Dec 27-30 2018 AKC Trial

New Years Weekend
Rancho Murieta
Trial Chair: Terry Leclair
Trial Secretary: Kathie Leggett

TRIAL PHOTOGRAPHER’S WEBSITE

Erin’s website is HERE.

RESULTS

Class	Thursday	Friday	Saturday	Sunday
Standard	ThuStd	FriStd	SatStd	SunStd
JWW	Thu JWW	Fri JWW	Sat JWW	Sun JWW
FAST	Thu FAST	Fri FAST	Sat FAST	Sun FAST
Time 2 Beat	Thu T2B	Fri T2B	Sat T2B	Sun T2B

NEW CHAMPIONSHIPS!

Awards czar Pat White says: TRACS had 4 championships earned this past weekend to the best of my knowledge.  If we missed yours, get back to us:
+ Wendy Johanson and Loki, PACH
+ Johnene McDonald and Benny, PACH
+ Sharon Murphy and Link, MACH (TRACS member)
+ Yukari Nishimura and Simba MACH2
+ Gillian Norris and Zara, MACH

BEST NOVICE DOG AWARDS

The novice competition had winners in 5 out of the 6 categories.  The biggest field of competitors was Novice B large dog, with 14 in it.  The winners were:
+ Novice A Small dog: no entrants
+ Novice A Large dog: Pixie with Ginny Carlson
+ Novice B Small dog: Libby with Steve Smith (Libby was the overall high scoring dog in Novice across all categories, Liz Armstrong’s Brix was the second highest across all categories but was unfortunately in the same category as Libby)
+ Novice B Large dog: Tommy with Terry LeClair.  Tommy would like to thank whomever cleaned off the dogwalk after he demonstrated his new way to stick his contact.
+ Novice P Small dog: Hazel with Peggy Cheung (who didn’t know there was a competition when we told her she had won)
+ Novice P Large dog: Nolan with Joanne Prada.

TRIAL CHAIR TERRY’S THANK YOUS!

It was cold, it was unusually dry, but it was a lot of fun.  We had good numbers even with us being in the qualifying period for an east coast nationals so we should make the club some money when the numbers are finalized.

Many club members and people who should be members worked hard, we had the
the four ring crew chiefs Julie, Karen (who ended the trial running Harley’s Max on the very last run and did very well), Vickie and Sandy. 

The course builders Harley, Bill, Steve, Cathy, Nick, Marlene, Norm had the rings built on time and also pitched in with the extra ring clearings as we did extra watering to overcome the dryness.  We originally had one watering and dragging scheduled for Friday night and added and additional one to compensate for the ground getting bone dry.  We might repeat this again next year as watering on the first two nights built up enough residual water in the soil that the next two days were nice.  Turns out they don’t bill us for more watering and grading, its just the hassle of clearing the rings and building in the morning but the conditions are so much better.

The office crew with Kathie, Becky, Marlene (and I may be forgetting someone Mary?  Nicole?)

Awards with Pat White, Hospitality with Dorothea (the vanilla moist cupcakes were really good) and the Raffle with Georgia.

My illustrious co-chair Debby who was very helpful in keeping everyone moving and wants to repeat next year!!!.

We had Lorie with tag crafting (a few hundred crate tags were made) and arranged for the last day new years photo op with shelties wearing top hats and neck ties in a form of handler revenge for a bad dog walk and border collies assuming the camera was trying to steal their soul.

Penny did a really nice Nor Cal agility grand champion display, it will be interesting to see how big that gets in the following years.  I was surprised there were so many.  I suspect our region leads the nation.

It was also nice to see Lisa Halop out an about as a full time timer in the jumpers ring (the jumpers ring always gets first dibs on full timers – harder to staff down there) after her bad fall from the horse earlier this year.

And our trailer folk, Jim and Jan who worked hard all thru the trial and especially at the end.  You could hear periodic tool noise from the trailer as Jim has been reconfiguring for those lovely new Max 200 jumps (well all except for the ones in the USC color scheme).

And our judges, Karl Blakely and Cindy Blanton who had nice courses and were very pleasant.

Kathie and I chatted about the red Tracs awning and came to the conclusion it will be far more visible if we put it on the floor of the arena, probably between the rings at the front.  We just have to make sure we can get the watering truck from one ring to the other.  I’m thinking it will need more content than Tracs clothing.  Could be a wall of fame (Tracs dogs with high placements at Nationals, Invitationals or International competition???) besides the Grand Champions.  I’m hoping the board can figure out more content for it.

Kathie’s schedule worked. The rings ran very efficiently, we really only had minor waits and we didn’t change the schedule and get people upset.

We had good participation at setup with many club members helping (not so good at tear down though when we had a number of us with bad backs struggling with moving the sandbags and vowing we have to get some young people to join the club).

The equipment experiments worked.  The new shock absorbing teeters were a big hit (loaners for the weekend thanks to Heath Bar Ranch and Touch N Go) and the dog visible colored weave poles (and oddly enough they were there for the usual problem of white weaves against the white wall and the weaves were hardly ever against the back wall this year) had many positive comments and only a couple of detractors. 

And we still have to figure out how to point the PA system speakers so people can hear it at each end of the arena.  The alternative of me telling Patty Fornelli what to say so she can yell it out is too horrible to contemplate.

Next year the dates will be December 27th thru the 30th (a Friday thru Monday trial) and I look forward to all your help again next year.  It will likely that setup will be later on the 26th than usual and then followed by the club meeting rather than have the club meeting on Saturday night when everyone is tired and cold and sore.

Terry LeClair

TRIAL DOCUMENTS

Click HERE for the premium, closes Dec 12.
Click HERE for just the entry form
Click HERE for the Rancho Murieta Waiver
Click HERE for the New Year Trial Novice Program