The Let Down

The American Maltese Association's National Specialty was in Ft. Worth this year. Besides being a good reason to try out our new bag, Rugby was also entered in Obedience.

We arrived at the hotel around 8:30 pm after a long day of travel. Rugby was sick of being in his bag. Instead of having him do his zoomies all around the hotel room, we headed down to the ballroom and met a friend for a quick training session. He quickly burned off that extra energy and then went back to the room to rest for the show the next day.

Friday would have passed us by if I didn't drag Rugby out of bed just before noon. He was exhausted. He didn't even ask to go outside. I tried feeding him some of my leftovers from dinner to see if he would wake up a bit and he did. The trial started at 1 pm with his Utility B run first, then Open B later so we went down to check in and warm up.

He did great in Utility on every single exercise. Except gloves. The #2 glove of all things. He went for it and just before he got there decided I would be happier if he got the #3 glove instead.


You can't tell from the video, but Rugby only lost 2.5 points on the individual exercises. Then he laid down during the Sit Stay.


Sigh, why couldn't he make his mistakes in the same class so we could have at least qualified in ONE of them?  Did you notice the fast transition in both videos? That is the slowest fast Rugby has ever done.

We tried. He did give me a lot considering how tired he was. This week is dedicated just to Rugby resting. Next week we will find our game-face again and get back to work.