I don’t have a lot of time today, tons to do before Tuesday, but I had to post this run from the weekend. Canada Cup was again fantastic.  My dogs were amazing, as a handler, I let them down in the early rounds but we pulled it together when it counted and won 3 of the 4 finals with (Feature won both 26″ Standard & Jumpers, Encore won Jumpers and was 2nd in Standard). I cued Encore way late for a turn in the finals so we lost almost a full second as Encore fell on her butt, but we still managed to come in 2nd.

Anyway, I will try and get course maps to post because, overall it was the best weekend of courses I have ever had the pleasure of running. The judges (Clara Theiss, Adrian Royakkers and Roger-Peirre Cote) set the bar incredibly high. Going to any other trial to run any other courses can’t help but be a let down after this weekend.

So back to this run. This is the finals of the Jumpers Classic at the Canada Cup. There were very few clean runs here (and they didn’t even call refusals, using Starters rules to encourage speed). In this jumpers run Encore demonstrates everything good that comes out of our training. From Susan Salo’s jump work, watch how she collects to turn so tightly yet manages to extend to bounce two jumps that no other dogs at the trial did (Feature bounced one of the but not both).  This is also a tribute to Greg Derrett’s handling system as I did not speak one word to her after the release from the start line. The dog understood all she needed to know based on my body positions and the cues it gave her.

When I  the course maps where handed out before the run I looked at it and thought, “wow, I have never seen a jumpers course without a tunnel before, how will that affect this dyslexic handler with only jumps as landmarks?” While running the course (it was the last one of the day) I thought, “man she must be tired because I am so far out in front, this can’t be a very fast run”. Once I watch this run on video I was speechless.

I hope this doesn’t come off as boastful, but I have had some great runs over the years but this one will be in my memory bank as my best so far.  Enjoy!

Encore & Susan winning the Jumpers Final

Today I am grateful for the amazing courses we got to run this weekend, thank you once again to all the judges and to Susan and Adrian for putting on the event.