Vito NADAC trial
Our first NADAC trial since October!
Saturday
Regular was first. I was a bit worried as we were surprised with doing barrels on course (WTF NADAC!) and the first one was right after the dogwalk. Vito's running dogwalk was trained to hit at the end of the board and drive to the next obstacle. I never fully was able to get that first half without the 2nd half, thus our turns issue and ultimately adding a stopped contact option for him. So I was worried as I highly doubted Vito would drive to an obstacle he's never seen before. There was a practice barrel outside of the ring and Vito thought the job was to whack it. When one paw clearly did not get him the reward he thought jumping at it with both was necessary. Awesome. I did get him to actually run around it eventually.
Luckily since in NADAC there's basically a 90% chance the dogwalk is either the 2nd obstacle or the 2nd to last obstacle, I was able to do a lead out and beat him to the end of the dogwalk so he drove to me and then around the barrel was an easy push. The 2nd barrel he had a very slight moment of WTF but then since I was sprinting to get a blind in after the aframe he happily finished it and ran after me. We qualified and it was close to being one of his fastest standard runs in a trial at 4.98YPS and that was even with an extra set of weaves on course.
Jumpers was sad Toller. We were 2nd in the ring and I got stuck explaining my video camera to the nice person I got to tape us. Vito got straight of the crate and had maybe 30sec before going in the ring. That does not work for the Toller. Knocked the 2nd bar and had a slow first half, but started to pick up speed by the end.
Sunday
Moderately happy Toller on Touch n Go. A rear cross in the beginning was hard to recover from. But the dogwalk to barrel appeared again and I was able to use some distance and running to make it there for him to charge to me.
Super happy Toller appeared for Chances. Singing for the whole world to hear before we even walked in the ring :) Broke his stay and of course I let him. (Don't get any ideas Mr. Corgi!). Chances was much easier than Saturday and he made the distance challenge like his corgi brother, but kept the bars up :)
Choking Toller walked in the jumpers ring. Well, at least a throat-irritated toller. During our warm up he coughed up a piece of kibble that was fed to him about an hour before. He was happy to play with me but his scream was more of hack. There wasn't much decision time as he was the last dog anyway so into the ring we went. It was slow and I heard a few coughs, but he managed to qualify. Poor guy.
Hahaha that *is* a super happy Toller. He made me laugh so hard. I'm glad you let him break that stay; and glad that you were able to get out far enough before he broke.
Barrels? Really? Ah NADAC. It was a beautiful run anyway.
Vito is learning to be naughty and is encouraged to be so :) The corgi not so much!
Elayne, don't even get me started on barrels. NADAC is now well on its way to becoming a flatwork only organization. It annoys me that a note specifically stated there would not be barrels at this trial and yet look what appeared...
If there was more ASCA in this area I'd switch, it's just that the straight lines are so good for the Toller's motivation and the lack tight turns better for the corgi's jumping. sigh.
So terribly interesting, because the same thing happened at a trial in MN this weekend (I was not in attendance as I don't travel for NADAC anymore) -- This particular club stated that they would have barrels at their APRIL trial and that there would be one set up in the warm-up area in March for people to play with.
Well, surprise, surprise --- They went and got courses with a barrel for the March trial and didn't tell anyone. Wasn't in the premium. Nobody expected it.
I share your opinion about barrels and the direction of NADAC. It is why I have moved over to USDAA, but sadly my wee one cannot handle the jump heights there so I keep playing NADAC for him.
I have plans to attend Champs this year with him and Sharon has sworn 2013 would not have barrels, but I'm not holding my breath on that one. I will throw a fit if that happens, though, as I'll be attending with a dog who's never seen one (the odds of my local club getting barrels even 1 day before they are required is slim to none).
Karissa, that's the trial we were at :) It was apparently a miscommunication between NADAC and the club but would bothered me is that it wasn't even mentioned at the briefing let alone an apology given. Then on Sunday we got to "vote" verbally but I think I was only one of 3 people who spoke no and I didn't want to be a bitch and bring up the fact that we were specifically told there wouldn't be barrels.
While there were no faults on the barrel, there sure were a lot of confused barking and spinning dogs. If it was any other organization I think at least 75% would have gotten a refusal. Dogs pick up the behavior of go around it very quickly, but driving to it would take much more experience.
I'm trying to enter Vito in more USDAA but I know NADAC has been great for boosting confidence. The corgi I'm afraid has no other organization to go to unless I go back to CPE which I just didn't particularly enjoy...
lol.... No wonder your dogs look so familiar. I'm just a moron, apparently. I started following your blog on the last action day and guess I never connected 2 + 2. ;o)
Well, I guess it's a good thing there weren't barrels sprung at more than one trial this weekend? I didn't see too much grumbling on Facebook about it, but the ones who did were fairly vocal.
Interesting that they let you guys "vote" on Sunday -- but not Saturday... But I'm not surprised there was no apology and that it went forward. Annelise is a very big supporter of EGC and thus, barrels. And that's fine, for EGC. I don't think it belongs in NADAC. There are too many hoops as it is (although I will admit, Kaiser really likes hoops...).
Don't worry Karissa, I'm painfully shy :) I believe we had a choice on Sunday because the course map had a hoop listed with the note that a barrel could be used instead at that obstacle. Since a hoop has more potential for an off course if the dog comes back through, I believe that is why people wanted the barrel.
I showed up on a whim at a day-of entry NADAC trial many years ago to practice weave entries and discovered they'd added the hoops to the standard and weavers courses. I sent Strum through the practice hoop a few times and he seemed to get it but when we got on course he came flying out of a tunnel, tried to jump over the hoop, didn't quite make it and hit the hoop sending it sailing through the air and it bonked me on the head.
Then I found out the hard way that NADAC didn't stake weave poles anymore as poor Strummer ended up on his side tangled up in the weave poles when they fell over while he was still in them. That was it for me with NADAC.
Wow, that barrel mishap is crazy. I can imagine there must have been some peeved people there. AAC used to allow a "crossover", a big huge honking piece of equipment with four long planks connecting in the middle, sort of like a four-legged dogwalk. It appeared at a fun trial once and people were definitely unhappy as most dogs had never even seen one. They ended up taking it off the course due to safety concerns. It's no longer an allowable piece of equipment, which is good news all around.
Anyway, good to hear there was a lot of good stuff out of the toller!
Nice to see the Vito had no problem with the barrel. He's a smart pup :)
Barrels are great for training, but I don't personally want to PAY to play on them in competition. With mine recovering from Sx and injuries the past year, I haven't trialed much, but am not looking forward going back to NADAC. Sadly, with the exception of a handful of AKC trials (an organization I disdain for non-agility reasons) there are no other agility choices for me.
My biggest concern with the barrels is that I'm not entirely sure they are as "safe" as Sharon likes to say they are. I'm sure they are fantastic on dirt or grass, but my local facility has some pretty awesomely crappy turf that dogs wipe out on frequently while doing gradual turns through a course over jumps or through hoops. If you try to introduce them to a new ground speed obstacle that they are expected to wrap tightly at speed, I just see strains and injuries happening from skittering and sliding. Yeah, not looking forward to it. Another thing to make my dogs hesitant about running full out.
The response I've gotten from some people is that I need to be more selective about where I trial. Well, if that's the case then I guess I won't be doing any more NADAC because I don't travel for NADAC anymore -- I travel for USDAA and that's all that's in my budget. Regardless, 95% of the trials available to me are on artificial footing, not dirt/sand or grass.