2nd Trial-NOT the Charm

Oh dear. Friday Kane was a zippy Cardigan, enjoying his time in the limelight on the Jumpers course. I'm not sure what happened between Friday and Sunday, but Sunday we were in Carthage, MO for Syd and Kane to run a Jumpers run. Kane was up first, and well, he finished the course with zero faults, but there was that little problem of him being 20 seconds OVER course time. ARGH! It was painful, and it all seemed like slow motion. Well, it was slow motion. haa. We got to the weave poles and he would go through one and look up at me, smiling his mesmerizing smile, oblivious to the clock I could practically hear ticking in my head! I finally said to him, "Kane, we're going to run out of time, buddy!" and I heard people laugh from the sidelines. Well, good, at least we provided about 110 seconds of quality entertainment for the crowd!

There were only THREE dogs in 8 inch class, and surprisingly, they were all Cardigans! (Hi Ned, the blue merle, if you're out there) So, I moved Kane to the front, and had to run to get Syd while Ned ran the course. Syd, as opposite as possible from Kane, ran that course faster than I've ever seen her run a course. I don't know who that dog was, but she worked well out from me, she seemed to know the course without me even telling her, and even when she popped out of the weaves twice and burned LOADS of time because I had to figure out what direction she needed to go through, she STILL finished a full 8 seconds under course time. I thought I saw smoke rising from her path. Unfortunately, with a jump, tunnel, jump to go, Syd took a nasty spill coming over the back of a jump after a very tight turn. She tried her best, but couldn't correct in time and took the jump more than late. She took out the jump and herself, which got a gasp from the spectators, but without blinking, she was up and in the tunnel, and finished the course to huge applause from those watching. After our run, people came up to me and said things like, "Neat dog!" and "Wow, she's fast, that's pretty cool!" So I wasn't imagining her performance on Sunday, she was running like a fast, seasoned pro! Too bad for the bars down, but I have no complaints, I was thrilled with her performance and very relieved to know she didn't hurt herself during her less-than-graceful crash! More about Syd's Friday in Des Moines over on her blog later.... and my course maps scanned as pdf files this time, so operator error with the scanner, I'll upload them as jpg images tonight. :-) I really liked the Novice JWW from Carthage on Sunday. And obviously Syd loved it too!