Hi, All:

I just wanted to post a little brag. We went to a NADAC trial last weekend and did pretty well for ourselves. The trial was held in a large indoor sports complex and there was a volleyball tournament going on at the same time, so it was extremely noisy. I resorted to Rescue Remedy for Dusty--the first time in a long time. "Soft" Libby seemed to take the noise more in stride.

Easter weekend was our first NADAC trial since New Years. At that trial, Libby earned her first Elite Jumpers Q in a year. This weekend, she Q'd both days in jumpers with a 1st and a 3rd. She also Q'd in one Elite Standard run each day with a second in each. Lib was doing so well, I decided to try running her in Elite Tunnelers on Saturday. Libby barks constantly on course, so this time I told her to bark her head off. Unfortunately, she had way too much fun and managed to take three off-course tunnels :-)

On Saturday, Dusty Q'd in only one run out of six--Elite Jumpers. However, his SLS were good. If he stood, he at least sat again on a verbal command. Our jumpers run was one of the best we've had. I was forced to take a four jump lead out and he held that SLS just fine. Also, the course ended with a line of jumps which Dusty took without a single look back at me. A real improvement! Although he ran at 6.38 yps, we only garnered a 3rd. Our contacts were much improved. He self-released from the AF on our second run Saturday, and I made him come back. Knocked bars and agruments over tunnels seemed to cause most of our NQ's. I finally figured out that if I was standing at a tunnel entrance, Dusty would not enter without an argument. The boy needs his space. The jump bars, who knows--probably handler induced, but I had no one to video for me.

Sunday, Libby had a Q and a 2nd place in Elite Standard and a Q and a 3rd in Elite Jumpers. We are now just 25 points short of 1,000 lifetime points. In the standard run, Lib saved the day by taking the weaves that were in front of her. I had lost presence of mind and wanted her to take a totatlly off-course tunnel. Since she saved the run, I bantered with her continually as we took the rest of the course. I'm sure the judge was amused. In the second standard run, I tried using a minimal amount of verbage to see if she would bark less. She still barked, but we were doing well until she decided to spin and bark before the last jump. Then she ran past it, came back to me and crashed thru it. Most un-Libby-like.

Dusty's Sunday was most excellent. His Q rate went up to 50%. He received his first Elite Standard Q with a fourth place in spite of having to restart in two sets of weave poles on the course and barking at me over entering a tunnel. Our second standard run was much smoother. I decided to try keeping my distance from him on the contacts and the tunnel entrance and it worked well. Unfortunately, he knocked the bar on the second jump at the start. Our second Q was in Elite Jumpers with a third place. This was Dusty's third leg for his Elite Jumpers title. Our third Q was a first in Open Weavers. This is Dusty's first Q in OW, and I firmly believe he was only able to do it because it was the 12th run of the weekend and he was a little more willing to slow down for his weave entries. Luck for me, too, because I got to the startline and couldn't remember where the course went after the fourth obstacle. Luckily, Dusty was running just slow enough that I could read the cones.

Rose