November 23, 2012 what a CATCH weekend!

I entered the Star City Agility Teams last trial they will ever have, I didn't know this at the time, but the three remaining club members have decided to shut down the club and stop holding this trial. Truly sad since I really enjoyed their very friendly trials.

So I get up early on Thursday morning (Thanksgiving) and head to Nebraska around 9:00 am. There was hardly anyone on the roads and it was an easy trip to Wahoo, except for the wind and the huge dust storms covering I80. I was rather shocked to see all restaurants/fast food places along the way were closed! Unreal, so I ended up picking up lunch at the only open place along the route... McDonalds (yuck)!

I arrive in Lincoln and check into the hotel and go into shock. The hotel smelled like cigarette smoke, body odor and a musty locker room! The room was really dingy and gave me the willies! They stuck me clear down the hall at the end with an exit door that was only used for emergencies! Really nice... not! So I had to walk a half mile every time I wanted to get something out of the car.

I get to the trial site at 8:00 am and I'm the only one there, since they are having a late start at 10:00 am the locals haven't gotten out of bed yet.

So the trial finally starts at 10:45 am, and I'm nervous. I've been here since 8:00 am, and we still haven't ran our first leg. Then I find out they have changed the running order and Fullhouse will run first. What? That is the main leg I came all this way to get, and we have to run it the very first run of the day. Good grief! So I walk the course, plot my path and hope Dolcenea is ready to Q!

We take off from the start line, run through the obstacles (and points) we need and fly to the table! Viola! Dolcenea did it, we got 29 points and only needed 23 to Q and she did it! Yippee! Dolcenea finally finished her CATCH!!! I can finally relax! At least I thought.

The next thing I know the gentleman crated next to me says "are you running in this?", I say which one is it and he says the second round of Fullhouse? What....? He says the gate steward is calling your name! So I yell I'll be right there, grab poor Dolcenea out of her crate and run to the start line! Off we go! One small problem... I never walked the course and I have no idea how it should be played. Oh well we're off and true to form Dolcenea follows mom around the course and we finish just in time to get 25 points and another Q in Fullhouse! Yippee. I guess I need to stop walking the courses before I run, because I run much better not having a clue where I'm going!

Next were two rounds of Jackpot, one traditional, one nontraditional. The traditional Jackpot run was fine, but the Nontraditional was a mess. I'm not sure what was going on at the scribe chair, but the scribe cheated me out of 11 points and poor Mike, I had to walk him through my run all over again using the course builder map. He remembered and changed my score, but what a mess. 

And finally at around 5:00 pm we ran our one and only Standard run.

For Saturday we completed two Snookers runs, and the first one was fairly easy, and Dolcenea Q'd easily. But the second round of Snooker really got allot of people and Dolcenea was one of a handful of dogs to Q, blowing out all of the bullet dogs. None of them Q'd on this Snooker course.

We ran another Standard run, and two Jumpers runs and Dolcenea did okay, she was rather tired from Friday's runs, but she was a trooper and stayed with mom and completed the task at hand.

So over all the trip was okay, the hotel sucked, but Dolcenea rocked! She Q'd 10 for 10 all first places and completed her CATCH. I am so proud of this girl, words cannot describe it. She is one amazing Akita!

June 2012 - CPE Agility Nationals held in Vancouver Washington.

Dolcenea "rocked" at the CPE Agility Nationals in Washington!!! She Q'd 8 for 9 with four 1st places and four second places. She was the only Akita to compete. She won High in Standard Level 5 AND 1st place in Games 20". AND she completed her 87th title STANDARD CHAMPION!!! It doesn't get any better than this!!!

Dolcenea High in Trial - Standard

Dolcenea High In Trial - Games 

Parent club discussion; No acknowledgement for this Akita

While I was at the Colorado Kennel Club agility trial this past weekend, I was talking with a friend who has a pedigreed agility dog, not a bullet dog, but an average agility breed. We were discussing agility and the difficulties of running with our different breeds when I asked her, does your parent breed club acknowledge your accomplishments in agility?

She responded, oh yes! With each title we achieve they’ve mailed me a very nice plaque with our name on it and a letter from the board telling me how much they appreciate my hard work in the event. I asked her what if the title you earn isn’t from the AKC? She said she didn’t think it mattered what venue you run in, our parent club appreciates all the hard work our breed exhibitors put into their dogs making the breed that much better.

I asked does your parent club acknowledge this information on their website, and she said yes, you can lookup my dogs information with pictures, titles and other accomplishments.

Then she said, I’m sure your breed parent club is absolutely thrilled that Dolcenea has, what is it now… 80 titles? I replied 83. She said don’t they have your stuff on their website? I said nope, they don’t acknowledge any of Dolcenea’s accomplishments in agility or anything else. She replied not even titles you’ve earned in AKC? I said nope, not even them. As her jaw dropped she replied... wow, that is a shame!

What else could possibly go wrong?

I entered a CPE agility trial in Boulder City Nevada being hosted by LVDICE over the weekend.  I left home at 6:00 am and was having a great trip until I made the HUGE mistake of stopping at the rest stop just north of Cedar City Utah.  Yes I noticed all five, I repeat five, large signs bigger than my truck making sure to inform everyone stopping that your pets are NOT welcome on the grass. Which is hilarious since the grass was all dead anyway.