I got Lucy when she was three years old and it was the fourth place that she lived. Lucy was over 40 pounds and had not been groomed in a long time. The next year we started dog 4H. We did showmanship, obedience, and agility. After the first year we started going to an additional agility class. Soon after that she started to run. Before that she only walked around the course. Now she was learning to go faster because we would put targets with food on them after jumps or other obstacles. She would run to get the food then she started to like agility and did not need the targets anymore. Now agility is Lucy’s favorite thing to dog. At the same time we started doing Rally. In June 2005 we entered our first AKC Rally trail. Lucy got a 94 and first place in Rally Novice A. Two months later Lucy qualified in both Standard and Jumper at our first AKC Agility Trial. Then in September of that year I finished her Rally Novice title and got the first leg of her CD. By the next year Lucy had earned CD, RE, and Novice & Open Agility titles. We were also working on AKC Tracking at the time.

In agility she was getting very consistent and moved up to the excellent level after only a few trials. Then we stopped most of the other competition to work on our Rally Advanced Excellent title. By August we had completed the 10 double qualifying scores in Rally Advanced and Rally Excellent. We had been looking forward to September 1, 2006 because starting on that day Lucy would be able to jump at 4”; we have been running in the preferred class. It is the same course but the dog can run at one jump height lower. Lucy had been running at 8” and now that cut off height for 8” had moved from 10” to 11” – Lucy is 10.75”.

In July 2006 Lucy had moved to the highest level of agility. We could start working on the Agility Championship. To get this title we needed to qualify in both classed on the same day 20 times. On September 1st we went to the first trial that Lucy could jump 4”. We were the first dog up that day. I had thought that it would be easier to qualify now at 4” but when we ran that course Lucy was faster than ever before. She ran by the first weave pole so we did not qualify. That weekend we only got one Q. The next few trials after that had the same results. She even dropped the bars on the course, something that she almost never did before.

We started working on more courses at 4” and Lucy would run very fast and still qualify. In November, Lucy passed the tracking test. Now we had a VCD2 title. The track was almost 500 yards long and Lucy finished it in only five minutes. In December, Lucy got four double Q’s at the two trials. By the end of the month we have a total of 5 double Q’s. Lucy was getting must better and by the end of July was had 19 of the 20 required double Q’s. Our next trial was not until the end of August in Oregon. We were entered three days and drove up the night before to camp at the fairgrounds. Lucy was first up the next day in the excellent standard. I walked the course and found it very hard and I did not have very much time. We ran very fast and qualified. Now we only had to qualify on the Jumpers course to get our 20th double Q. We had another perfect run and finished Lucy’s Agility Championship. We got a ribbon and a jump bar for people to sign – this was Lucy’s 19th AKC title. Today Lucy is officially known as Lucy VCD2 MXP2 MJP2 RAE PAX, CGC.