So, do you want a report on the shopping or on the competition?
It's late and we're tired, so this won't be too long. Lyra is already in bed, I hope to get there soon. Long day today. After four straight days of sunshine, the morning was cloudy, then it started raining a couple of hours before the tournament started and lasted till late afternoon. Things got underway at 2, I was at the field about noon, went for a walk with Lyra and practiced some T&F (in the rain
). They had a freestyle competition, the so-called last chance qualifier for the world finals tomorrow, and also a last chance qualifier for the Super Pro T&F, which I had entered since Lyra didn't qualify at the EC. The competition was held at a really nice big park just outside the town of Cartersville. Woods, jogging/biking/walking paths, numerous playing fields for football, baseball, etc. Freestyle was held on a football field inside a track, T&F on a nearby field next to a baseball diamond.
We had a decent first round of T&F, 18.5 points, good enough to make the first cut (top fifteen--we tied for tenth place after the first round). Lyra's new boyfriend Ulfi was even better, total of 22.5 I think, including a couple of 5-point catches (40 yards, air catch, in the middle zone). Our second round was dismal--only two catches for 7.5 points. My throwing the second time was not great but not that bad; Bode or Olivia would have caught them easily, but Lyra needs near-perfect throws to catch well (and even then it's not guaranteed). Not too high, not too low, straight and level. Several of my throws started out okay but dipped to one side at the end; she often misses those. Ulfi was good the second time, too--I think he had 21.5 points and came fourth overall. He'd already qualified at the EC, Darek was just doing it for fun/practice.
The truly miraculous thing is that, believe or not, even with such a crappy second round, we STILL qualified for Sunday's event!
That's because so many of the people ahead of me had already qualified at other competitions, or had qualified with more than one dog, but the person only gets one slot (and then gets to choose the dog). So I just squeaked in. This means that no matter what happens tomorrow in the freestyle, I won't be idle on Sunday. If I fail to make it to the top fifteen in the freestyle (starts tomorrow), I'll still get to play in the T&F. If by some miracle we DO make the final freestyle cut, I'll likely pass on the T&F, since it's too much for one day. The top people in T&F are pretty amazing--I saw one guy make three 5-point throws in a row. There was a tie for first place after the second round so each competitor had to throw once to break the tie. BOTH made 5-point catches.
So then they had to go again and this time one of the guys choked and gave a bad throw.
Some people today competed with up to four dogs in the freestyle qualifier. Like this guy, Lawrence Frederick:
http://www.presidentsfest.com/attractions/dck9s.html2007 World Champion Tracy Custer and her seven dogs are in the room next to mine.
Mio (my Japanese friend) was very very happy because she qualified today. All the other Japanese had qualified already at other competitions, and now she has too.
So tomorrow we start in the morning, we drew numbers for the starting order today, I'm #24 of I think about 55 or so. Only the top fifteen will be invited to compete on Sunday. We won't know until Saturday night at the banquet what the results are.
Too tired to write more now, I'll have to share some other impressions (along with all my shopping news) another time. My feet are still drying out from being in the rain most of the day.