, so I was worried he'd knock bars again. He ran super slowly, but hopped over every bar and got everything right. He took 2nd place with a Q.

Sunday - Advanced Standard:
Compared to Saturday's, this course was very nice, and Philip did great almost all the way through. When he got off the table though, he knocked one of jump bars :( I also managed to call him off the weaves after that, and Philip actually finished a second over the allowed time. All in all NQ.

Sunday - Advanced Pairs:
Last but not least we ran pairs with Sally the Corgi as our partner. She liked jumped over the contact zone, so we decided that Philip would take the first half that had the A-Frame, so that Sally wouldn't have to. The course wasn't hard, and Philip did it well, albeit very slowly. I almost forgot which jump was last, but got it right, handed the baton to Sally's handler, and they finished their half like pros! We had the slowest run of all, but we still got a Q - yay!


So we had 4 Qs out of 8 - not bad at all if you ask me, especially considering how badly we bombed our last USDAA trial. Philip now has 1 Q each in Standard, Gambler, Jumpers, and Pairs, and just need a Snooker Q and 2 more Standard Qs to get out of Advanced :D