Carbon Defies Gravity to Win SKC Jumpers!!

Well, this Pood just wowed me with her efforts this past weekend!!! SKC (Singapore Kennel Club) had two trials in one day -- one in the morning and one in the afternoon.

Her first Jumpers run was SO fast and fun and precise -- she was on fire!!! -- but I ran the wrong course (totally missed a tunnel) so we did not Q. This loss made me sad as Carbon was awesome, really wonderful, and the mistake was totally my fault -- she did exactly what I asked her to do, but I asked for the wrong thing! A humbling reminder to relax and PAY ATTENTION at all times on the course.

Our team members Darren and Sparkie won it, though, so I had some consolation as they REALLY did have a wonderful run and deserved their win.

Our Agility run in the morning was correct -- slow but steady, and still within SCT so we did Q (but no official placing - we actually came in 5th by points).

Our Agility run in the afternoon was...well, it had gotten quite hot, and I took Carbon out too early...I knew it too. She was very hot, and after the first 3 obstacles tried to run into the shade to lie down! I called her back and she finished but the 'refusal' cost us time and earned us faults, so no Q.

I walked her for a few minutes so she could cool off a bit, took her back to our tent, iced her down, and put her back in her pen to rest. I kept her quiet till it was time to run again.

It rained just a little as they were setting up the course for Jumpers....hmmmm...Carbon the Princess doesn't like being wet!!! so I took her out JUST before her run, hoping she would not notice the rain....we went in, ran, and she was super! Not quite as 'on fire' as in the morning, but great, and solid, and no errors -- and she won the class of 12. Won a B.A.T. (big-assed trophy) too. Darren and I are sharing it since he won it in the morning and I won it in the afternoon! So when I have it I will take her photo with it and post it here.

It was a very satisfying day!! GO POOD.

So, next is USDAA in mid-September. We will limit our runs to Starters Standard, Jumpers and Relay on Saturday, and P2 Standard and Jumpers on Sunday. We really want those P2 Q's.

More to come after USDAA.

The Next Weekend....

So after the bloodbath that was the USDAA trial I decided that I had ignored my instincts (and her signals) and had pushed Carbon too hard and asked too much of her during a two-day trial on a VERY hot Singapore weekend. The SKC trial on the following weekend was a chance to recover our dignity and we both tried hard to do just that.

SKC offers just two runs -- Agility and Jumpers. In Agility she did a good job but had a flyoff from the A-frame, so no Q and no placing but otherwise a respectable run. Jumpers run was fine -- a very simple and straightforward course, and she did very well, placing third and Q.

Here's what judge Cheryl Bedggood said -- "A lovely steady approach to the course with some excellent handling is what it takes and this team showed us that today. With a clear round in the time of 22.27, this team attained a well deserved 3rd place in the class and were a pleasure to judge. Well done and congratulations on this excellent effort!"

See how much happier she looks?



Then just last weekend another SKC trial -- more on that in the next post....

A Very Tired Poodle

Carbon had a USDAA agility trial back in April. It was a hot weekend, and the first day ran late, which meant that she had two runs on Saturday and then two more pushed forward to Sunday. So on Sunday she had the two 'leftover' runs, plus the two that were originally scheduled for Sunday, plus a Grand Prix run (please don't laugh).

The two runs she got in on Saturday were Starters Jumpers and Gambler. She was jumping 26" with miles to spare, but had a couple of mistakes. And in Gamblers, I just really got screwed up and while she did complete the Gamble we did not have enough points to Q.

But she is such a pretty jumper!! Looky here.

Sunday she had Starters Standard and Snooker. Not impressive. Poor contacts, and slow as molasses in the weaves. Then P2 Jumpers. Yuck. P2 Standard. Yuck again. Grand Prix was last. We were pathetic.

The last two pictures here capture the tone of the day beautifully.

I realized I had gotten caught up in the competitive spirit and overworked my dog. I vowed to be more conscious of her comfort and ability for the next trial, an SKC (Singapore Kennel Club) event the following weekend. See my next post for details on that.

All these photos are taken by, and used with permission of,

Bad Hair Day

Carbon is not a morning poodle. This is what she looks like when she is awakened suddenly.

Carbon and her Sit-Upon

When I was in Brownies -- a LOOOONG time ago -- one of our projects during day camp was to make a 'Sit-Upon" which if I recall was about half an inch of newspaper? sandwiched and sewn between two layers of heavy naugahyde (there's another dead giveaway of my age...) and then we used it to sit on around the campfire, etc. -- the purpose was to keep your rear end off the cold wet ground. Well, Carbon likes to use our little doormats as her sit-upon. They are tiny -- maybe 18" x 22"? -- but she can also curl herself into a little ball and sleep on them. Here is Carbon on her sit-upon.

















Here is Cody, her dog, on HIS sit-upon. Oh, excuse me -- Mike tells me that 'boys don't HAVE sit-upons. It is his orange dot.' OK, fine.

















And here is Carbon trying to steal Cody's orange dot. Not that she wants it -- she just doesn't want HIM to have it.

Carbon's First Singapore Agility Trial!

Carbon overcame the mud and slop to put in three respectable runs (OK, two respectable runs and one pretty sorry one) at her first Singapore USDAA trial on Saturday, September 12. Unfortunately, she did not earn any qualifying scores, but we were both just glad to have stayed upright.

It had rained the day before; and the park maintenance people had mowed, and then dumped composted cow manure on the whole place, some of which was raked out, some of which was still in huge mounds. It wasn't muddy IN the ring, thank goodness, but outside the ring it was a mudhole. The compost built up on my shoes till I had huge Mickey Mouse feet, and it was slick. I was amazed that Carbon was willing to walk in it at all - she can be such a Miss Priss about the terrain over which she prances. I was able to set her little pen up in a dry area on higher ground, though, which helped our mood.

The trial was held at an off-leash dog park, and the agility area was not cordoned off (the ring itself was, but that's it) so there were loose dogs everywhere, many with oblivious owners, which made for an interesting day. The loose dogs had a grand time rolling in the mud and compost and then gleefully running past and onto people and swishing their muddy tails all over everything, so we humans, too, were covered in the mud and compost.


But Carbon the Poodle Princess made many new human friends! She lay there on her little woven plastic mat, paws crossed, looking like butter wouldn't melt in her mouth. She can be so prissy. The little queen. "What a BEAUTIFUL dog!" they would say. "What an amazing color!!! Is that a FRENCH poodle???" "LOOK at her just lying there so quietly --- HOW did you train her to be such a GOOD DOG???" And I would just smile and thank them, all the while thinking, god help us all if a little white Maltese wanders by right now. Somehow I got lucky and she did not act like an idiot more than just a couple of times --and was certainly no worse than any other dog there.

Poodles are fairly uncommon in Singapore, especially standard poodles, so she got a lot of attention just for her poodledom.

The trial started late so we did not have our first class till 1:00 and it was good and hot by then...but Carbon did not embarrass me; she was hot and not very energetic but she tried hard; she was a good poodle for the most part. She got distracted a couple of times by squeaky-toys being played with on the adjacent field -- but overall her course times were fine and she only knocked one pole, and not hitting any when running in Championship level where she had to jump 26".

The last class of the day was the one I would have liked her to qualify in; she had a VERY good run overall but knocked a bar -- it was my fault because I didn't give her a good approach. So no Q ribbons -- too bad!

The last class was around 7 pm - Carbon was the last dog in the last class -- and then they had a nice ceremony to give out the prizes and loot! Carbon won a bunch of treats and toys and food for her 2 second place ribbons -- that was a nice surprise (they don't do that at U.S. trials).

Kenneth Tatsche, the president of USDAA was there -- there is a new USDAA chapter starting in Italy, too, so he was visiting it, and us, and then to Hong Kong, and then back to Dallas. There was also an agility trainer from Australia there, who had been in town doing agility workshops, and we chatted about Singapore agility, Australia agility, and of course dogs in general. We also met many other friendly dog people and had a good day.

Sunday was the Masters Team classes and also the World Frisbee Championships but I was still recovering so we stayed home on Sunday.

My shoes were disgusting but I was able to rehabilitate them over the next couple of days...
The photos in this post (with the exception of the ones of Carbon in her pen, and my disgusting shoes) were taken by Fawn Loong of Malaysia.

The Pood Tackles Singapore Agility

The Pood is already eyeing her first USDAA trial in Singapore, coming up in just two weeks on September 12. It will be held at West Coast Park and is the 6th USDAA trial in the country. In preparation, we attended a practice match at Ethans Pet Resort in Pasir Ris, where the PUPS Agility group meets.

We were made to feel very welcomed there. One of the members, Anderson, drove us to the practice location and we got in one warmup run before Carbon succumbed to the heat and humidity, the long winding car ride, and the excitement of being out of quarantine (I'm FRRREEEEEEE!), by repeatedly getting sick to her stomach. We tried two more runs but both times she left the course to pee/poo and then returned to her little corner to barf. Poor thing!! I had wondered why she seemed to be behaving VERY well (not really being too obnoxious to the other dogs, etc.) and sure enough, it was because she didn't feel good.

So my new agility buddies think I have a much friendlier and less capable dog than I actually have.

The fun thing is that if Carbon gets even one "Q" at the upcoming trial, she will be the top-rated USDAA poodle in Asia. That's because she appears to be the only poodle competing in Asia.

Here is her practice run. You can see that it is a very small course, and she found the distraction of the dogs tied to the fence irresistable!!