December 04, 2011

2 down, 1 to go!

Dazzle made up for the mistake yesterday by getting a 1st place ribbon today!  I had meant to get a photo of him by the ring, but I wanted to wait till they removed the rally signs that were set up as soon as our class left the ring.  Then I forgot to get the photo after I was done helping with steward duty.  So I got this one in the living room of our two ribbons (from Friday and today)



Today's run didn't FEEL as nice as Fri and Sat, but when I looked at the video it wasn't as bad as it felt.  His nice Fig 8 heeling wasn't as nice and still had issues with the about turn.  But I'm VERY happy with his overall performace and attitude.  Only minor things to work on for the next Q.  And I'm looking forward to the next level because I think Dazzle will really like the dumbbell retrieve and the jumping. 

For the stays, I got him REALLY adrenalized with some vigorous play/tug before we went in.  I could tell when I first started to practice the sit stay a bit that he would have laid down again.  So I had to take the chance and see if getting him amped up would help.  It DEFINITELY did!  His sit was great!  He was a little bit more figity in the down, but I didn't see any moment where I thought he might get up.  This is great progress, because I know doing this (in the not too distant past) would have made him too amped up to work.

Because of how I thought the run felt, I really didn't expect to be in the ribbons.  There were 17 compeditors and a ring full of qualifiers.  So I was truely surprized when our number was called for 1st place!  Score was 193.5 (out of 200).

I got some great pro photos from our runs.  The photographer is great at capturing shots that aren't the usual heel, sit, finish photos.  Two made me laugh out loud each time I saw them, so I had to include those in the purchase. I'll post them as soon as they arrive.
I'm SO happy Dazzle likes to play these games as much as I do! :-) I promise buddy, the next level is more fun. Just need to get through one more Novice class!

VIDEO of today's run:
 http://youtu.be/yZzCOo2dSYU