Fetch Gate Trial

They say it takes a year to really get with a new dog...we had a good reminder of that last weekend at Fetch Gate. I also learned that driving myself 10 hours for a weekend dog trial is just too much for me to handle, both physically and mentally. Temps were in the high 90s all weekend, making things that much more unpleasant. And I had a nice headache going from the time I pulled in Friday night til pulling out Sunday evening. Grr.

We drew up deep in the order both days, running in the 60s on Saturday and 59 Sunday. I need to learn how to stay focused for those late afternoon runs...I seem to have trouble with this and I'm finding that I'm exhausted by the time I even get on the field. Maybe it will be better when I have more than one dog to run.

Saturday I felt like a zombie at the post. My timing was off, and Rae was reacting by being slicey and over-flanking. I don't really remember the run, which is weird for me since I usually have quite the photographic memory. I think we saved the fetch in time for the panels, missed the driveaway, banana'ed the crossdrive to squeek through the panels, sloppy line to the pen but made it. We fooled around a little in the shedding ring before I called it quits. It was very tricky shedding, we ran a ewe and two lambs and ALL of them were totally glued to the person. Rae got wider and wider and hotter and hotter, so we gave up.

Sunday was better but I still feel like I handled very poorly. Missed the fetch panels, but had a perfect turn at the driveaway (looked like the sheep just pivoted around the inside panel!). Part way through the crossdrive I had a huge mental lapse and blew a down whistle for Rae. Doesn't sound so bad, except I know that 100% of the time in practice she takes it as a comebye instead of a down...so of course she took it as a comebye. That was at a critical moment and the mistake caused the sheep to run hard for the exhaust. Rae caught them, but it took a great deal of work to get them up and moving again. This is not one of Rae's strengths, and the ewe was very unimpressed by Rae's attempts to turn her. They were a good 150yds away from me, and I could see Rae looking to me for help. I cheered her on, flanked her, asked her up, working for maybe 30 seconds before she finally got that ewe turned. I tried to put them back on line, but too much precision took our momentum away, and they stopped again. So then I just had Rae bring sheep however she could, and that good girl did! We worked a bit at the pen, then headed to the shedding ring with about 40 seconds left. I fiddled around for a little setting it up, then threw out the Hail Mary by running straight at a lamb. Rae came flying in for an impressive full point shed with only a few seconds to spare.

I was less than happy with our performance for the weekend, most of it my fault, but I was very proud of Rae for hanging in there when she was having trouble. I was very close to giving up on her, but I'm so glad that we hung in there. And for her to keep her cool to get a difficult pen and shed made it all the sweeter. We had many compliments on our shed, as they were few and far between for the weekend, so I am super proud of that achievement.

I did get to visit with friends that I don't see often, so that was great. The rest of the trip wasn't so great, though. On Friday morning I met Sue at her field to work my young dogs before leaving for NY. I took a couple good hits when working Livy, one of them was quite spectacular, actually. I got hit on the side of the knee, went airborne, and rolled over one complete revolution before hitting the ground. I felt like a stuntman in a movie who gets hit by a car and rolls over the hood.

Somehow Gabe managed to put a gash in his leg, so I ended up at the vet clinic where I used to work getting it stapled. I'll need to add something to the first aid kit for lacerations, I didn't have anything to patch him up.

THEN when we got back to Dad's on Sunday night, the dogs got locked in the car with the windows up. Of course it was Sunday AND 4th of July. I hate the VUE and I don't know why it does this. I was literally walking around to let the dogs out when I heard it lock itself. We worked for awhile with a neighbor and finally got it opened by lasooing the lock with a twisted coat hanger.

THEN on the way from PA to VA I got pulled over for speeding. I was driving with the flow of traffic but happened to get singled out for being out-of-state. Ironic in that I've lived my whole life in PA til last fall. The rest of the trip was painfully long since I had to drive the speed limit.

It was good to finally get home after such a long weekend.