Qualifier prep fun match #2

Today was Jumpers followed by Standard. The handling of the Jumpers course involved a lot of standing and pointing while the dog circled around, which neither Walter nor I get particularly excited by, so our enthusiasm level wasn't great. In fact, at one point Walter trotted between two jumps - oy! Oh and this was the type of course that not only had a lot of offcourse options, but also was really hard to remember - a lot of going over the same jumps and through the same tunnels again and again, so any momentary "where am I going again?" was rewarded by a guaranteed offcourse. If I'm not mistaken, all of us forgot where we were going, at least once. And, um, some of us a lot more than once. :-)

Standard: Warmed up first by putting him through the weaves once rewarding with his soccer ball. Then, secretly gave the soccer ball to the judge to throw for him if he did good weaves during the course. I thought it was a pretty straight forward course but he surprised me with an offcourse at the teeter. Looking at it after though it was no wonder since I had set him up at the startline looking staight at it. Anyway, he weaved great twice and got the surprise soccer ball reward both times. Good dog!

There was light rain during our first Standard and it started coming down more heavily during our second so it was a good opportunity to give lots of reward in the rain since going out and deliberately practicing in the rain isn't exactly the highest on my to-do list...

He stuck all his dogwalks and teeters today, what a good boy.

Oh but once again he (almost) flanked me, ignoring my front cross and heading for the wrong tunnel entrance. Interesting trend in him since we started practicing again after his foot episode.