At the Northstar Working Group Association agility trial on July 25 and 26th in Burnsville, Ace, Mellie and Ripley tried to get some more qualifying runs. Abby was in heat and thus, ineligible to be entered. We had a mixed result week-end with just a few qualifying runs and only two placements.

Mellie had some great runs, but a few errors on her standard runs, so she only ended up with 15 MACH points for the week-end. She did get a third place finish in one of her Jumpers runs. She definitely is picking up some speed, so that is a welcome change.

Ace qualified in one of his Jumpers runs, earning a few more MACH points. He had some trouble with his last Open Standard run. The first obstacle, a tunnel, proved to be too irresistable to rush through. He decided to lie down and roll around inside the tunnel. Terry wisely met him at the other end, and carried him off the course. No goodie bag of treats for that memorable run!

Ripley, in only his fourth ever day of trialing, managed a wonderful Open Jumpers run, not only qualifying, but taking first place to boot. He weaved all 12 weaves like a pro. I was not only speechless, but wondering… “who was that dog??” By Sunday afternoon, he returned to true form, making his Standard run a unique course. No contact obstacles, two chutes, bypassing jumps and generally “doing his own thing”. Back to the drawing board!

Overall, we had some good moments, but we did not need a trailer to haul home the ribbons!!

At the MAC agility trial on July 11 and 12 in Burnsville, Ace, Abby and Mellie cleaned up the place!! Bringing home some impressive ribbons and racking up these awesome statistics:

2- Double Q’s (by Mellie) She now has all 20 Double Q’s needed for her MACH title. Just need to get some more points!

4- New Titles
(Ace: FINALLY got his Novice Standard title, and also his Exc. A. Jumpers with Weaves title… So add NA, and AXJ to his name!)
(Abby: FINALLY got her Open Standard title, and also her Novice F.A.S.T. title… So add OA, and NF to her name!

8-Placements (three first place finishes, two second place finishes, 1 third place finish and two fourth place finishes)

13-Number of qualifying runs (out of a possible 15)

64-MACH points: Mellie-43 Abby-14 and Ace-7 (his first MACH points ever!)

Needless to say, it was a fun and very productive week-end. Long days but rewarding. To say that Terry and I were ECSTATIC when both Abby and Ace completed all their teeter obstacles is putting it mildly. Our next trial is in two weeks and Ripley will be getting a go at some runs as well.