I was re-reading Leslie McDevitt's great book Control Unleashed and it struck a chord with me as a competitor in Working Trials.
Briefly the background was Leslie's dog Rumour who was her "competition dog" to work in Agility and subsequently had to retire at a very early age due to a incurable spinal condition. Leslie stopped doing all training with him and even the things he could do and enjoyed. She lost her enjoyment in the dog and resented his inability tocompete. Leslie took up Rally-O with Rumour but he just wasn't having fun and it was then that Leslie realised she had changed the way in which she interacted with her dogs becaue of competing. Rumour became a pet dog and Leslie went back to doing a little bit of training with him on the things they enjoyed and their relationship flourished.
I understood where Leslie was coming from. My GSD Cooper came to me as a puppy and I was already in Trials with my Cocker but I wanted to progress through the stakes and needed a bigger dog. Cooper was from a great sire and I had high hopes and he did really well in his first two Championships qualifying in 2 stakes and being placed. Unfortunately he had an accident on the scale jump and although I didn't know it at the time it was his last competition at the age of 3. He had severe spondylosis and was out of trials for good. I was very disappointed as this was "the dog" and for a while I did nothing with him - "what was the point of doing training if he wasn't competing?"
Neither Cooper nor I were happy though and I decided that as he and I loved tracking we would continue -it was good exercise for his muscles and his brain! and we enjoyed the time together. We joined in the golden oldies fun competitions where the dogs were spoiled and had great fun tracking and searching and when he died aged 10 I can honestly say he was still "the dog" to me. We had a great life together, we had fun and he was the funniest clown I have ever met! I am so glad I came to my senses quickly and enjoyed who he was as dog and not a competition dog.
It is often the case in canine sports that when the dog can't compete they no longer do any of the activities they so enjoyed as the handler gets another "competition dog". So what is about canine sport we enjoy? Is is the enjoyment of a dog using his natural abilities or is the competitive streak? We miss out on so much if it is just for competition....
