Episode 351: The Inaugural AKC ISC Championship

Sarah: Today, we're going to be talking about the AKC ISC championship. This is a brand new event.

It was the inaugural event, um, that just happened in the last. Couple of weeks, um, right after the agility world championship. So we've just had a lot of events kind of backed back to back here, uh, in the fall. And Jennifer, you were at the ISC championship. Yes, yes, I was.

Jennifer: Wasn't going to miss the inaugural event.

Sarah: Yes, exactly. And so we want to talk about that event and the structure and the vibe and how it went and, and all of that stuff. Um, for this very first brand new event, we had first discussed this event, um, talking to Carrie DeYoung about the ISC class in general. And so I will link to that podcast where, um, Carrie talked about kind of the vision for ISC.

Within the AKC and, um, and we kind of got the breaking news that this ISC championship event was coming, but there were at that point, no details about it, nothing about the structure, how you get in, how you qualify, anything like that. Um, Now that it's happened and of course we should also say that things can change so just because they did it this way this year doesn't mean that the rules won't change next year based on how things went but it was essentially an open event right Jen I think anybody could enter you didn't have to have you could have never done ISC before in AKC and you could still enter this event is that correct?

Jennifer: Yep, that is correct. They did limit it to 350 dogs, but you, it was open for anybody who has an AKC registration number to enter and, uh, and try to get in.

Sarah: And I believe that I know that we were debating when they first announced it and they said that it was I think going to be um, random draw, right?

Jennifer: It's actually was first received.

First received.

Sarah: Okay, so they said it was going to be first received and so everybody was kind of scrambling because They thought that would fill and I remember we were having this debate with our training partner, Brittany, and I believe she was really worried. It was going to fill. And what is it?

Wasn't it? Your prediction is still on that. It would not fill.

Esteban: That is correct. That's right. Single person without exception that I spoke with predicted that it would fill that there would be a

Sarah: massive waiting

Jennifer: list.

Esteban: Yeah, yeah, yeah. The people. Yeah, I'm not getting in.

Jennifer: We talked about this, I don't know if it was on a podcast or, uh, behind the scenes, but I was one of the ones who I, I readjusted my entire schedule the day that it opened in order to open, enter, like the moment that it opened, because I thought for sure it would fill immediately.

I thought we were gonna break the internet and it was going to be, um, very difficult to get in. And, uh, I was super wrong on that. I actually am not sure it's filled. Um, I believe, I thought I heard somebody say that they got 330 dogs entered. Um, but it did, I don't know if it felt, I do know that, um, I entered a dog really, really, really late, like within the last week and, and, um, she still got in, so I, I know even if it did feel, it didn't feel until right at the very end.

Sarah: Right. Yeah. So, so I thought that was interesting. I mean, I do feel like it's a very. Um, specialized population that people that run ISC, um, care very deeply about it. I mean, I think it's a great program, but it is not for every handler and every dog. It does, um, require, uh, different skills than your regular AKC courses.

I think it, it requires a lot from the handler. Um, in terms of ability to move around a very large horse, um, that, you know, that is not everybody's style of agility. Um, so we don't know that

Esteban: yet because we haven't yet talked about the course. All right. I want to tap the brakes here because all we really know at this point in the podcast, we're going to discover, we're going to uncover some of these facts, some of these truths.

All we really know, and I will emphasize this here, is that y'all were wrong and I was right.

Sarah: Oh, don't say y'all. I didn't, I didn't have it. I didn't have a

Esteban: horse in this race. That is the starting point here. Okay. Um, but I do want to know more about the competition because I was not actually able to follow it because, um, it was, uh, poorly timed in terms of our kids activities.

Sarah: Yes, we were in the middle of, of high school water polo playoffs.

Esteban: Yeah, with our, with our daughter. And so we were out there traveling and watching and doing all of those things. So, um, let's first Jen, I want to get a sense for the format. So we have an idea of the entries, right? So we're looking at the three to 400 and for people who don't know, um, but need some kind of reference.

Yeah. I think here in the United States, we are not like the UK, right? We recently had Dalton Meredith on, uh, and he was telling us about 17 ring trials, right? That is well beyond what anyone here in the United States can really, uh, uh, comprehend. Not because we couldn't have that kind of event. But we can't have that kind of event because of our geography, I think does not really permit it, whereas the UK is, you know, geographically very, very different.

So the concentration of handlers is not the same. Um, but we do get big national events where we have had five, six, have we had bigger than a six? Ring event, Jennifer, that you can recall any organization. Not that I

Jennifer: can recall. Yeah, I think UKI

Esteban: is bumping up. I

Jennifer: think UKI is bumping up against it. I believe UKI did have eight one year and I was there because I remember they had two inside, two undercover, two on grass, and two unsamed.

I think we maybe have gone to eight for UK, but I believe they were trying to reel that back down, um, to six. So I think this year it is only six, if I can recall correctly,

Esteban: but it's not like six running simultaneously, right? It's like,

Sarah: it's basically because there are so many different events. I mean,

Esteban: a fine distinction.

The, the, the point is that, um, Some of these big national events, uh, break a thousand, right? A thousand entries, yeah. Closer to 1, 500. Somewhere in there fluctuating over the years.

Sarah: Yes.

Esteban: Depending on how agility has gone. And so this event, you're, you're looking at much smaller. So it's more comparable to say, Jen, a Westminster type event or even smaller than Westminster.

Jennifer: Yeah, I think Westminster does three 30 or maybe they do three 50. And this was a limited to three 50. So yeah, very similar to the same size as that. It was just two rings and just two days. Now I do think that potentially one of the factors that, um, caused the entry to be maybe a little bit lower, if in fact it didn't fit.

Phil, maybe it did fail, but even if it did fail, didn't fail quickly is how late they notified us of this event. So I don't believe we found out until may that this event even existed. We had no premium, no information in June, nothing about location, nothing. And then it like all came out, I want to say August.

It all came out. So I think a big part of this for people was, um, they just, they just couldn't put it on their calendar, you know, like as you said, Sarah, the fall is busy, um, and a lot of us are planning our calendar, our agility calendar a year out. Um, so, you know, we say, okay, I have so many weekends, I'm going to be gone.

I'm going to do this, this and this, and then we find out about these events and it's just too late to do anything. So I think that if they can say, okay, this is going to happen every year around this time, people can plan better. I also think there's a large percentage of. People who don't like to do inaugural events.

It's kind of like, you know, I'm going to let it happen. I'm going to let them work out the kinks, work out the bugs, smooth it out a little bit. Um, that was, I remember that's how I was about Westminster. When Westminster was announced, I was like, not for me. I'm going to let them get a couple of years under their belt and figure it out.

So I do anticipate that the event will grow. Um, what then. You know, we have to look at like, and we don't know, you know, is, are they going to change the format? Are they going to change the scoring? Is that going to affect people? Will they put qualifications on it? But, but size wise, yeah. Two rings, two days, 350 dogs, tops.

Esteban: Well, I

Jennifer: think the

Sarah: other thing that we might see

Esteban: is, well, you eventually pick a world team based on these results.

Jennifer: There's a, there's a lot of, there was a lot of, you know, questions of the future of the event. Of course, everybody going around going. Okay. I would change this and I'll change that. And we'll get into that a bit when we go and talk about the scoring, my thoughts on things.

But certainly that question did come up.

Sarah: Right. Yeah. And I, I've got to think that it has potential to grow because up until now they're, um, like the ISC classes exist for people to. Enjoy, they don't actually lead to anything. There's no titles and there was no event. Now that there is an event, a championship event, not that you need to qualify for it, but that you need the experience on these type of courses, then we may see more people doing local ISC to get ready for the ISC championship.

So it may kind of generate some of that, um, interest by, by having a national event.

Esteban: Yeah, interesting. I think that's a very good point. Okay, so tell us about the format of the event. Like how many runs was there a final? How did it all work?

Jennifer: So the format was, in my opinion, when I read through the premium, I thought it structured very, very well.

Um, and I told them, made sure to talk to every rep I saw and tell them how great I think the structure was. Um, because the format I think was very nice. So the way that they did it is there were three runs on Saturday. And then a round four on Sunday morning with finals Sunday afternoon. Now, the way the time schedule was, the finals was actually anticipated to begin at 1230.

They were a little behind. I think maybe it was one o'clock when we were walking, but not that late night feel that you have sometimes of, uh, some of the other events, but how it worked out on Saturday is you had an a two, which a is agility. Two is level two. You had an a two. And a J2 jumping for J2 level two.

And then you had an, uh, J3. So we bumped up to another jumpers run on Saturday afternoon, level three. And then Sunday morning for round four was a three. So essentially you were getting two level twos and two level threes.

Sarah: Yeah. And let me just jump in here for people who haven't been following ISC. And again, the podcast on ISC covers a lot of this, but there's only three levels.

There's one is the lowest is the easiest and it, and it, and it really is quite straightforward. It's, it's big, but it doesn't have that many, you know, crosses and things like that. Um, two is kind of the medium and then three is the hardest. So there's only the three levels. And so they start with the two.

Middle, middling levels and then add on the more difficult ones.

Jennifer: Yeah, and I think this was kind of a chance to let the the difficulty build as the as the event went, You know kind of get your feet wet. There was no warm up class. There's you know It's not like um NAC where we get a warm up round or some other events I mean you come right into it and boom you're being thrown in these level two courses and Because it was two rings one ring was standard one ring was jumpers You One ring ran small dogs, the other ran big.

And then they kind of did a flip flop and you switched. Okay. Um, and then you did three runs on Saturday and that fourth run on Sunday. Now, as far as the scoring goes, and this was the part that I really liked, they may reformat it going forward. It's hard for us to talk a lot about future years with this, not knowing what they'll do is nothing.

Was predominantly nothing was cumulative, which I think the nature of ISC is to be willing to go out there and push and go fast and take the risk and test the skill. And so how you made finals is it was the top five dogs from each round. So you had placements one through five in the A2 got to finals, placements one through five in J2 got to finals, and then et cetera through all the rounds.

Two things to keep in mind with that is because it was top five and they wanted to guarantee some diversity in the finals, they did bump down if a dog secured a spot in finals in multiple rounds. So Theoretically, if the, if the dogs one through five in the first round also were one through five in the second round, then the sixth, seventh, eighth, ninth, and 10th place dog would go, et cetera.

So by the time we're getting to the fourth round, assuming that a lot of the top dogs are consistently placing at the top, you're seeing dogs that were in 11th or 12th or 13th or 14th. Um, place, get a spot into finals and then the final spot. So you're talking 20 dogs. So five from each of the four rounds and then the final spot.

So the 21st spot was the top cumulative dog who didn't already make it into final. So let's say that you do have a dog who's not quite quick enough to be in the top five, but can consistently pump out those scores. They were going to take one dog. So the maximum dog in finals was 21 dogs. Per jump height, but there were not even 21 dogs entered in the eight inch class.

So every single dog that entered an eight inch class made it to finals with the exception of one and then We've had been a total of 99 dogs in finals So I like this format because again it encourages you to push it and go for it and take the risk You have to have top five and should you have a fault in the round your weekends not over which is very different for those who Who have been to NAC.

If you've been to NAC, it can be super heartbreaking to have a fault in that very first run because the odds for a lot of dogs to then make challengers or win out of challengers is slim. So you almost feel like your weekend is over and that was not the case here. Um, and I imagine with that and go.

Sarah: With that kind of scoring, then I imagine that there are plenty of dogs that, um, have faults and make it to finals.

A

Jennifer: hundred percent. Absolutely. Absolutely. You would not have

Sarah: that many clean runs. I know the

Jennifer: 16 inch scoring real well because that was like my main height. Um, and like we had dogs who got into finals who never had a clean run. I mean, they didn't have a single clean run and they made it to finals. Um, and then, you know, we'll get there when we talk about course design, but in the finals of the 99 dogs that ran, we only had eight clean runs.

So you were seeing the quote unquote podium photos where they line up one through four and dogs with faults, uh, to the point that we had the dilemma of in the 20 inch glass, no dog ran clean. And therefore the title in front of your name, the, uh, ISCH title that you would burn to go in front of your name was not awarded in the 20 inch class, which I know is a debate and thing, something that we're still doing that.

I

Esteban: am so not a fan.

Sarah: Well, I didn't even realize that there was like a title to be, I just thought it was more just like, Yeah. Do you get a title of the invitational if you win the invitational? Not invitational.

Jennifer: And again, you're bringing up all these lovely debates that have been brought up and conversation that was muddled through the crowd at this event.

But yes, when I say they're making this a national event, they're making this a national event. Just like you get NAC in front of your dog's name and it's in front of pink and it's in front of Rio, this you get ISCH in front of your name. But not in the 20 inch winner.

Esteban: I think that's a travesty. As far as I'm concerned, they've won the event.

They were the best star there. They are the champion period, especially,

Jennifer: especially on the difficulty of the finals course, which as I said, when only eight out of 99 dogs are running clean, um, it was, it was pretty tough. So, so that's kind of how they did the preliminary rounds to get to finals. Um, like I said, five from each height.

And there was, I mean, you can't. You can't point block. So like I said, if I, if I get first place in the first round, which I did, I ended up scratching her from other runs because what was the point? She already had secured her time to finals. I can't point block. So there was no incentive for me to run.

The courses were big and it was on dirt and I had a lot of dogs and I was like, I'm going to save my life. And I wasn't the only one. I mean, that's

Esteban: a very good

Jennifer: spot in finals early. You can essentially scratch. I mean, it was a very long day. I did not pull out of the property until 10 Oh, 6 PM on Saturday night.

Esteban: Yeah, I see. It's giving me European open vibes in that sense where you can kind of get into standard or jumpers, but not necessarily, you don't need a cumulative score of the two in order to show up in the final.

Jennifer: Yep. There's a couple of dogs that, you know, you could tell when you watch their finals that they probably got in from jumpers based on their contact performances, which is always what you kind of see at the European Open as well.

Um, but I, I just really liked that format. I don't, I don't want to see him go the cumulative route. I liked that there was one cumulative spot. Um, that was kind of nice. Um, but I, I liked the way that it played out.

Sarah: That's awesome. And so then there was also, and this part confused me because there was also a team element of it, but it wasn't separate runs for team like it is in Agility World Championship, which is kind of where my head's at.

So tell us how the team part worked.

Jennifer: The team element was quite Interesting. And this is something that I do have pretty strong opinion opinions on just opinions, not facts. But the team event, how it worked is they decided that they were going to offer a team event that kind of ran inside of the regular national event.

And basically what you could do is you could create a team of up to four dogs, but you all had to be in the same jump height. So it could be three or four because what they did is they would drop the lowest score So if you were a team of four you got to drop a score But if you were a team of three all scores counted you had to be within your height So you had to be a team of four 16 inch dogs or four eight inch dogs or whatever Um, but they didn't have separate classes as you said, basically your level two scores.

So your a2 and your j2 score Combined for your team. So you you were kind of running team Within The individual runs, which became very interesting strategically and, um, kind of how people were running and it affected the time schedule to be honest. This is kind of how AKC got off, but normally on an individual rant round, if you faulted, so if you had an off course, you would just kind of be like, all right, well, there was the run.

You'd keep going. You might not fix it. You might not save everything. But because these runs were team, it wasn't over when you faulted. So how they did it is standard faults, which would be your contacts and your bars were a five point deduction. Um, refusals were a five point deduction. Off courses were only 10 points and then it was scored time plus faults.

So if you were fast with a refusal, you could be a dog that was clean, but slower. So part of what caused the time schedule on the first day to be so off is that people were out there forever, trying to fight for the run and save everything and get a score for their team. So if we think about AWC, which as you mentioned, happened to the weekend before, as soon as you eat, there is no score, you get a zero, there's no point to like, get a zero.

Fix everything. I even talked about on one of my runs, I was just like, get off the course as fast as possible, because I'm embarrassed. No, no, we were out there fighting for it and fixing and saving and recovering for the most part. So, um, the team kind of affected the handling and the running on those first two, two days.

Uh, two courses and team was optional. You didn't have to be on team. Um, but one of the things, I guess, my opinions, the two opinions that I feel like on team, and again, this is just me, Jen crank speaking is they didn't do enough for the team winners. So I'm like, okay, they have this team event. They talked about this team.

I couldn't even tell you the teams that want, I have no idea when they did awards, what awards they get. It was sort of like, you know, like we had matching shirts and all this stuff. And then like, they kind of just didn't do a lot with team. The other thing is I think with. If it were up to me, the ISC scoring, I would just do an off course as a zero.

Um, I, that is what we're used to for FCI, which is kind of what this is mimicking. And rather than just saying, oh, 10 faults, just if you go off course, you get a zero. And I know the concern was they needed to get enough dogs into finals. You know, if an off course got you a zero, would we even have that 21 dogs going to finals?

Um, but I think, I think that they need to, To kind of play out how that would have worked because I can tell you because I went to my hotel room and I'm a data person that with the exception of the eight inch class, it would not have affected the first day's results of who made finals. Um, the dogs that were making the top five.

Yes, they might have had a bar or a refusal, but dogs were not getting in on off courses on that first day. day. So, so the team event was kind of fun. You got to pair up with your friends and you could have multiple dogs on a team. Um, so like I was two dogs on my own team and then my teammate was Abby with her too.

So like it was two handlers, but four dogs. Uh, the other thing that was interesting, and I'm not sure if this was intended, but the whole dropped score element, it was not. It was not like AWC where it was like they dropped the lowest standard score and then they dropped the lowest jumper score. They took your two rounds, combined them, and then dropped the lowest team member, which was very interesting and odd.

And I'm not sure if that's how it was intended to be. There were some scoring issues. Um, I'm not sure if that is one of them. There was a scoring issue, uh, that I went to them about and they did not fix. So hopefully they'll get that all fixed going forward because it was a bit unfortunate. Um, but. They, uh, that I'm not sure if was, was planned because normally we'd think like, okay, if dog a Eden standard, we dropped them.

But if dog B eat and jumpers, we dropped them. And instead they didn't do it. They just added your scores and then dropped the lowest team member. So it was interesting. So that's how the team

Esteban: event worked.

Jennifer: Okay.

Esteban: So you're telling me there was no team final. Is that correct?

Jennifer: That is correct. Yes.

Esteban: And there, you said there were titles awarded to the individual champion.

Was there a team title? No, it was not. There

Jennifer: were ribbons, there were ribbons and photos. Um, and it was the top team per height. So you had like an eight inch team winner, a 12 inch team winner, a 16 inch team winner, 2024. Um, but there was no. Overall team winner and I, and they do not get a title. I think the team thing was maybe just kind of adding something a little bit more fun to build a camaraderie, maybe going back to the old days of, if you recall, back when NAC had ISC on that first day, they also had the state team tournament, so I wasn't sure if it was like a throwback to some kind of like state team tournament, adding the ISC or what

Sarah: Well, I, I will say real quick that I, I pulled up the premium because I'm, I'm like a, um, a rule reader.

I, I like to like read through the, the fine, I I'm a fine print reader. And it does say in the premium that the cumulative score for the team award is determined using the three Three lowest cumulative scores from all dogs on a team. So it was written in the premium that they were going to do it the way that they did do it, so it was intentional.

Jennifer: That was when we, we found the group that I was traveling with. We didn't know if it was right or wrong, but we, it seemed odd. And I think our brains had just come from AWC, which I'm sure to that way. So we were just like, does this seem right? But I'm glad that that did end up getting scored how they wanted it to.

Esteban: Yeah. Interesting. Yeah. Based on what I'm hearing, I vote, just drop the team, but that's just me.

Jennifer: That's my opinion too.

Esteban: Yeah. Yeah. It was

Jennifer: like, it would make things go a little bit faster because again, all the, the saving of the faults and the getting the score. And I do think there potentially is a downside when people are on team that they're more willing to let the dogs get away with stuff and kind of, it just changes the mindset.

So they didn't, it just didn't seem to make a big enough deal about it for it to be worth

Esteban: Right. Exactly. You got to, it's all about the, the cost benefit, uh, analysis here. And I think when you're the AKC, you need to think about this long term, what does this event look like in three years in five years in 10 years?

Right. And are we going to be able to get like 600 dogs here, a thousand dogs here? Uh, what is that going to look like? And, and how do we want to run this? And this doesn't sound like a winning play here to me. Okay. Um, the next thing I think before we get to results, um, You know, obviously related to that is, is the courses.

So let's talk about it. First question for me is, was there a noticeable difference between the level two and level three courses? Or was it like, somehow you go to like some open and excellent master's type and you're like, the open is harder than the masters.

Jennifer: So it was quite rough in my in my opinion and I think the collective opinion of a lot of people that were there In terms of the difficulty of them and i'm going to go back one step and talk just quickly about the judges So for this event, they did have a designing judge Um for one of the rings that was different than the actual judge in the ring.

So we had a fci designer from france named I think andrea I, I, I might have butchered that, um, who was not there, but was the designing judge and then Heather Dickinson was the judge of his courses. So she stood in the ring and made the calls. And then we also have a actual FCI judge from Finland come in, um, named Rita Piertowski.

Again, I might be butchering these names, but she's very popular in the U. S. and has made many trips over here. So when, when they decided to have an ISC championship, they were going to be authentic on the course design. And what I will tell you is I thought it was very, very, very, Very difficult, which I think says a lot coming from AWC.

I mean, I literally landed home from AWC on Monday and Friday. I left to go to this event. Um, and I don't know why, I don't know if, um, AKC as an organization felt that way. I know that there was a lot, a lot of talk of those of us that were exhibitors looking at the courses and going, there's no way these are A2 and J2.

There's just no way. A2 and J2 should seem very. Doable and I think the 16 inch class had one clean run on the on the on the a2 the a2 We're not even getting to the three yet the a2. I think there was one clean run Um, like the second place dog had had faults. Um, so and it was just It was really tough.

And I don't know, I mean, I I'd be curious to kind of go back and look at the maps now, because I don't know if it was that we don't get a warm up and we come right in and we're like, you know, walking in Saturday morning and it's an, it's a, an emotional thing and a mental game of, oh my God, this is so hard.

Um, but I just, I've run a two, I've run J two, I've done level two. And I did not feel like these were level two courses. Um, what I will also say is the designing judge from France, uh, Andrea. Andrea, I had done a lot of studying of his course maps before the event, and I knew they were tough. Like, I was consistently setting them up in my building and walking them and going, Oh, this is a doozy.

Oh, this one's going to be tough. Um, part of the reason that I set them up and trained them before AWC is because some of his were harder than the AWC courses that I was, um, prepping for. So I definitely felt like the judges, uh, uh, the courses were, uh, Tough. Um, I mean, I remember walking past a group and somebody's like, this is like an A8, you know, kind of teasing that it was no level three.

It was a level eight. Um, and you know, I mean, I know the rings were a little bigger, right? So the rings were a hundred by one 10. That's not that much bigger than we're used to. I mean, I think at NAC, they're a hundred by 90. So you have the same length and 20 feet wider. Um, I really did feel like it was just the challenges, the, the ring size.

The other thing is it was on dirt and I always know that's a factor for me. It's like harder for me to get places. So maybe if the same courses were set up on turf, I would feel better about my ability to get places. But the courses were tough and men came the finals course, which as I already alluded to was pretty brutal.

Uh, they did actually bump up the ring size and finals to one 20. By 140. Like, process that. 120 by 140. It was, it was a runner for sure.

Esteban: That is super interesting, and I guess I have a couple of observations. Number one, I need to go and look at the course maps myself, so I want to, I want to go and look at that, and then I want to see some videos of some dogs doing it, certainly.

Um, did Four Legged Flicks provide the, um, the video?

Jennifer: So AKC TV did air it. So AKC, it was all over AKC TV all weekend. You could watch live, but Chris from four legged flicks was responsible for, um, doing the camera angles and stuff. So I don't believe you can view it on the four legged flicks YouTube page, but I believe you can go watch it on AKC TV with their filming.

So it's, it's good quality filming there.

Esteban: Okay. Yeah, I definitely, I definitely want to check that out. I think it's very interesting what you said about levels two and three, although also given the difficulty that in your opinion, you were seeing from the French judge, that could very well be something that is particular to this set of course, the science that may not carry over to the future.

And in fact, with a feedback from the competitors, certainly, I think the AKC may be a little more careful going forward, making sure that there's a clear differentiation between levels two and three.

Sarah: Well, and, and I trust. Jen's assessment, right? Because Jen was literally like eight days after the agility world championships, you know, and then coming here and doing these courses.

So,

Esteban: well, not just this year. Right. It's not like Jen's first AWC.

Sarah: Right.

Esteban: You know, she's, she's been around the sport at all levels and international, uh, you know, abroad and here in the U S as well. So it's different than if. I was hearing this from a first time competitor who had never competed abroad, and it was kind of new to this setting.

You know, I would take that with a big grain of salt. Although,

Jennifer: I will say that even though you guys trust me, it would be good to get somebody else's perspective and opinion as people are chatting about this. Because I do think in my head, I do think there's a mental aspect of it that, because I was at AWC, And I view that as like the pinnacle of the sport I expected to come home and things to be more manageable.

And I'm not sure that that was everybody else's use. I mean, there might've been a lot of people who had been like training hard, working hard, like ISC national, they're going to give us everything that they got and showed up and went, yeah, these are the courses I expected. So that's why I say, I wonder if there's a little bit of my brain that just came home from AWC and expected to like, take a deep breath and go, Oh, I'm back in the States.

I get to do American agility now. And it's. It's going to be a little bit easier and then it wasn't. So, um, but yeah, I mean, it wasn't just me talking. There was, there was a lot of, but when you look at the list of who was in the finals, I mean, I think it was a lot of who you'd expect, so I think it all may be played out how it was.

I just would never have guessed such a low number of clean runs. I mean that you can go results. They're still posted and you can just look at the sheer number of sure.

Esteban: I've got them pulled up now. Round after round. Yeah, and

Sarah: I heard, sorry, I heard some of that on Facebook too, but and I really liked the attitude that a lot of people took.

They said, look, like you don't go to ISC to run clean. I mean, yes, you go to run clean, but you can't go expecting to run clean. Like these ISC courses are hard and you're testing your skills and people get excited. I can't remember who wrote this on Facebook, but I really liked it. They said people get excited about.

Parts of the course, you know, you make it through a difficult sequence, you know, within the course and the crowd goes wild. So it is kind of a completely different mentality, I think.

Esteban: Yeah. And what I was trying to say was that, um, I've often thought For many years now that the European Open, uh, had more challenging courses as a whole as a group than, uh, the AWC, which I think tends to be, in my opinion, a little bit easier.

And I have, in some years, been a little disappointed with what they put up there. Um, and because I do feel like, um, Yes, low Q rates kind of suck, right? It's got its own kind of problem, but it is a great differentiator of handling

Sarah: right

Esteban: strategy execution, that sort of thing where we're not in a situation where 10 papillons are all going to have a clean run and the very fastest one is going to win just because they are the very fastest dog, right?

There's some element of handling and strategy that requires the handler input. So, um. Now, we have said all of that, looking at these results here, and so the winner gets the title, right? So, I think one thing we can do is kind of just go through this very quickly. And so, as I look through the 8 inch class, I see, as Jen mentioned, a lot of the usual suspects, right?

Like, some of the very best Papillons. I see the two clean runs here at the top, and the winning run, a 42. 98 first place to Flint. Danica Hedges, and so they are the inaugural champ. Julie Currier with Raindrop, also a Papillon. So Papillon's finishing first and second with the second place. And the only other clean run, no, no time faults.

So when I say clean run, I mean, no time faults, no course faults, right? Just zeros across the board, just two there. And then when we go over to 12 inch. That's super interesting because when I look at the top three, these are three of the biggest names in this height, right? Laura Dolan and Pri, the poodle winning, uh, 40.

06 first place. Congratulations. Um, love watching your run. Marco with Bet, the Sheltie. Right behind really close 40. 24 and in this height class you have sunday and angie benneke So they are of course european open champions, right the all american and they had the winning time 38. 43, but they had 10 course faults.

However, those course faults Came about. So they are added on to the time. So their time was a 48, the winners, each one 40. So she ended up taking third. So again, just two clean runs, no course faults, no time faults here in the 12 inch class. Moving on to the 16 inch class. Uh, the winner was Emily Klarman border Collie vanish.

So again, you got the border Collie in the 16 inch height class with a sizzling 37. 09. And I believe that was the fastest of all heights. And second place. Right here, Jennifer Crank and Sheldie B. So congratulations, Jennifer, uh, 40. 750. So you were one of the eight, uh, clean runs, no course faults, no time faults.

So congratulations for that. And a 40, it's pretty fast. But, uh, So yeah,

Jennifer: I'm not, um, interestingly enough, I'll talk just briefly on that run. So by the time B ran, I had already run three other dogs. So I got four dogs into finals and B was seated the highest. So she was the last of the four dogs and, um, Wait, four dogs

Esteban: in the same height?

Jennifer: No, two twelves and two sixteenths. So I'd run the twelves and then we get to 16. I run my first 16 and then B was seated last, which is exactly how I wanted it to play out. Part of why I pulled my border collie is so that she would be seated lower and would go before B. Um, a lot of strategy in my world, in my game of agility.

Um, so. I, I realized at this point how poorly this course was going because now like 40 dogs have run and, um, I realized what was playing out and I thought to myself, if I can just get around, even if it's not pretty, if I can get around fault free, it's going to play out really well. Heck, it'll potentially even win the jump height based on how things are going.

So, um, I had a strategic. time consuming move on the course, which if you don't know, the course is a little bit tough, but basically there was a backside that was difficult to get to. And in a lot of people's attempt to run up to the backside, they were showing all this motion. It was a tunnel to a backside.

Uh, the dog saw all this forward motion going into the tunnel and the dogs were not getting to the backside. They were actually taking the jump as a front side. So, So if I recall, that's what happened to Sunday, hence the 10 faults is she got the off course, but then was able to very quickly turn around and go.

So it was a very, very fast 10 faults. Um, so what I did is I actually did not cue my dog to go straight out of the tunnel and I brought her out of the tunnel and did a 360 degree spin on course, but on the landing side of the backside, so as to not occur a fault. And then went forward and kicked her to the backside.

So in terms of world class runs or, or elite runs, it was not, um, it was not one I shared on Facebook, not one I was excited about saying. I like how you're telling

Esteban: me this now, as soon as I said, I'm going to go and look at some of these runs, you're like, whoa, whoa, whoa, there's something I need to tell you before you look at the run.

Jennifer: But what I will say is I appreciate it. What I will say is it was a strategic move and I just, I mean, I literally manipulated the results leading up to finals to make sure that B was the last dog that I had to run.

Esteban: So, like I said,

Jennifer: strategy is a big part of the game for me. Absolutely.

Esteban: You're the queen of strategy.

Jennifer: I was going to say, so I'm proud of myself for the strategy and the mental aspect, the run itself, I can't really say that I am proud of, but what I will say is that it was not a three fault, a three second mistake, like vanish was going to beat us no matter what she had a flawless run, she out trained us, she out handled us, she deserved the win.

So I don't want people think, oh, well, Jen's trying to justify that. If she had gotten that she would have won. No, I wouldn't have vanished, deserved it, vanished. And it may be cost me a second and a half to two, but you will see a big strategic spin because I was concerned about what was happening now that I expect figured two seconds wasted is better than the 10 faults that I would have gotten if she took the jump from the wrong side.

Esteban: Right, right. That is super interesting. And I, I officially can't wait to see these courses. Okay. Now onto the 20 inch class. And this is what you were talking about before there were no clean rounds here. So the winning run was from Steve Schwartz and Border Collie snap. Congratulations. I believe this is Steve, the agility nerd, right?

So congratulations, agility nerd. Fantastic job. Uh, winning this big event. Uh, his time was 46. 81, and that's after the five course faults were added to his time of 41. 81.

Sarah: Do you happen to remember, was that a contact or

Jennifer: was that a bar? I do not recall. Unfortunately, this was after the 16, so I was kind of cooling down.

I didn't get to see a lot of the 20s. Yep.

Esteban: Okay. And second place going to Danielle Scott and the awesomely named Iron Man, also a border collie, uh, with a time, uh, that would have been faster 39. 56, but incurring 10 course faults. And so, uh, dropping down to second. So super interesting there. And again, I, I, I.

I have already made my position very clear. He should be awarded the title regardless of, um, having incurred faults there. He is in fact the champion of the event. Okay, 24 inch, the winning handler, Regina Burton and Border Collie Witt 39. 720, which is Really well done in the context of looking at these results here.

I think 40 and better and Amber McCune, uh, and Howie taking second 42. 08. And they were the only two, uh, no fault, no time fault, no course fault, uh, runs in the 24 inch. Class so super interesting, uh, and, you know, as I read through all the names, you see lots of international experience, national level competitors, you know, well known folks here in the U S so very interesting event.

And I'll be interested to see and how it grows and changes and develops. And hopefully they'll be responsive to, you know, making the little improvements as they've done for so many of the other events that they've started.

Jennifer: Yeah, that's crazy. And one thing I'll quickly add in that we didn't, uh, I skipped over on accident when we were discussing scoring is you were able to enter and run at your preferred height, but you were scored with your championship height.

So we're at NAC. They have an entire division dedicated to preferred and then an entire debt. Division for regular. This was very similar to how they do Westminster. So you could jump at, let's say performance 12 or preferred 12, but you were going to be scored with the 16 inch dog. So in finals, there was a little bit of, you know, run a couple at one height.

Okay. Drop the bars down and go back up. And a little bit of the scoring in there as well. So you could. You could compete at your preferred height. And then what they did for the eight inches and the four inches is they did keep like the spread jumps and the tire jumps. Um, a KC, uh, heights because the other heights 12 16, 20 and 24 are FCI heights.

So they followed FCI spread jumps and regulations and distances, uh, but since there are no four or eight inches in FCI, uh, they did keep the a KC heightened distances, uh, for those dogs in the lowering of the aframe as well.

Esteban: So, so yeah, you're having probably having the same thought I am.

Sarah: So what my question, my first question is, do you know if one of those preferred dogs had one, what title they get in front of their name?

Does it change instead of being an ISC champ? It's. It's ISC champions, whether it's like regular preferred.

Jennifer: I, I'm 99. 9 percent sure. Cause I like you and kind of read the rules, know the rules and go to the scoring. There was no separate preferred title. You would get ISCH in front of your name.

Esteban: And so I understanding this correctly, where if let's say I'm showing up there and I know.

that, I don't know, I have the second fastest dog in that height class and if the fastest dog shows up and we both run clean, I'm going to lose. But aha, I'm entered at 16 inch preferred and I know it's 16 inch preferred. I would beat that dog because I'm going to pick up a second and a half. That I could thus game the system.

Jennifer: Yes. Is that what I'm hearing here? Theoretically, you are correct. I will also say, because now you have me pulling up the rules, and I also will say that I am potentially giving a huge retraction here, depending on the wording of this and the interpretation, but it does say. everybody. A score must be earned from finals to obtain both a placement and its first place ISCH prefix title.

In my mind, I interpreted that when it said a score must be earned to mean a perfect score, but that might not be the case. They might just be saying you must complete the course and complete the obstacles, in which case. So if everybody

Sarah: eliminated, there would be no person, right? So

Jennifer: it may imply that Steve's 95 was in fact a score.

Because it just says a score must be, and he would get one. So we're going to hope that's the case because I'm with you. I'd love for him to get it. But I, when I read it, I remember thinking, oh, this is like the NAC rule. Like you have to be clean, but it doesn't say you have to have a perfect score. It just says a score must be earned.

Esteban: Okay, well, we will definitely update people because I think we should just shoot him a quick message and see what the deal is. Um, and because there are probably going to be people then who know the answer to this and they listen the entire podcast and they're like, no, you're absolutely right or no, you're absolutely correct,

Sarah: right?

Esteban: Or wrong or, or right, right,

Sarah: right. Yeah, that's super interesting about the title because I don't know, I feel like there's, there is a, there is a type of person that when there is a title to be won wants to win the title, right? Sure. You know what I mean? Like, uh, people who like to check off boxes and complete quests, those kinds of people.

And, um, I, I think, uh, you know, if you really want to get that title that dropping your height and doing preferred could be a way to do it.

Esteban: Yeah. It won't be an issue until you show up when you're in the entire 20 inch classes, jumping. P16.

Sarah: Yeah. But what I've always said about this particular issue is for the most part, it works itself out.

No, you know, everybody kind of does what's right for themselves and their dogs. But the moment Westminster says, we'll give a million dollars to the winner. Suddenly everybody's going to be preferred, right? It's like when there's cause it does give you a competitive advantage. So, but that's my computer brain always looking for the, the like edge cases, you know, of, of any particular set of rules.

Jennifer: Yeah, and we didn't see any of the five winners were not coming from preferred, but we did see some other top placements coming from preferred.

Sarah: But I do think it is a good way to, um, to include more dogs, um, both preferred dogs, but also maybe dogs that have a lot of skills, but not bars. Um, and giving them something, you know, to really achieve and to shoot for and stuff like that.

So from that perspective, I like it from the like. Competitive fair is fair. How do you compare scores thing? You know, I have some questions, but that's okay. So like we should probably wrap up here pretty soon, but Jen, I guess in closing, what else do you have to say about the event, about kind of the vibe of the event, how it felt, how it was received, like, you know, what was it like as a competitor?

Um, you know, were you just out there? putting in the work, putting in your runs or like, were you having a good time? Like how did that go?

Jennifer: I think that it was a very, very nice, nicely run event. I mean, it was a very traditional, very classic AKC event for anybody who's been to a big AKC event. I mean, they, they do a good job, you know, they have the banners, they have the huge ribbons, they have the photo booth.

Um, they brought in, um, Mike, um, pageant to do dirt. The surface was great. Um, they were doing a lot of grooming of it, watering it. Um, I, I always felt like I was at a national event and I think that's hard when you only have two rings and you're kind of in a dirt arena. Um, like you, you kind of think, am I at a national event or am I at a local show?

And it did for me. Feel national caliber. I know there were a few local people that felt like they were just driving to their local event because that facility does hold local events But I thought that they did a good job of making it feel like a national event. So I really liked Um the vibe of it. Um, I loved that.

It was two days I mean we're getting to a point where these agility events there's more and more of them and they're getting bigger and bigger and Bigger, I loved that. I worked a half day on friday drove down, showed Saturday, Sunday, came home Sunday night. That was huge for me. Um, the time schedule was off, so they need to make some adjustments for that.

I don't think they were, uh, calibrating the length of the courses and how long it would take people to do them. Um, and my fear is because that first day was so long, they are looking at going to a third day, which I'm not in favor of, but that's not my call. Um, The courses, you know, they were challenging.

They were good. The teams that were there, they were good. I liked how the event ran. Um, as I said, the only two things that I would make the adjustment on is go ahead and let the off courses be a zero because that's FCI scoring. That's what I think should be done. And then get rid of the team event. Um, But yeah, I thought that they did a good job.

I, I think probably on their end, there's a lot of kinks. They all, all the reps and the organizers at AKC kind of looked like they were running around, not really sure what to do, but as the exhibitor side, it looked, it ran great. I think it was just a lot of new stuff for them. Um, so yeah, I, I liked the event.

I'm a fan. I hope they continue to do it. Um, you know, what changes they make going forward. It's hard to say, but, uh, no, I thought it was, I thought it was a very well run event.

Sarah: Awesome. And one last thing that I wanted to, um, put in here at the very, very end, uh, which we didn't say when we were talking about the structure of the event is that, um, all the heights ran the same course.

So like for people who in the United States, like, uh, that's all of our, all of our events are like that, but, you know, you know, this is kind of that blend between AKC and, you You know, uh, FCI or, or overseas or European agility. And, and when we do things like the agility of our championships and tryouts and, um, and, uh, the European open, those all have different courses for each of the different heights.

Um, and here that they did not do that. So the, the eights were running the same course as the 24. So that's, you know, for this kind of style, of course, that's a little bit different. All right. Well, Thank you so much, Jen, for kind of giving us the complete lowdown. Super interesting. I'm, I'm very, um, intrigued to see where it goes.

I think the fact that they gave out a title means it's not going anywhere. Like, you're not going to give out one round of titles and then give up, you know? Like, There, that's definitely a huge signal that, um, this is here to stay and it will continue to like evolve and develop and all of that stuff. So we will reconvene in next year and see, you know, what kind of, uh, changes happened to it.

Jennifer: Yeah. And normally at the end of the big events, they announce the dates and location for the next year's event. They did not do that, but I can tell. So that would be my request, AKC. I'm pleading for you to tell us when and where for next year, so we can plan to attend it once again.

Sarah: Awesome. All right. And that's it for this week's podcast.

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