Agility Day 2

Beth Godwin presented an incredible set of Standard courses today but our GSPs didn't do as well as the Colorado Community. I thought it was a course with flow and fairness and allowed our large striding dogs to move out. As the morning wore on GSP after GSP fell to a simple mistake or a "fun run" without a Q. But we were fortunate to have at least one Q when Nancy Wards CH Newpoint Southwind Let it Snow RAE JH managed a 100 with a time of 59.07 and a Second Place in Novice B. That was it for Standard.

The JWW course appeared difficult to me but in reality a rather high Q rate was recorded for this class. I asked Judge Beth Godwin about this and she pointed out the dogs "line" was away from the most difficult options, so although the course looked tough, it ran much cleaner. We again had a single qualifier with Sandy McDonald's Berlin's Bonuse Points v Hawkeye CDX RE NA managed a Second Place in Novice B JWW with some time faults and a score of 96 at 42.94 seconds.

This was a great day with a lot of cheering and happiness. Although only two GSPs qualified throughout the entire day, our competitors had fun competing, sharing stories, and cheering on my local community which exhibited their normal extraoridnary skills in this sport.

Our morning started with rain but cleared to blue skies where the majectic Pikes Peak, over 40 miles away, broke through with a bright white vista across the western horizon. As the day wore on the clouds moved back in and we had heavy rain during much of the late afternoon -- very unusual for Colorado (it is normally snow :-) )!!

I must say that our club presented itself well to the regional competitors -- time after time I would hear comments about the athletic GSPs, how strong they are, how enthusiastic they are, and how driven they are. We were bombarded by small birds in the afternoon, including a full out point by one of our Novice A competitors to the delight of the local agility community.

Again our ribbons were commented on, and the efficiency of the trial resulting from my trial committes hard work throughout the day. I peraonlly had a great time and am proud of the face the GSPCA presented here -- we did well folks!

Tomorrow is GSP only day and I had competitor after competitor with other breeds offer to help at our Monday trial -- isn't agility great.

I'm looking forward to Judge Beth Godwin's courses tomorrow, including the FAST class which we did not offer at the all-breed trials. It should be another fantastic day.

I'm hoping the crappy weather hangs around through Tuesday for the tracking dogs (this moist cloud cover is perfect for tracking) and that we have the clouds disappear and the sun return for the main NSS events starting on Wednesday.

I'll report on tomorrow's trial in the evening tomorrow. Now I'm going to download some pictures for the PerformanceGSPs list and for Missy -- will be blogging with you tomorrow night!

Dave

David Nauer

GSPCA 2009 NSS Agility Trial Chairman