We went back to trialling on the weekend. It was a 2 day event with the Goulburn club in country New South Wales.

While the weather was slated to be freezing cold and wet, it was actually beautiful. We had cooler weather than Sydney, but not freezing. The rain held off until Sunday afternoon, and wasn’t too bad when it did arrive.

Are we there yet?

As the first full trial back after 3 months of not trialling, I’ve taken the approach of “trialling = training runs”. This has helped Jaxon relax around the event, and he is a much happier dog. He doesn’t bark as much, is happy to sleep in his crate between runs, or walk around and check out what’s happening.

All up over the weekend we had 7 events entered. A good chance to have a run & put some practice to purpose.

We walked away from the weekend extremely happy and high energy thanks to the fun we had. And the bonus of a few brags.

In AD and JD, we missed the mark, but Jaxon seems to prefer the harder courses as we ran clear in RQH Jumping, and missed the ADO by over-running one jump!

A huge thank you to our friend Belinda – who also runs a papillon (Luc) – as she gave us such brilliant tips on handling a little doggie around a hard course!

On Sunday we had our first go at strategic pairs. Again, a huge thanks to both Mikhail and Eddie for brilliant tips on Strat Pairs and running little dogs!

Three little muskateers. Jaxon, Fleur & Pepe

Nga & Pepe, Jaxon & I managed 3rd place out of all heights in the Novice ring! Not too bad for a first outing. (may be difficult to follow up, though!)

The Snooker ring wasn’t Jaxon’s thing. He decided to wee on the first jump, so I disgracefully left the ring 😦 Better make sure he’s empty next time!

Finally we came to the last run of the weekend – Novice Gamblers.

The rain came down just in time for the run. I knew Jaxon would hate running in the rain, so I really revved him up & started running with him to give him a good chance. While we didn’t accumulate enough points for a clear round, he ran beautifully, did everything I asked of him. Yes, everything! Even the gamble!  It was a tunnel, tyre, jump, jump. He just ran straight out of the tunnel & down the line so well!

So even though we didn’t walk away with a qualie – it was the best qualie ever in my mind! Jaxon had a blast, was soaking wet, and got the big treat rewards he deserved.

A bit wet, Mum

So now we look forward to just having fun at agility, and nothing more. That seems to work really well for us 🙂

Happy agility peeps

Thanks to the Goulburn Club for a great trial, all the hard work from their members, the fabulous judges who had brilliant courses (except maybe Snooker – the turns were crazy!), all the other competitors & doggies for making it a brilliant & fun weekend!