Weekend Update from Splash N Dash

I had a fun weekend. LuAnn and I stayed at the Clarion, it was about 9 minutes away from the Pittsburgh Indoor Soccer Arena. There is a decent restaurant on site and we are always thrilled to go back to the hotel, shower and NOT drive to get good food and a beer. Our dogs really enjoyed playing with each other in the hotel. Those of you who know Gusto well will be shocked to learn that he will, in deed, play with Jack.

Gusto ran really nice most of the time this weekend. There were only 2 runs were he was a maniac and not paying attention - Standard and Grand Prix on Saturday. I was very happy with the rest of our runs though. Still no Q in Standard - dropped 2 bars on Sunday. One was me talking to him and the other one was him cutting too close to the standard.

He has his second Q in Steeplechase at 26 inches for 2009 Nationals. I can now focus on Grand Prixs - he needs 2 and then I can drop him down to 22 and get those Qs.

On Sunday, Denise Thomas with Zippity (first litter of Mayhem x Credit) was in the other ring running her young dog, Zacchary. Love him!! She didn't get a chance to walk Snooker and she doesn't like that event anyway and asked if I would run Zippity. I said YES! So I told her my plan for Gusto and she thought it would work for Zip too. We moved Zip to the beginning of the 26 inch class so I would have time to warm G up for his run.

I warmed Zip up, making sure she was happy to work with me. Zip will work for anyone, she is an agility whore. I took her in and off we went. WHAT A RUSH!!! She runs almost identically to Gusto but is a bit less responsive to my come in cues becuase Denise doesn't use RFPs. I did all 4 reds, 3 7s and finished the course in 45 ish seconds. I was thrilled when I came out of the ring and Zippity was as high as Gusto gets on a good run. I handed her off and went to get G.

Next up, Gusto's turn. Same plan and he ran it flawlessly. He was tigher than Zippity because I worked those turns better knowing how wide Zip had gone. He kept all his bars up and went exactly where I wanted and we finished the course - 2.5 to 3 seconds faster than Zip. I took first place with Gusto and second place with Zip and got 2 Supers Qs. Denise didn't tell me this but Zip needed a Super Q for her ADCH. Glad I didn't know that going in. Denise will get another one though so she can celebrate the ADCH for herself.

I then had to go walk Steeplechase Round 2 and run G almost immediately after the Snooker run. He was hot and I was still winded. He ran beautifully but dropped 2 bars and ticked the broad!! I was irriated with him to say the least. Took him outside and he had to go potty! UGH!

Anyway, we had a great weekend and finally got some successful runs under my belt at 26 inches!!