I have to say, I was a little bit giddy during the day at the thought of getting to run Tangle on his very first fun run. It was kind of like a first date in a way. You know all the prepping (year long training), anticipation, and finally you get to go on the date.
I had no expectations going into the run. I just knew that what ever happened I would come out of the experience with work assignments. If he ran perfectly, I would take him to another fun run, but one with a little more energy. If he had all sorts of issues, I would analyze those and come up with a training plan to fill in the gaps that had been exposed.
In short, it was a great first date! We ran a 18 obstacle Jumpers With Weaves course. The courses wasn't a gimme. It had some advanced lines of motion. My plan for running him tonight was to support him as best I could. I wanted to run him conservatively, let him extend and just gain confidence. The course was a little difficult to run without too many sends and front crosses.
Tangle did a really great job. True to his nature, he was a little reserved with a the new experience. He hadn't been in this particular arena a lot, so it was a perfect place to dry run some skills. He had a marvelous start line, followed my line of motion beautifully. Beautiful balance between handler/obstacle focus. Hit his weaves every time (straight on entry). The spin after the tire was because I didn't want to front cross a tire with such a young dog and I kind of cued a rear cross, ops.
Really, really proud of my boy!
Next run I will pace him a little bit faster and see how he holds up!
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