The first thing I wanted to comment on was the GREAT atmosphere at this year’s AKC Agility Nationals. The picture of the judge’s laughing, smiling and waving really sums up the feel of the weekend!

What I consistently noticed was that exhibitors were friendly and supportive. There was a lot of laughing, smiling and cheering going on in the stands and just about everyone who sat down around me throughout the weekend made time to chat, joke and ask lots of great questions.

I heard one exhibitor say “This was my first time at the Nationals and it was such a positive experience.”

I also heard several folks specifically mention their interest and excitement at seeing the mixed breeds attend. These guys were popular to watch and were cheered on by their fellow ‘breed’ agility lovers.

The courses were GREAT! Nothing too technical, nice solid Excellent level courses and there was a ton of flow so dogs could work at full speed.

As for the AKC, first I need to say I’m a bit biased because I know the reps well (being one of their judges) and find this group to be a pleasure to work with. With that said, I was impressed with how positive, professional and helpful they were. I also found the ring crew and all of the workers to be so helpful, organized and incredibly patient. Without all of the VOLUNTEER workers, this event could NEVER happen so I want to publicly thank each of you for ALL of your help, time and attention. THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU!

Check back for more observation details…

It’s the last day of the 2012 AKC Agility Nationals and winners in each class will go home with one of the lovely trophies pictured on the left.

Today was the Hybrid Course, the Challenger’s Course and lastly, The Finals Courses. (Note: for information on scoring, placements, etc. click HERE)

I also had an unexpected surprise…I had another opportunity to run Luke, the Golden in the Hybrid round this morning! As a refresher, he recently started having teeter issues in competition and so my sole job was to get him on and then over the teeter obstacle.

If you saw yesterday’s video (check out yesterday’s blog post), I’m hoping you’ll notice the progress we made when you watch today’s video. Needless to say, both his Mom and I were SO PROUD of him and his progress!

Click here to view the embedded video.

If you’d like to see more videos and hear some additional items on the AKC Agility Nationals, stay tuned!

Day 2 of the 2012 AKC Agility Nationals and it certainly was an exciting day!

First, the friend I accompanied has been having on-going difficulties convincing her dog to take the teeter in competition (a problem that just started about 6 weeks ago). Luke CAN do the teeter and earned his way to the Nationals, so there is no doubt about that and his success is a priority.

So the plan for the day looked like this…she ran him in Jumpers and I ran him in Standard.

My sole responsibility was to achieve a teeter performance. Sounds easy, but first I was required to run a dog I’ve never had the pleasure to work with and second, I had to make the experience fun so that hopefully his confidence would increase and he would follow me through the steps to a successful teeter. Oh yes, and did I mention I’d have to run at a high altitude? lol

So here is a video of our run:

Click here to view the embedded video.

In the meantime, the Time To Beat (T2B) class was run and I was lucky enough to capture 2nd Place winner, Stacy Goudy and her red Border Collie Maze and their amazing 2nd Place run (video below).

Here is a link to the T2B Course Map.

Enjoy!

Click here to view the embedded video.

First impressions:

• The facility is wonderful. Tons of seating, lots of crating space, 3-rings in the main area and the 4^th ring nearby via walk through a short access tunnel.
• Excellent vendors – of course one of my favorites is Max200 where I purchased a new chute!
• Nice level surface.
• Tons of bathroom space and no lines!
• Everyone is so excited to be here and they seem to be having a fun time.
• I love that workers are pre-assigned and there’s no yelling “We need workers….”
• It’s easy to always find an AKC Rep to answer questions.
• The electronic scoring is amazing. Exhibitors have a bar code card that gets scanned as they enter the ring and their scores are entered electronically. To check a score, exhibitors just have to scan their cards to find out their score and how they placed in the class.
• For me, I get to visit with friends from across the country!
• As always, the dogs are amazing.
• The first day consists of a practice Excellent Standard course as well as a Time-to-Beat course where the winner of each class will earn an automatic buy into the finals.
• Great hotels. We’re staying at The Nugget which has a ton of restaurants, good food at a very affordable price and of course the benefits of casino living, such as slot machines. I gave myself $20 and have a won $60 so far.

There are several ways to enter so be sure to take advantage of this since each one counts as a separate entry! This includes Facebook, Twitter, Sharing with your friends, leaving a comment and more.

For complete rules (we’re keeping this one simple!), click here.

To the best of our knowledge, we are the FIRST agility DVD (possibly the first agility product?) to be featured in this highly respected retail pet business magazine.

To say it’s an honor to be included in this magazine is an understatement.  We are so excited to represent the agility community and to expose the general public to our positive (and successful) agility training methods.

Thank you Pet Age Magazine!

Click here to view the embedded video.

When the voting smoke cleared, the winner was…Spy Buehl!

Congratulations Spy! As a part of your prize, we’ll get you enrolled in our upcoming on-line 2on-2off Contact Training class and see if we can make those contacts a little more independent!

According to the AKC Agility’s In The Zone newsletter: “In 2011 the AKC® agility program reached a new record number of agility trials and entries for the 17th straight year, with 2,629 agility trials held and 1,040,071 entries recorded.” Now that’s a lot of agility runs!

Another interesting statistic that was shared by the AKC is that: ”2011 was also the first full calendar year that All American dogs competed in AKC agility through the new Canine Partners(SM) Program. 2,160 agility titles were earned in the second year of the program, with 29 dogs qualifying to attend the 2012 National Agility Championship.”

Want more information on the end of year rankings in the regular class, including statistics on specific breeds? Read the full article by clicking HERE.

OR

If you are interested in the AKC’s Preferred Class 2011 end of year rankings, click HERE.

As an AKC Agility Judge, I put a lot of thought, time and care into the overall design of my agility courses.

I diligently work to create universally dog-friendly challenges and especially to maintain safe angles and approaches to the various obstacles on my courses.

If I didn’t, I can guarantee that I would receive quite the earful from unhappy & concerned exhibitors, the club(s) who hired me would have a few comments and lastly, I would more than likely receive a note and/or a call from the AKC inquiring about my course(s) and the ‘feedback’ they had received on them.

In contrast, I’m always confused and baffled when I watch handler after handler encourage and create blatantly unsafe approaches to obstacles on a FAST course.

Simply put, why am I held to a high set of safety standards while handlers create, maintain and provide a much lower and far more dangerous path for their dogs in the FAST class?

More importantly, are these handlers aware of what they are doing?

Case in point, today I judged the above course. I was shocked when over 60% of the handlers, started with the #3 Double jump and immediately put their dog on the right side of the #8 a-frame. The path in red represents the dog’s angle and clearly indicates the lack of room, momentum and notice each dog had before they were expected to ‘climb Mt. Rainier!’

Worse yet, it didn’t appear that handlers were aware of the physical struggle their dog had to endure in order to complete their request. Don’t get me wrong, MANY folks did this sequence and did put the time and effort into shaping the dog’s path, but unfortunately, the majority did not.

The result was that I had to watch dog after dog physically STRUGGLE in order to please their handler and get up the a-frame. Some would say that I should have somehow prevented or discouraged handlers from being able to do this. Believe me, had I known handlers would take such a huge risk with their dog’s, I would have!

However, handlers have to face the facts and realize that most of our dogs would do ANYTHING to please us…including physically sacrificing their well-being in order to complete any task that we request of them. So when handlers fail to oversee to the safety of our dog(s), it makes me cringe!

Did anyone get hurt today? No, thank goodness. However, it does not negate the lessons everyone should live by, which is that:

1. Every agility handler is responsible for the safety of their dog. Period.
2. The FAST Class is not an invitation or an acceptance of sloppy handling.
3. Handlers are ultimately in charge of creating a safe agility path for their dog. Period.

So forget the accumulation of points and remember, your dog’s safety is far more important than collecting a bunch of numbers.