Riley's First AKC Agility Show!

We did it and survived! Our first agility show was a blast! And not only did Riley and I have a ton of fun, we even earned some Q's! Going into the show, my only real expectation was to not have Riley run zoomies around the course. Which at some points I could tell he was fighting them off!

Day 1 was nerve wracking and COLD! Which didn't help with my shivering! I got there in plenty of time and got Riley measured, then my friends talked me through some of the finer points. The first course of the day for me was, Novice A JWW. I walked through the course over and over, and was having trouble figuring out how to get to the weaves, which was a really tight right turn. I got my game plan and went to get Riley and in literally no time I was up, my knees were shaking (and not from the cold) and I walked to the start line.

I decided to do a big lead out, as I had planned to do a front-cross at jump 3, but I was nervous and you can see in the video, I all of a sudden go, "oh yea! move!". The first sequence was good, but then Riley caught a whiff of Daddy in the stands and decided to go say hi! I called him back and had a good second sequence, then came the weaves. We tried our 3 times and just couldn't get it, so the judges called for us to move on. The 3rd sequence was awesome (you can kinda see him fighting the zoomies here). We NQ'ed but I was so stinking happy! We ran our first course and didn't look like idiots!

Our second run of the day was Standards, and I felt much better, I wasn't as nervous and had the first run jitters out of the way. My only hope here was that he would hit his contact and again, not run out of the ring. And just in case Riley decided to say hi to Dad again, I had hubby video from the elevated booth above the arena. Riley did AWESOME, he even got the weaves! We had a few little blips, but we earned our first Q and even a first place!!!!

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Day 2 was so much better! Riley and I both figured out what we were doing and both were a lot more confident! Again, our first run of the day was JWW, and wasn't as nervous as the previous day, but still nervous. When they started I was suppose to be dog #7, but there were a few absent and a couple who were late. There was one 24" dog and then they called me to the line since I was there! Yikes! I got Riley lined up and waited for the jump height to be change, and off we went! We had a couple refusals, Riley doesn't seem to like/understand rear-crosses yet, so I got some spins, but other then that we had a wonderful run! With our first JWW Q and a 1st place!!!

Next was Novice STD. Over the course of the weekend, with each run, Riley was more and more focused and that was no different for this course. This was our best run of the weekend, earning us our 2nd STD Q and another 1st place!

This weekend, Riley and I earned 3 Q's and three 1st places! We had so much fun and learned a lot! Thank you, to all of you who gave me words of encouragement and support! Our first trial was a blast and I could not have asked for more from my awesome dog, Riley! I am so proud of him! I can't wait for the next trial!

End of day 1 after earning his first STD Q and 1st place!

Riley earned 2 Novice STD Q's and a Novice JWW Q!

Also, in earning our first Q, we earned our club crate sign and shirt!

Ready or Not

Okay guys, this Saturday and Sunday can way too quick! Ready or not, this weekend is Riley's agility debut, and I am so nervous! I thought I had my nerves under control, but the more I think about it, the more I think," Oh shit! We are really doing this!". I know the nerves never really go away, but still.... I don't like them. I think the only thing really keeping me from going into total panic mode, is the fact that I will have my husband and my whole group of agility friends there to help me.

I signed up for Novice Standard and Novice JWW both days, and I am pretty confident in our ability to run the courses, IF I can keep him focused, if I got, that then I think we may have something. I am not expecting to Q, but if we do, awesome, all I am hoping for is a somewhat collected run. I am going to make sure I get there plenty early, so I have time to set up, get Riley measured and most importantly, calm down.

Besides being busy with worrying about our first trial, work, and life, the other reason I haven't posted in a little while is because, we bought a NEW CAR! Well, certified pre-owned, but basically a new spankin car! Now I have a proper dog car! I LOVE it! And we got it just in time for our first trial. Going from my little Corrolla to the Pilot takes some getting use to, I just have to remember I now have a bigger kuboos, although the back-up camera helps a lot!

This will most likely be my last post until after the weekend, and come next week I should have a few pictures and videos to share! So until then I leave you with some cheesy, posed, fall pictures of Riley and Grace.

Agility in Real Life

Today Riley and I saw our first agility trial in person! Up until now, I have only seen agility on TV and what we do in class. It was so awesome it actually be there, even if this was just a small trial.

Now, I apologize in advance for my lack of agility terminology :) I'm new to this whole world LOL. The trial we watched was a CPE agility trail held in Santa Fe, TX. The runs I watched were Standard and Jumpers. The atmosphere there was very friendly and relaxed. Everyone would cheer for each dog after a run and I even got to meet and talk to people. I got to see how a trial works, the different height classes, and different types of runs.

Here are some pictures I took during the Standard run.

Even this young girl could do it! Gives me hope about Riley and I LOL

These pictures are from the Jumpers run. All I could think of during these runs (besides how much fun they looked) was I BELIEVE I CAN FLY! :)

This Lab was so cute. She was just an old girl having some fun :)

So Riley, what do you think? You think you wanna do this?

"Do I wanna do this? Bah ah ha ha ha! What a silly question."

 So this was our adventure today :) Everyone did great and it was just an all around fun place to be. I look forward to the day when it'll be Riley and I out there!