Our Best Rally Day Ever

What a great day Wyatt and I had with Rally yesterday. In Excellent, we got a 97 and 4th in a large B class. We had a couple of small problems with the first few stations and then things went fine. He went over - very briefly - in the initial offset figure 8 and had crooked sit a few stations later. I noticed that I did not get nervous at all until we were 2 dogs away. But I took some deep breathes and made sure to do my usual warmup. It does seems to help to:

Get there an hour early
Make sure the create is completely covered
Make sure his "brother" Patriot is there
Don't do much warmup and nothing right before we go in
Show him the treats he will get at the end of the run
Make sure we are connected at the start line

In advanced, the course was not bad at all and it was similar to Excellent so I felt very confident. I made sure to stay connected in the initial offset figure 8 and go as far from the bowls as possible. Once we sailed through that, everything was perfect, all straight sits and downs. I knew about 1/2 through that we had a 100 going or close to it. Rather than getting nervous, I felt happy and excited. When he did a straight front for a stationary front I thought we had a 100. Turned out to be a 99 but that's OK. I had a secret goal of getting a 99 or a 100 before we got our RAE.

It was thrill to get such a high score and high placements amongst all the BC's, labs, goldens, shelties, poodles, and aussies.

Check it out...