Well it looks like that beautiful sunrise this morning was a good omen. We just finished competing in the first ever SDDA (Sporting Detection Dogs Association) Games trial hosted by Canine Coaching. We started with the Distance component and we found the hide in 35 seconds. Then we moved on to the Aerial search and we nailed it in 25 seconds and came in first overall. Next was the one minute Speed search. 20 containers down a hallway and into one room. We found the 3 hides in 56 seconds and came in 2nd overall. Last and most terrifying was the Team search. We were paired with a total stranger and her dog and only had 2 minutes to chat before trialing to come up with a search plan. We started out strong with each of us finding a hide quickly. Sadly the other team false alerted so we were all disqualified. So pleased to walk away with 3 Q’s. Brodie worked his little heart out for me today…so proud of him!!
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My handsome, sweet boy is 2 years old today. Man time flies. We are so blessed to have such a wonderful golden in our lives. We spent the morning doing a 7km canicross at -20 Celsius which felt quite mild compared to the -30 to -40 it has been for the past few weeks. Look at the frost icicles on his chin.
Well my first Iron Paws has come to an end. We did pretty good considering we got very few points over the last two weeks because of the damn polar vortex. Overall we finished 75th out of 296. In the 2 dog sled category we finished 7th overall. The Edmonton Regional Group finished 12th overall and Team Spirit came in tied for 2nd place in our region. It was great to meet so many people in our area that love to get outside and play with their dogs. I definitely plan on doing another Iron Paws.
It has been almost 2 weeks since the dogs have been able to go outside for anything more than a potty break or a brisk 1km sprint. I can’t remember the last time we had such an extended cold spell. And the wind makes it even worse. Sadly we recorded no mileage or points for the final week of Iron Paws. It looks like there might be a slow improvement in temps coming in the next week.
Look what arrived today. It is a plaque acknowledging the Elite title that we earned at the Sniff and Tell trial in Picture Butte last October.
February 2nd is National Sled Dog Day. Unfortunately it is way to cold today to go for a kicksled run (-33C with the wind chill) so I have to use pictures from a couple of weeks ago. I played with a few filters to jazz them up a bit.
This Sunday we are supposed to start our training program to prepare for the 1/2 Corked Marathon in May. Unfortunately Mother Nature has decided not to cooperate. The forecast calls for temperatures around -24 degrees celsius and who knows how much colder it will be with the wind chill factored in (just checked and it will be -41 with the windchill…yikes!!!!). I decided to start our training program a few days earlier to avoid Sunday’s chill. Brodie and I did a lovely 7km canicross on Thursday morning using all our new gear…..Brodie’s pulling harness, bungee leash and my canicross belt. Everything worked great together and was so much easier on my back.
