Mt Nittany Feb 2012

Just too busy lately to write much, but I'm so proud of my little Indy. She qualified for 2013 nationals in just a few trial weekends!

mysterious Indy

So, Indy has been a bit of a mystery. For pretty much her whole agility career she's bounced between beautiful, fast, independent weaves and no weaves at all. It just sort of cycles, lasting for weeks at a time. The last two trials were we at, no weaves. she gets the entry and at least the first six and then comes out somewhere, typically it happens when she's on my left and she always comes out on the far side of the weaves (away from me).

Massage therapist has scared me death, says she's a mess. Thinks it's related to a minor soft tissue issue. She's very tight in her right hip, which is causing almost her whole body to be a tight mess and she's thinks Indy's mental over the whole thing and worries about it possibly hurting, even when it's not.

Chiropractor found an issue with her lumbar adjusted it easily, doesn't thinks it's going to be an issue. He also thinks that's why she slips so badly when running on matting. I like his diagnosis better!

Bottom line something has been going on, Indy's a good girl, she knows how to weaves, I think she likes to weave, so there has to be a reason for this to keep popping up every so often.

2012 Agility nationals

Indy earned QQ # 6 a while back.....which means she's qualified for nationals and we're going!!

I went back and forth about it....should we, shouldn't we, are we really ready, will she do well, it's really far, it's really expensive blah blah blah, but I finally just stopped and decided, we are going.

It's almost always far away, what difference does it make once you get on a plane!
We are ready, she has just as good a chance as any other dog there to do well
I can't think of a better excuse to take a vacation
We still have lots of time to improve

Been busy

We've been busy lately. Not with anything out of the ordinary, just enjoying some cooler summer weather.

We took all of august off from agility trials, although I did a bit more training than I normally do.

I went to a Lanny Bassham mental management seminar. I've never been one to get nervous, I don't know if it's because of my years competing in gymnastics or performing in ballet. but when I'm at a trial it's all about me and my dog. I just try to do my job to help give them the best experience as possible. Making it fun and making sure they always know where they're going as quickly as possible......but I don't know that I'm the best at setting appropriate goals and really making a plan and working towards them. I also tend to be very hard on myself, and brush off compliments. I'm really working on improving this.

We had our first trial since our break last weekend, and I'm pretty happy with how we did. I took some chances with things, some worked, some didn't, but I think it's important to do things that are outside of your comfort zone. You get stuck in rut and really limit your dog if you let yourself be afraid to try new things, and now is a great time for me to try new things. Indy is still a baby, not even three, but really loving everything about agility.

I set a goal to improve our average yps in both std. and JWW and we made great progress. all of our Jumpers runs were over 5. yps, with one run being 5.6

We're going to try to go on a longer all-day hike this weekend and then we have 3 day trial next weekend.

Hoping for Fall to come soon. I love Fall!

conditioning VODs

I took advantage of a couple of the video on demand dvds that clean run has, strengthening your performance dog and stretching your performance dog. Both are pretty good, not so long that my short attention span starts to wander. There wasn't a ton in the strengthening one that was news for me. We already do most of the things listed, and I have to admit the section on "dancing" your dog kind of freaked me out. the dogs just looked like they were hanging on for dear life.....I'm not a professional, so I assume they were fine, although funny to watch.

The stretching dvd was great though. I've never done much of anything like this, so it was all new. watching it, I assumed no way would my dogs be too cooperative, but to my surprise so far they seem to really enjoy it. I've only done it with Indy and Abby, but Kittie's next. Both times I've done it, Indy's spent the next 30 minutes sprinting around the house/yard. stetching = a very frisky Indy.

Will have to see if it goes over as well at trials, there's a shortened version to use before & after runs included.

This, that & a QQ

Went to the golden retriever club trial this past weekend. It's held at my favorite trial venue, the Pittsburgh indoor sports arena. Field turf, LOTS of room around the rings and for crating, air conditioning, a creek to play in near by and it's only about 20 minutes from home. Sadly this was the last trial of the year being held there.

Indy picked up another QQ on Friday, we messed up our standard runs on both sat. & sun. On Sat. I front crossed at the end of the dog walk, (late I'm sure) and she didn't pick up on it and ended up behind me, and we danced around for what felt like 5 seconds with her behind me, not knowing where the heck she was supposed to go. Then she came off the table. On Sunday, I was too focused on her finishing the weaves (she did) that I had no idea where I was and pulled her off the correct jump. She did get 2 Ex B JWW legs though, finishing her MXJ title!!

Indy hurting her back has got me really thinking about conditioning, and proper warm up/cool down I always do a fair bit for conditioning, but I'll admit I'm not great about warming up. We just go from crate, walk around a bit, maybe do a few tricks, tug a little and off we go.....afterwards is just about eating a jackpot of chicken and then (whenever possible) getting away from the trial a bit to go chase her ball for few minutes, a short walk and then she sometimes hangs out with me for a little to watch agility or just goes back to her crate to rest a bit. Now I'm wondering if there are some specific things we should be doing, and there are a ton of things on the market to buy......this is big business.

I imagine the whole products for performance dogs is a relatively small market, but seriously there is a product for every possible problem you or your dog may have. Products to calm them, to perk them up, reduce stress, fix all manner of structural/muscular injury. You can set up a whole gym worth of equipment for your dogs. I'm not saying any of this is a bad thing, we've used a lot of these products, but some of it does bother me a bit. There's a vibe of "my dog doesn't like agility, so I need to fix it with special powders, drinks and pills" when rather it's probably a training issue or an actual physical problem. People get desperate though and our society loves a quick fix.

I'm off to shop for canine conditioning and stretching dvds. Now that I'm closer to 40 than 30, I find I need to stretch (when did this happen?)....so I guess it would be good for the pups too.

BFFs

Indy's best friend Callie stayed with us for a few days. This is pretty much how it went the whole time. They slowed down every once in a while....probably talked about hair care products.






Whenever there is a camera, Abby usually isn't far behind.


Look at ME I'm the cutest!