BCOA 2009 and the MBC Specialty

It's six days past....and I am still not completely recovered (although that may be due to other factors from this week...more later). After missing the California event, I was chomping at the bit to be at Nationals again, and it was great to see folks that I pretty much only see at Nationals. The hotel and grounds were FABULOUS and the large ring next to the river set a charming stage despite the long, downhill walk to it (again...more later). We found a great spot to park the Zoibus which allowed us to set up a double-size ex-pen to potty the dogs on a grassy median right beside it. This enormously cut the amount of time to ex and feed our critters during the stay. Solo and Sassi got to hang in the room while we were there, and the weather pretty much cooperated with the youngsters that stayed cozy in the van.

Due to time constraints and also not having much to run, we skipped the racing and coursing events - we certainly hope to have entries in 2010 for them! This being the case, our first event was the Futurity, where Ozzy took a 4th placement in the 6-9 Puppy Dog class.

The next day in Sweeps, diminutive Sparkk took 2nd in a large 6-9 Puppy Bitch class, which thrilled us to no end, especially since she looked practically microscopic in size next to the other entries. She sure had the attitude and showiness of a BIG dog though! Burni then provided us with much excitement by winning his 8-9 Veteran Sweepstakes class, not showing his age one bit.

Ozzy on the move
We had a touch more excitement in the Regular Classes, beginning with the 6-9 Month Puppy Dogs. The entries present for the class totaled 12 and Ozzy took 3rd place and his brother Vlad (owned by Rebecca Neal) was 4th. Interestingly, 2 other sibs from a friend's litter were 1st/2nd and are somewhat closely related to the OZZlings. In the Bred By Exhibitor Bitch class, Faina and Pumpkin both made the cut, but in the end left without a ribbon, as did Solo and Sassi in the Best of Breed class. Certainly better than being dismissed right off the bat, so we were happy for that!


Solo in BOB


Sassi in BOB
The day after the conclusion of the BCOA National was the Midwest Borzoi Club regional specialty show. I was pretty much beat from the days previous and my ankles were having an uproar, but we labored on! In the Sweepstakes classes, Ozzy was 3rd in 6-9 Month Puppy Dog and Burni was Best of Opposite Sex in Veteran Sweeps. In the regular classes, Ozzy took 2nd and little (microscopic) Sparkk WON her 6-9 Month Puppy Bitch class! Burni went on to win his Veterans class as well.


Lynn showing Sparkk


Burni
We had a wonderful time, a touch of success, and good times catching up with people we don't get to see often. Looking forward to next year in Kentucky!!

Three's a Charm (SilkenFest 2009)

We had an unbelievable Silken Windhound Nationals experience this year - I am completely floored! In addition to our show ring experiences, we got to meet up with several folks who have dogs from us (both Silken and Borzoi) and see how our pups have grown - and some were being shown as well. Nice to see our dogs in the ring with someone else handling them!

Nan brought out Andres (Solo/Duri; borzoi) - he has forgotten he is a dog as he is the only one and doesn't see much in the way of dogs (except the occasional "ankle biter") out his way. But he is a stunning adolescent male with coat so shiny it's almost blinding. Deb and her daughter also brought Mukki (Bruce/Luna; silken) along for a visit - he grew into such a lovely boy with luscious coat and a grin for everyone. Also got to see Voodoo (now with the Peffers) and her mother Jett (VooDoo's mother, with Ahryn); Kandi's 2 daughters (Blondie and Oreo) from her leased breeding; Tim and Vicki Frey had Sylvi (Bruce/Luna) and Enzo (Isaak/Serena) along to show and their sibling Ajax was also there with Lynn Wall; and Tripp with Pam all the way from CT (and boy was that WORTH it!) - I did not have near enough time to visit with everyone as much as I wanted to - not even Pat Shaw who was so kind as to put us and our crew up at her home for the weekend!

On Saturday we took care of some health testing on several dogs and then began visiting with folks. Victor was at the SLASH LGRA meet with Nox since we decided to take advantage of it being at the same location. It paid off as she won the meet and earned 2 GRC/NRC points! We also had the huge shrimp boil (and pig out) - tables lined up with brown paper and the menfolk dumping fresh from the pot corn, potatoes, shrimp and sausage among the various trays of fresh fruit available for desert and strategically placed bottles of cocktail sauce and squeezy butter. We opened up the sangria that Nan had brought and shared amongst several folks in our vicinity.

Sunday was the day of the showing festivities and started off with Puppy Sweepstakes. Shadow won his class (9-12) with brother Enzo taking third. Goth and Pryss both won their classes and Fanci and Darkun both took 4th in their classes. Kandi's daughter Blondie also won her class. Pryss then went on to win Best in Sweepstakes and Goth took Best Opposite in Sweeps!!

The Regular classes had some nice surprises for us as well. In the 9-12 month puppy dog class, the three brothers, Shadow, Ajax and Enzo took 2nd through 4th places respectively. Gabe won the Bred-By Exhibitor dog class and Tripp won the Open dog class, with his almost 9 year old great-grandpa Ivanhoe taking 2nd to him. Tripp then went on to take Winners Dog and Gabe got Reserve. Fanci was 4th in the 9-12 puppy bitch class and Blondie was 3rd (I was so thrilled to see how she and her sister Oreo have turned out, although poor Oreo managed to cut her pad and was slightly off - but they are stunning youngsters). Pryss won the 12-18 Month class and Maverick's daughter Storm (bred by Lori at Elessar) was 3rd. A naughty Missi was 3rd in the Novice class and still got compliments despite her bratty behavior. Radar shown by a friend for her new owner, Mary) was 2nd in the class and I overheard the judge comment that she was a beautiful bitch, but a lunatic (I 100% agree - she has always been a hard one to work with!!). In the Bred By bitch class Luna was 2nd and Kandi 3rd. Our most amazing class performance was Trouble winning the largest class there - Open Bitch (11 entries). I don't think anyone recognized her since she was behaving so well! Siren, on the other hand, declined to participate and Victor couldn't even get her out from under the tent - she sat her hiney down and outright refused. Sylvi and VooDoo were also there but unfortunately didn't get placements. In the end, Trouble won Reserve Winners Bitch!

By the time Best of Breed came around, I thought I was going to fall over from all the dogs we had shown. Tyler was on "autopilot" though - and I just let out his lead and held on to the very end as he zipped around the ring like a Brittany and pretty much showed himself while I huffed and puffed behind him. I am still on cloud nine - as Tyler earned his third national specialty win! He has now won the two highest entries of Silkenfest (2009 and 2007) in addition to the 2006 show. This also finished his ISWS Grand Champion title!

A nice finish for this year's Silkenfest was Ivanhoe winning the inaugural Stud Dog class, represented by Tyler, Kandi and VooDoo. He sure gave the youngsters a run for it in the classes as well. He just needs a qualifying specialty win to complete his ISWS title - but we figure it will be hard as he lost some teeth when he broke his lower jaw a few years ago.

Needless to say - we floated home!

2008 Race Nationals (LGRA/NOTRA)

Our local club, GIT (Gazehounds in Texas) hosted the 2008 OB LGRA/NOTRA nationals (straight- and oval-racing) this past weekend at WindyGlen in Boswell, OK. Victor had gone up Friday mid-day, and I went up after getting home from work and ex'ing and feeding the rest of our crew, and giving Arthur a bath so he could look all fancy for his appearance in the Legends event. Nothing like driving around at midnight in the middle of nowhere on super-dark country road on Hallow's Eve! It was a bit spooky, and on at least one occasion I thought I had missed the turn - it looked completely different in the dark!

We had set the Zoibus up for camping, and even splurged on a plug-in so we could have a/c if we needed it (we did!) and I was quite content to pass out on the air mattress up on the platform - it seemed like I had just settled in when the alarm clock buzzed at 530am. Yuk! I had two Monster energy drinks before noon - I needed an intravenous caffeine set-up though! I had volunteered to work the boards, in addition to having handled the formatting of the race catalog and any advertisements, and of course, we had the girls to run. Nox had a few meets under her, but this was Pumpkin's first official meet after having had training practices with sister Nox at the last WindyGlen meet. Also along were Buster, for some socialization, and Magik, whose ear hematoma had burst earlier in the week and we were treating it (antibiotics and 'drainage maintenance').

Victor walking Buster in the way-too-early morn
In the first program on Saturday, Nox came in 2nd and Pumpkin 4th. In the pictures, you could see Pumpkin contemplating the box a bit - she had pretty much been introduced to it that morning as Victor hadn't practiced her on Friday afternoon during the scheduled time. Thankfully she wasn't too completely fazed by it. Both girls finished 4th in the 2nd program (Nox had moved up to a higher race), and then in the 3rd program, darned if Nox didn't decide to try and get Pumpkin to play about halfway down the track. So much for being able to run the sibs together! At least Pumpkin kept on going and she got the Turtle award for the day (with a new toy).

For me, the highlight of the day was the Legends program. I had entered Arthur, so folks could see that the #1 racing Borzoi waaaaay back from 2000 is still up and around with a bit of get-up-n-GO! Check out the pictures in the online album - the ol' man can still kick up a dirt trail, he's not just loping easy down the track, hes still diggin' in at 10 1/2 years of age. Although he did learn that he can't stop and fling himself down on the squawker like he used to. But he'll still pick it up after having his muzzle removed - and be really proud of it too!

Saturday after the racing (we finished early thanks to everyone's hard work and efficiency), I attempted a brief nap before the FEAST that arrived. Fabulous slabs of medium rare prime rib, baked potatoes, salad, brownies...I gorged myself. Haven't had beef that good in a while. We also sat and chatted with some folk for a while before finally wandering back to the van to crash. We also got an extra hour of sleep (although it never seems enough to me) thanks to turning the clocks back that night!

On Sunday, Magik ended up being recruited to run in place of Pumpkin since we figured it wouldn't be a good idea to let the sibs run together again - which was unavoidable as both were NOTRA FTEs. The night before we asked a friend of ours if she could pick up some knee-highs at the Hugo Walmart to try and hold down Magik's ear so that it wouldn't bother her by flopping around. It worked - but the visual was hysterical. I don't think Magik was particularly amused - but she always looks pouty.

Magik shows fine form for a Veteran racer, despite the funny headgear
In the first race program, Nox ended up being the cream in the oreo cookie between one dog fouling another - after holding her own between them for a while, she stopped at the backstretch and came back the other way. It was disappointing, especially considering that she had not shown this tendency in the practices she had - we hoped it was just that she couldn't handle whatever behavior that resulted in a foul on another racer and just left its proximity - so we left her in for the 2nd program. The 2nd and 3rd programs she did well, finishing each race without incident...although we did have an interesting occurence. At the end of the 3rd program, as she was closing in on the finish line, her head was lifted and she seemed a bit distracted. My heart sank and I prayed she would cross the finish (she was several lengths in front) - which she did, and then squatted almost immediately after the finish line. You can find the answer to her mysterious distraction HERE - she was taking care of business while...taking care of business. Dan Gauss (Shot on Site) caught the moment in several frames. We were laughing hysterically when we first noticed this while going through all the photos and making our choices to take home. Nox's DNF precluded her from getting any points, but we're still proud of our girl.

Magik came away with the Best Veteran Award (and the Turtle) and got some nice bling for her trouble and Nox and Pumpkin got some nice runs in and we've got our fingers crossed for the future.