Friday, September 20, 2002

 
Sorry, sorry, sorry . . . lots going on in my life, and I haven't updated poor Phyl's blog lately. I promise to do better in the future--we have a couple of weeks of breathing space before our next round of stuff in October, which will bring a Bobby Dalziel clinic in Virginia, followed by Edgeworth, followed by our first two OPEN TRIALS in upstate New York. Yikes! But I'm getting ahead of myself.

Phyl and I have been to three trials since I last posted. It's been neither the best of times nor the worst of times. Trial #1 was at Fosterfields (Morristown, New Jersey) over Labor Day weekend. We had a solidly mediocre performance, with better sheep on the first round and lesser sheep on the second. Scores were in the 60s, but weren't good enough to place. Trial #2 was a new one at Green Lane Park, in Pennsylvania. It was a pretty interesting trial: small field, lots of pressure. Our outwork was quite good both days, but I really butchered the drive in our first round (couldn't figure out how to compensate for the pressure, which caused the sheep to blast all over the field). By our second run, I had managed to improve the drive enough to have it look decent, but we still missed both panels. Still, it was good enough for a ninth, and (since it's been such a draught since we last placed), I was pleased. Trial #3--the NEBCA novice finals--was rather depressing. Our first run was a total and complete bust: we drew three crazy sheep that just ran all over the field whenever Phyl took a step toward them. Our second run was somewhat better (we had a pretty driveaway, at least), but I messed up the crossdrive and only got half of the pen. As a result, we didn't make it into the top ten and thus never got a third run. :-( (The NEBCA novice finals take your best run of two to determine who gets into the final top-ten run, and then adds that best-of score to the score you get in your third run to determine ultimate placements.) I was pretty bummed after that trial, but I'm basically over it. After all, I have bigger worries: how on earth are we going to pretend we know how to shed when we're standing at the post in Open in la month??

posted by Heather Nadelman