02/19/2026
OK guys here’s the tea. You know I have to be real with you on my failures as much as my successes and last weekend was a pretty big failure. My perfect boy is a little bit older (4) and because of that, I wanted to get these early trials out of the way, and try to qualify for something in the fall. Though one regionals was just rescheduled for September (yay!😂) the previous dates were too early and the only way I could qualify for anything other than a club trial in fall was to try for WDC. Otherwise we wouldn't be competing for another full year, making him 5 years old at the start of our career together.
It was a big ask to be ready (he's only had 14 months of training) for all 3 of the trials plotted and I wasn’t sure it was possible, but that was truly part of the fun. The biggest push would be in protection, really starting to put together the routine at the beginning of January. We put everything into it and I really believe we would’ve passed. These early performances wouldn’t be our best, but at least might allow us to compete this year.
We weren’t ready now, but we thought we could be ready then.
The thing when you’re cramming, little things fall through the cracks. You're probably gonna miss something. While Trigger likely would have gone over the jumps if I had set him up closer, a last-minute decision to place him a few more paces away than we had been practicing, resulted in a hole being shown.
One element, many points.
There are not many dogs going for their IGP 1 that have no training holes, the key is to not expose them during the trial, which is what I did. Proofing the direction around the jump isn’t rocket science and it’s a standard foundational skill that I teach with puppies. It’s just not something I’ve done thoroughly with him. Well... now I have because it’s a few days later and obviously that’s the first thing we did when we got home 🫠 (very very low jump but tough competing reinforcers)
The judge failed us with 68 points, all 30 jump points gone. Because of a recent collision on an escape and two weeks off protection only 4 weeks ago, it was not optional to continue in the trial if there was even a slight chance that he avoided the jumps due to physical discomfort. We pulled from the trial. Failing is never fun, but almost anyone who’s done this long enough has had it happen. Luckily, with enough time to lick your wounds and cry to friends, humans have a great way of finding the rays of sunshine among the clouds and turning most negatives into a positive. This has reminded me to put more emphasis in the Trained to Trialed course with regards to the IGP 1 jumps and will make the content of the course even more meaningful to those learning.
Last weekend was tough, but this amazing dog showed me that despite his mom’s crappy attitude, lack of preparation, and clearly things to work on, he showed some really beautiful pieces and I’m proud of us both. Love this dog so so much 🥰🥰🥰
