Lulu & Minnie

Back to agility competition this weekend. Still in grade 2. Place was Vastse-Kuuste and judge was Laura Grosser (GER). 1st agility course . When course walking it seemed pretty good and simple. When running, it felt the same. maybe in couple of places I could have been faster with the commands - she had time to slightly look at me :) But anyway everything went smoothly and clean run with 1st place . Speed 5.63 m/s.  2nd agility course. Much more challenging. There were 3 moments on the course that I found challenging while course walking. First moment was after slalom and it went well for us. Only the joy of success caused me to miss the plan after that. And we got a DSQ from a jump before see-saw. She went to the back side...Then after tunnel I was miserably late by watching her so she went out from the line. The second challenging moment was after dog-walk and tunnel, where the dog had to come to the inside of the jump. My plan was to stop but in reality I did not stop not I tu...

 We went again to try out rally obedience. Judge was Vivian Ainsalu. Grade 2. First course. Short course, no temptation, no spirals, no jumps...very pleasant. Out of nowhere i got this "brilliant" idea to put a ball in the finish. Was I not concluded after last competition that she cannot see or play ball before the obedience course - its too exciting? So I dont know why now I thought that it was good idea...well it was not. This ball was distracting her when we passed it at third sign. And she was first time ever vocalizing her impatience :) Then at 7th sign (double 180 degree turn) she got distracted by the judge, also then missed my turning. Result was -10 because she got more the 90 degree angle from me. I should have been taking her with me more carefully. Then it was quite nice for a while. She didnt wait until called at the left turn (but no minuses). And then at the last sign she got really impatience because of the ball in sight. She was barking about 3x. That earne...

 All march was a super spring. It must a be record early spring. It was mostly sunny and just invited to go out more.  Little fun at agility training :) Even a video from a training course:  Also the every week Wednesday orientating started again, that we are taking part and that it lots of fun. I think Lulu is enjoining this the most.

Finally back to grade 2 level. Competition was at Vastse-Kuuste and judge Anastassia Tamm.  1st course . Jumping. I was worrying about some turns and "traps" but as we started to run it tuned out that they are not a problem at all :) We got clean run - that was our third one - so we also got a right to move to grade 3. It was not the fastest time and we got 2nd place ! 2nd course. Jumping. I was more confident in running and actually enjoyed it a lot! I even had time to cheer Minnie! Great feeling. Again smooth sailing and clean run with 1st place . 3rd course . Agility. Same thing. I felt good! Clean tun and 1st place! 4th course. Agility. Same same. At first I was not sure how to do second jump. But then I did it like everyone else. In the end, the jump before see-saw, I was very happy how I gave "cross" command (jump and turn away), but saw that Minnie still starts to turn to me after jump - but then changed her plan and actually tuned away from me! beautiful!...

Second tryouts for Estonian AWC team. This time in Vastse-Kuuste. The course design was done by Reetta Pirttikoski (FIN) but judged by Anastassia Tamm.  1st agility course. I think the fist half went quite well. I was worried about the slalom entry but it went well (probably because I was confused jut before that part) :) But everything worked out as planned.  Then after jump no.9 (jump after long jump) she did a sharp turn away from me and took the wrong jump- DSQ . I have no idea why she came up with this plan :) On the second round passing the same place she thought that she knows exactly how the course goes :D. Overall i´m happy of our good 9 first obstacles :) 2nd agility course. The DSQ came area at 4th jump. She went behind the jump. She is in the stage where she follows her line very well - and the line went behind the jump. Anyway the jumps 4 to 6 was very difficult for us. Next impossible line was 10 to 11 (tunnel under A-frame to jump and not going to slalom)...

I made my (and Minnie made her) debut in Estonian AWC (Agility Word Championships) qualification competitions. Our qualification system currently is that dogs (from A3 and A2 grade) will run 12 courses divided in 4 different weekends from February to May. All clean runs or -5 results will give points and 4 most point collected dogs will be Estonian team. Since Im curios about the courses and we are allowed to participate then I decided that Minnie will also participate. Of course, as she is 2y3m old then we do not go there for "results" but we go to get experience.  On 21 February we had first qualification competition. Judge was Anastassia Tamm. There was 27 medium dogs participating :) 1. jumping course . Course itself was noting very difficult, with a good flow, I would say. Most difficult part for us was entry and exit of the slalom. And she did not see  the slalom entry (did i block it or she did not look for it?) and took the obvious jump. DSQ . But she worked very well...

 On third of February it was anniversary of getting Minnie. 2 years for now she has been on my side.  Minnie watching Olympics:

In the weekend again agility competition at Vaste-Kuuste. Judge was Stefi Praakli. Grade 2. 1. jumping course. Nicely flowing course. Not too "straight -in-your-face" traps. I managed to not mess up handling and result was clean run, speed 5.56m/s and 1st place . 2nd jumping course. At the start I did not left her enough behind, that caused me to be late for the jump after tunnel,that caused me to be late for blind cross after the jump :) Somehow still the turn worked.  Then for a while tings went smoothly. She did turn away from me when should have taking the wing on my side. Maybe that caused me running so much out after the tunnel..anyway my certain plan was not to go further than the tunnel end. But in the video its seen how Im going actually a lot after (1-1.5m).... this caused me to be very late at the next jump (0.5m). And that meant that I could not turn her to the correct line for the next jump... DSQ .  1st agility course. The course demanded some more skills fro...

January was cold, there was regular sleeping in the house activities :D Of course training, fitness and some competitions Pärli being cute with Lulu and Minnie: Minnie got herself shoes. She was of course wearing them like she would have had boots all her life!

After a month long break we are back in agility competition. Still on our "home-turf" in Vaste-Kuuste. Judge Esa Muotka. Still in grade 2. 1st course. Jumping.  In all four courses there was the same 3 tunnel positions. And the course went a bit in 8 shape. I was late after slalom. And then I forgot to change hand in a quite critical point. I tried to recover from this with rear cross before tunnel. But I was too confused to handle the next jump well. My right hand was up instead of down (sending the dog behind the jump - that she perfectly did). DSQ .  2.nd course. Jumping. Now the start was straight line to trap jump (after long jump). I was quite sure that she will take the trap, because the tunnel was in the way of avoiding going straight. My plan was to stop and call the dog. Did I do it? Nope. I just kept moving - and so did Minnie - and took the trap: DSQ .  Then in one of the turn (where now I did not forgot to change hand) Minnie turn was so wide that she went tr...

Second weekend in a row we went to Tallinn to participate Rally obedience competition. This time we were in grade 2 (RK2). Judge was Zaiga Elibird Zvirbule (LV). For Minnie it was new dog hall to be.  1st course. The course had a big stuffed dog - witch was not a distraction but a scary thing. It was a bit smaller than Minnie. I personally find that the items in distraction 8 should not be potentially scary for the dogs. Anyway Minnie was in a good mood and up to the distraction 8 we only lost 2 points (because of 2x not sitting straight - that is a typical thing for Minnie). Half way in the distr 8, she saw the dog (-3p), it was disturbing her until the end. Still she did a good job with me. We got -10p from the  spin after the distr 8, fully my fault i was too fast with my signals. in the next sign we earned -1, -1 and -3 points, she was not sitting straight, looking behind and staying behind from me (looking behind again). The on the turn around we got -2p, not good s...

Very first official Rally Obedience competition, although last summer we went to an exam. This time it was held near Tallinn and the judge was Karin Lassmann.  I started to drive from my home already at 6.30 in the morning. The condition of the roads were not great. Anyway I arrived well. Minnie was participating in grade 1 (RK1) and was first in the startlist. I like to be first in obedience.  1st course. Minnie was great. Good contact with me. In the second half of the course I made a handling mistake by not making sure that she is ready to come with me after laying down - she was convinced that I should give her some treats after this nice "down" :) So we earned -3. After that at the next sign, she needed some extra convincing to sit. There came also -1. But rest of the course was good. I was not giving any treats as I know that it might create more possibility to loose points and Minnie can work the course without it...or well - we lost 4 points because of it :D. Minnie ...