Why Compete?

I have been hashing out an answer to this question for quite some time. One of my friends tells me that the answer is simply, "because it is fun" ... well, yes it is - but fun is easily had with a dog or two, or six, if you love them.

SO why invest the considerable time, money, effort and energy in the whole business of competing? It takes up enough of my resources of time, money and energy that I needed to have a complete answer to this question for myself.

My dogs are well rounded citizens with different skills and interests. Why leave the confines of our own social ramblings and enter the odd circus of dog sports? I've dabbled in various disciplines but, for the moment, it is dog agility which really has won my heart.

If you are reading this blog you will not be surprised to hear that I love learning more than just about anything else. I prize gaining new knowledge about dogs, about communication, about learning and teaching. I love the feeling of being in "flow" OR connecting with my own canine companions. When I work with a client and puzzle out how what makes their dog tick and how to bridge better communication between human and canine. I love my time at the shelter when we observe and chat through the behaviour of animals who have often been treated very poorly indeed.

What does competing offer that staying at home cannot?

This past weekend was my first trialling weekend of this year and I got a very complete answer to that question! I had been feeling pretty awesome about how my training has been going .. hmmm ... it turns out a little humility was in order :)

I've been diligently setting up other people's courses, training through obstacle challenges, training with all four dogs out to add distractions. Basically doing everything I could think of to add challenges to my training. MY TRAINING, at MY HOME - we have been doing well. I got up early on Saturday morning feeling confident. Off we went ... AND ... well

No need to go into the gory details but lets say that the smooth flowing connected runs of our home training sessions were NOT to be seen. this weekend. The perfect contacts, excellent driving lines and weave pole entries from any angle ... not so much. How about ME - my smooth fluency handling courses - out the window - SIGH

Why compete? To learn. To learn more, to learn better and to over come challenges and obstacles. I am going to be brutally honest, it really sucked not to measure up to my own mark. BUT there was a huge piece of this weekend that I am very proud of - I cheerfully stuck to my own criteria. When my dogs popped off the contacts I asked them to get back on and when we ended each run we celebrated together. We were far from where we will be when we have more trialling time under our belts and we did not replicate what we are capable of at home but there was lots of learning and we will return to the ring stronger, better and more connected.