Results and report: State Yard/Utility

Its taken a few days to recover from what was quite a big weekend!

Starting Thursday, the WA State Yard/Utility Championships were held last weekend at Gordon and Sara Curtis' Kellerberrin property. There were lots of entries, and the competition was very tight, with the results of the big events coming right down to the last run or two of the finals.

The weather didn't seem to know what it was doing, sunshine one minute, drenching rain the next, but the sheep (supplied by Rod Forsythe) worked really well- until the pen!. Many utility runs seemed to go perfectly until the sheep approached the pen, where they made it clear they'd prefer to head out the gate behind them, and any dog that hustled them was rewarded with sheep going in at least 3 directions.

It was good to see some fairly new dogs and triallers among the top scores- Rod Forsythe's young kelpie Milo did particularly well, and Marianne Rogers had a great weekend, making the Open Utility finals with both Coco and Bernie (who held the top score for quite a while in the first round).

Richard had a good weekend (despite suffering from a nasty cold), winning the Novice Yard with Bella, coming 3rd in the Open Yard with Charlie, and equal 4th in the Open Utility with Fred. He also ran Jake, who was full-on as usual, and Tama, who did well for a youngster.

I had a couple of good runs with Queani in yard and utility, just coming to grief at the pen (along with quite a few others). She didn't swipe once! I think if I put some work into her and get her fit we'll do OK together. Bill did one really nice utility run (again stuck at the pen), including some nice yard work, and then in the Open utility he was working OK in the yard when he just lost it again and bolted. I seriously don't know what I'm going to do about this. Muddy was pretty good for him- we got some respectable yard scores and he did alright outside in his one utility run- but there was also some very slack work from both of us (me messing up gates, him, not covering).

BabyJ was still recovering from his URTI, so was a bit grizzly, but the caravan didn't leak so we mostly slept well. I've been having nightmares about the budgie incident (Queani killed and ate my parents' much loved ancient budgie Peggles on WEdnesday night) but I'm sure I'll get over it eventually.

Pictures to follow... (of the trial, not the budgie incident).

Novice Yard
1st Richard McGuire Yarralonga Bella (kelpie) 63 + 61 = 124
2nd Rod Forsythe Binnaburra Milo (kelpie) 56 + 63 = 119
=2nd Neil Kristiansen Badgingarra Lisa (border collie) 56 + 63 = 119
4th Neil Kristiansen Bellview Shadow (NZHD) 58 + 59 = 117

Novice Utility
1st Neil Kristiansen Bellview Shadow (NZHD) 88 + 93 = 181
2nd Neil Kristiansen Badgingarra Lisa (border collie) 86 + 93 = 179
3rd John Charlick Nolan’s Gael (border collie) 82 + 89 = 171

Open Yard
1st Neil Kristiansen Badgingarra Jock (kelpie) 70 + 69 = 139
2nd Ken Atherton Ramulam Gus (border collie) 68 + 70 = 138
3rd Richard McGuire Yarralonga Charlie (kelpie) 68 + 69 = 137
4th Nigel Armstrong Yarralonga Magot (kelpie) 68 + 68 = 136
=4th Grant Cooke Grassvalley Lisa (border collie) 67 + 69 = 136
6th Simon Leaning Fleetfeet Will (kelpie) 65 + 69 = 134
7th Nigel Armstrong Yarralonga Delta (kelpie) 68 + 65 = 133
8th Neil Kristiansen Badgingarra Lisa (border collie) 66 + 63 = 129
9th Grant Cooke Grassvalley Tod (border collie) 67 + 59 = 126
10th Simon Leaning Stoneyridge Harry (border collie) 65 + 59 = 124
11th Simon Leaning Marionvale Flash (kelpie) 65 + 56 = 121
12th Simon Leaning Fleetfeet Axle (kelpie) 66 + 54 = 120

Open Utility
1st Gordon Curtis Binnaburra Tuff (kelpie) 107 + 95 = 202
2nd Neil Kristiansen Badgingarra Jock (kelpie) 99 + 97 = 196
3rd Rod Forsythe Binnaburra Milo (kelpie) 92 + 103 = 195
4th Richard McGuire Boylee Fred (border collie) 97 + 97 = 194
=4th Gordon Curtis Binnaburra Jess (kelpie) 92 + 102 = 194
=4th Neil Kristiansen Grassvalley Sam (border collie) 95 + 99 = 194
7th Marianne Rogers Christies Cocoacina (border collie) 99 + 90 = 189
=7th Neil Kristiansen Bellview Shadow (NZHD) 98 + 91 = 189
9th Neil Kristiansen Badgingarra Casey (border collie) 100 + 87 = 187
10th Marianne Rogers Bellview Obie “Bernie” (border collie) 103 + 82 = 185
11th Simon Leaning Fleetfeet Axle (kelpie) 92 + 80 = 172
12th Tony Boyle Boylee Pepper (border collie) 92 + 79 = 171
13th Simon Leaning Boylee Barney (border collie) 90 + 80 = 170
14th Neil Kristiansen Karrawarra Shona (kelpie) 93 + 74 = 167
15th Nigel Armstrong Yarralonga Delta (kelpie) 91 + 67 = 155