We have a ROCK STAR in our midst!

The SPURMINATOR ROCKED!!!!! He went 7 for 8, and his last NQ run was his BEST!! LOL! He was ON FIRE!!! He got better and better and faster and more confident each run. He was STRAINING to get into the building!!! He LOVED it there, he LOVED the energy, he LOVED the whole trial scene!!! He was ready, there is no doubt, he was ready. And, yes, I have some videos. Wish I had more, but in the Starters ring there are very few people and few I knew. I supposed I could do what some folks do and just shove my camera in their hands to film us. Maybe I will do that next time, it happens to me, I filmed several folks I didn't know over the two days. It's like that old trial rule........any unoccupied chair is yours until the owner comes along and anyone standing around looking bored is a potential filmer! It's a rule! :D

Anyway, this was his gamble on Saturday. He also got the gamble on Sunday, so this was his starter's gamble title. On to advanced gamblers now!! In this gamble I tried to practice what was going to be the course in his standard, which was A-frame, jump, dog walk....NOT the off tunnel, but little guy was going too fast and LOVES his tunnels. Tunnels are so low stress. Dog walks = stress. So, into the tunnel he went, but LOOK how happy he was!!! YAY!

OK, for some reason youtube is doing maintenance and will be up and running "soon", so for now this is all you get! Be cool, four more videos to come!

Oh and Roscoe? We sucked. I have to say we just sucked. And it happens that way with him. I don't know why, because each time I felt like we were "on" at the start and I have been working on doing better start line behavior. He looked pretty good at the start line, each time. Happy, silly, whining, ready to GO. Then we just fell apart. And when he starts to slow, I know it's happening, he's melting........he's worrying.....he and I fall apart. I am not good after that. I just mentally can't hang on and it's like a rock falling down a steep hill, it gains momentum. I melt, he melts, we become a mix match of stress and worry and he might finish up OK, but just OK. I give him his cookies anyway, because it makes me feel better and I KNOW it makes him feel better, but ultimately it sucks. All our hard work and we just can't hang on in the ring. ACK! He did get a jumper's Q and the Master's Gamble yesterday, which was really hard and really fun for him to get......wooohoooooo.......it was freakin' cool! Very hard gamble that many people could not get. Tiny 12" Roscoe did it with ease, good little man! Wish I had THAT run on film, darn it. I didn't bother filming him because we were so out of sorts and I don't like watching "out of sorts", but I shouldn't be that way, I should think more positively, give off better vibes to him, have better mojo.........what ever. It is what it is and it is hard to change my ways. I started to wonder if he was simply not happy with sharing the spot light with Spur Man? I am SURE that is part of it. I mean, he knows I am on cloud nine about Spur. He knows Spur is taking over the spot light. There isn't anything I can do about that, except recognize it, try to tell him he is as brilliant and awesome and my littlest Rock Star. I will try like heck to help him out. I know he doesn't like to share, but it is what it is. It was tough because several times my runs were at the SAME time, so I had to run one and run over and run the other right away. That is never good for me or the dogs. Plus, it was raining off and on and Roscoe hates dealing with the rain. He was cold, he's always cold. I kept running the truck, keeping it as warm as could be, but his legs and feet get wet in the wet grass and he gets cold. That is never good for him, even though inside it was dry. Still, once he gets wet the cold stays with him. Not his best trail, but he still managed to pull it together for that gamble, last run of the day yesterday. Good little gamble dog!!!!

OOoooh, I may have figured out how to capture the embed for the videos even though youtube is down.......This is the standard after the gamble. I just wasn't clear enough, dumb ass I am and he STILL took the off tunnel. He almost fell off the teeter, and I made NO big deal he missed that one jump on the closing. He was FLYING!!! I think the missed weave entry was the yellow cone. He just focused on it!! The white walls sort of blurred the weaves as he came over that jump and the yellow cone "spoke" to him. Watch his FREAKIN' AWESOME A-frame!!! Certainly his fastest in a trial! His dog walk contact got more and more "bouncy" as he got faster, but you will see his most AWESOME dog walk in his Friday's standard.


Friday's standard. You can see, not as fast, he improved each run and got more confident with each run! But, what an AWESOME dog walk!!!! WOW! Going so fast he almost over shot the weaves, but good little weaver hung on and nailed them!!! I can not BE more proud!!! -


Friday's jumpers I decided to practice two back crosses. Not our strongest move. We did fine. Back crossed jump before first tunnel and back crossed last tunnel. Good little Rock STAR!!! -


The facility is really nice. The grounds, um....not so much. Although, with a short hike down a very steep embankment, there is a lovely huge field to play with the dogs. And a pond, with a mean swan, but the pond has a "no" sign. No swimming, no boating, no fishing. It looks to be part of a small ice cream stand or vegetable stand that was closed now.
The drive sucked. Big time sucked. Less than three hours, but there is no easy way to get there. Going down was OK even with rush hour traffic around 495, but coming back my GPS took me about 12 miles through crappy little towns that gave me a headache. I don't know if another way would have been faster. Easy, probably. Plus, it was raining and that's always harder to drive in. And I didn't have a partner to drive with, so it was a long drive home. Got home just after 8 and we were all relieved to get out of the car! Phew!

Colby - she ran her pairs run well and looked great! She didn't have to do a teeter, which was awesome. The field turf and lighting was fine for her, yay!!! Jones had one little bobble/refusal, so we didn't q, but I am so happy she ran well and she seemed happy to do half a course. We will keep trying for that MAD. I want it with Jones. It means more to me, so if we keep trying and never get it, so be it. She was happy doing half a course, so I am going to keep doing that for a while. I sure miss running her! She's so smooth and easy. No worries, other than teeter and her sight, but really she is so smooth and easy to run. We are a team.

There was one major bummer about the event. Saturday morning I get a call that my dad's horse, Bob, was found dead in his paddock. Blood everywhere from his mouth, they think some sort of aneurysm? Freak thing. The vet had been there for spring check just a week before and they were all fine. Bob was only 7, one of his young Fjords he used on the farm. It's a total bummer. My dad is not a "spring chicken" and now only has the one other youngster for working the farm. It's a huge loss. It made me tired and sad for my dad. He sounded really tired. He had just finished burying him when I spoke with him. He said the hardest was letting Tim "pay his last respects". Tim was Bob's partner. They were a team. Very sad. This photo was taken a few years ago -