Cheltenham, mid-80s.
Because of the on-going heat, I'm reluctant to run Laddie much on land, and even on water, I feel I should keep down the distance. So today was all water blinds, all 2" bumpers, and none too long.
Retrieves A-D were at the same location as last time, about 35y, all orange bumpers. A & D were off the point, B & C were across the point. Laddie ran all of them silently. I liked the way he ran B & C: He took a wide line, then accepted a cast onto the point.
Retrieve E was 180y. I set up an LP with a WB, then ran him from the other side of the pond. The line was wide of one point on the right, then across the next point on the right. Laddie stayed responsive to the whistle and took every cast correctly, but he didn't carry them well so we needed a lot of WSCs. I felt it was a reasonable performance. The best news is that he didn't vocalize on any cast.
Retrieves F &G were at a new location. I lay two WBs where they'd be visible from the SLs. The distance was 45y. F was on a line wide of the point, G was on a line across the point. Again Laddie required no handling on the bypass, a little handling on the line across the point, and we had no vocalizing.
Retrieves H & I were once more with white 2" bumpers, but at 90y, I now think they were not sufficiently visible from the start line. In any case, H was across the point, and unfortunately included one bark, when I cast Laddie horizontally off the point. But other WSCs were also needed to get him into the correct location on the point, and he took those silently. No handling was needed for the final retrieve bypassing the point.
I'd like to try this again next time we're here, with better visibility of the destination, and see if Laddie can take that cast without vocalizing. Then, in another session, we'd do it as cold blinds.
LL&L
No comments:
Post a Comment