USDAA nationals - Day 2 and 3

Day 2 is a bit of a haze to me at this point. It's been a long and hot 3 days. On Thursday we had Team Jumpers and Team Snooker and Icon was awesome in both of them. Team jumpers had a tricky broadjump/tunnel spot that really worried me, but we managed to muddle through it. Apollo was really good on that course too.

I tried for 3 7's in snooker for both dogs. It was a really tricky course for that. Apollo dropped the 2nd red and I had to figure out how to save that. I managed to get to the correct 3rd red but only got through 6 in the close. Icon got through the close, but it wasn't pretty!

Day 3 started out with a bang, or more like a spray, when I was sitting at the dinette in my RV and suddenly heard a "hissssss" sound. I opened up the access to my water heater and my pvc pipe had sprung a leak. So I rushed outside and turned off the water. I tried turning on the pump for the water tank and the spray started again too. So I was totally without water and didn't get my shower :( Thankfully I ran in to Ken Nevarre and asked him to take a look. He told me that to fix it I should get some copper tubing and hose clamps and it would be as good as new. It was first thing in the morning and I had my walkthroughs and runs and so many other things to think about, so I decided to wait until I was done for the day to fix it.

So I went on with my day. I had Apollo's PSJ first in the main ring and got lost and sent him off course :( It was such a shame because he was moving so well. But it's tough getting into the finals so he probalby wouldn't have made it anyway. Next was Icon's Steeplechase run, which was the "same" course in a different ring. The courses were actually totally different, which is why I messed up Apollo's run (haha, I can tell that to myself...). But Icon was really good and we finished that run in 2nd place. I think we hung onto that spot all day (maybe we dropped to 3rd). Yay!

Both dogs were good in team standard but Apollo dropped the first bar. I got lots of compliments on Icon's standard run, but we ended up in 8th place or something like that. Not so good! My story is that I held his contacts, and I'm sticking too it ;)

Polly ended the day with his pGP semi run. He ran clean, but not so fast. It was hot out! I couldn't figure out if we made it to the finals or not, so I figured I would just check when they put up the running order.

I decided then it was time to make the trip to the hardware store to see if I could fix my rv and get some water. I had tons of dishes to wash and needed a shower. BAD. A friend offered to drive me and I took her up on the offer happily. I returned back with some coppper tubing and clamps. On my way back to the rv I passed by the main rain to see the running order and noticed that Polly's name wasn't there. Oh well. I continued to my rv and single handedly FIXED the plumbing in my RV!! I now have water! And can shower!

I was sure this was the highlight of my day, but as I was preparing to have some dinner and go down to watch the finals, I hear them announce on the PA, "Channan and Apollo please come to the main ring" (they also called for Dave and Tahoe, but this is a story about me!). Apparently there was a miscalculation in the original running numbers and Apollo (and Tahoe) were in the finals after all!

Ok, I'm tired of writing. But the moral of this story Polly came 3rd in PNS finals! Woot! Maybe I'll write about the experience later, but I'll probably just post the video. Pictures speak way louder than words (especially mine).