Shaking off the rust on tracking

It's been more than 2 months since we tracked, and you could tell! On Saturday, Terrie and I met the Ripleys to plot tracks for Steve's seminar this weekend. Actually, we didn't do much plotting; Steve was very efficient and got it all done for us. But we did lay the tracks we'd be in charge of for practice. We also checked out the tracks we'll be helping the auditors lay.

Devon's track was approximately 484 yards long, with about 338 yards of non-veg. It was 70 degrees and sunny when we laid the tracks, and by the time we ran Devon's track about 3.5 hours later, it was 73 degrees. The wind was between 15-20 mph, with gusts even stronger; that's a very strong wind whipping around those buildings. 

Devon started strong on grass. She has really lovely starts, and I tested her by coming in at a 90 degree angle. I tried to not to turn and follow her right away as she went left, the way the track ran, until she was really pulling into the start. 

Devon did some very interesting things at her first transition and on her second turn. Both times she head flicked in the correct direction, then checked out all the other options before finally choosing the correct one. Since I knew where the track ran, this initial head flick was very easy to see. 

Unfortunately at just past the halfway mark, Devon started to struggle. There was only hard surface turns on sidewalks and in parking lots ahead of her, and the wind was swirling around the building. She continued to struggle until the last turn which was only 45 yards to the glove. She finally quit on me, and I had to show her the turn.

We were definitely rusty, and that tracked proved several things for me. First, she still needs finger tip touches on the track to give her confidence. She's not ready to run a non-veg track unaided. Second, we need to run some short motivational tracks this week to build her confidence.

Devon is still an amazing tracker, and she gave me all sorts of effort on Saturday. Unfortunately we threw a little too much at her for the amount of training we've done (or haven't done) this winter. It was the first warm day we've had this spring. Temperatures were 10 degrees higher than the previous day, and those were warmer than it had been on Tuesday of that week. It takes dogs and humans a few days to adjust to the warmer weather.

Plus, the wind was blowing, doing things to the scent she wasn't used to. The track was also all hard surface after the first turn. I don't recall Devon ever doing that much hard surface without it being broken up by some vegetation. This is clearly something we'll have to start working. And as mentioned earlier, it's also clear she still needs some help with extra scent on the track.

Although it was discouraging for both of us, it's good to have these types of tracks to tell you where you are and what you have to work on. This only motivates me to get a better training plan for Devon and work harder.