mistressofmuses

I had a 9 and a half hour workday, but some dogs got to go on a field trip and run. Lol


The beaft. Why her tongue so long.


And her times for today!

She has definitely seemed to settle into some fairly consistent times, which is to say "between 10 and 11 seconds." I'm happy with it, even if I do hope she breaks 10 seconds again someday!

Alex is hoping that she can get her FCAT by the end of the year. (The top title for the event. Her big fancy ribbon from a while back is for her intermediate title!) He hopes that once she's gotten the top FastCAT title, that he can do some new events with her. Maybe Rally or Barn Hunt? Though she seems to like FastCAT so well, I wouldn't want her to stop just because she got top points, ha. Maybe then we can just do fun runs, haha.

Look at her big fancy DCAT ribbon! :D

Bella got to do two more FastCATs this weekend, semi-unplanned.

So, she got her DCAT, which is the intermediate title for the event, back at her event in February. Back when she got her BCAT (the first-level title), she got a big fancy ribbon the same day. This time, they took down her information, but said she'd get her fancy ribbon at the next event. (At the time we assumed that they had to wait for the new runs to be officially tallied with the AKC.)

Her next event was the one from last weekend... but at that event they said oops, it was supposed to have been mailed to us! We could pick it up in person, as long as it was at an event sponsored by the same organizers as the one she titled at. (But this one was the same organizers...) But! The lady who had Bella's ribbon would be at a different event being held April 03-05, would Bella be at that one?

Alex hadn't known about that one, so he entered her for Friday.


She almost broke ten seconds again. So close! (Ignore that she apparently got cheese crumbs on her ribbons, lol.) Also ignore the date on the ribbons - this did actually happen on the 3rd.

But when Alex asked about her DCAT ribbon they said, oops, the lady who has them isn't here for the Friday event, only Saturday and Sunday. *grumble grumble*

So just to make it worth the drive, Alex entered her again for today. I think this is the first time she's run twice in one weekend, Nope, she did enter a Thursday and a Sunday at a previous event. Dogs are allowed to enter as many days in a row as they want; just limited to two runs per day.


More pretty average times for Bella! Haha.


Look at how fancy her ribbon is! It's even personalized, which explains why she didn't get it same-day.

Alex said that as soon as her fancy ribbon photoshoot was done, she wanted to run around for several more minutes, haha. Apparently even two events isn't enough to burn through all the energy!

Bella got to go to another FastCAT today! (I wish I'd been there instead of dealing with a class close, but alas.)


The runner!


SHE DID SO GOOD!!

Those are her best times ever! She broke 10 seconds, which was what I've been hoping for! And the second run was barely over the 10 second mark. I'm so proud, haha. (As Alex said, this is also a little bit of vindication for the previous one down in Colorado Springs. He thought she was under 10 seconds, but the timer malfunctioned and didn't record her time, so she had to redo the run.)

Apparently a lot of people said their dogs were having a good day today. The ground was very level, and while it was a grass track, the grass was obviously dead and very short, so it was really good footing.

I'm so delighted that she did so well, and had such a great pair of runs.

This does get her the DCAT designation, which is the intermediate AKC title for FastCAT, though she'll get her fancy ribbon sometime next month when the point totals from today are officially tallied.


Looking a little more tired after all that effort.

The beaft.

Yesterday, Alex took Bella to a FastCAT. It was hosted by the same organization he prefers. (The events are generally hosted by a particular kennel club, but there are bigger organizations that also help to run them. "Harmony Dog Sports" does a bunch of the ones in our region, and Alex likes them. They tend to be friendly and helpful.)

It... sounds like this one was a shitshow from start to finish. The usual woman who directs it wasn't there, and it seemed the people who were kind of floundered.

He said that it took forever to get checked in, because people kept just walking up to the table and ignoring the big long line of people waiting, and the hosts didn't ever tell them to stop.

Then there was a group of people with five dogs, who all wanted to do "fun runs." (These runs don't get times recorded for the dogs' records, but are just for fun/practice.) But those are supposed to be held when the paid entrants are either done, or when there's a serious lull in the day. Instead, for some reason, they kept cutting to the front of the enormously long line with their whole pack of dogs.

Finally! It was Bella's turn!

Alex had gone down to "catch" her at the end of the run, with one of the organization volunteers releasing her at the start line. First, the guy releasing her let her go before Alex was inside the catch box, but Bella ran anyway, so it was fine.

And Alex was thrilled! It was definitely one of her fastest runs, and Alex said he'd be willing to bet she was under 10 seconds (which has been the thing I've really hoped for her to manage!)

...Oops, the timer malfunctioned. Oh well!

Oh well, she can go run again.

*Sigh.* Yes, she *can* run again, but now she's tired after having just done one, and she already has a second one that she's supposed to do. The dogs are limited to only two runs a day *because* it can be so exhausting... They'll let her have a re-do and still do her second official run, but that does mean she's doing three runs on the day. :/

She repeated her run, but Alex said she was visibly a bit tired, and it came in just over 11 seconds.

The line to get the second run in was super long, so Alex waited for a while, letting Bella get some water and a snack. The event was extremely busy and absolutely packed.

Finally she goes to do the second run, and the volunteer releasing her did a great job hyping her up in line! The second run comes in at 10.82 seconds. Neither score is terrible, but it's frustrating that she had a much better one - that may well have been a personal best for her - and she doesn't get credit for it due to the malfunction. I didn't see her run, obviously, but Alex is usually pretty good at guessing how fast they are, so if he says he thinks it might have been under 10, I believe him.

So Alex goes to get her ribbons... and the attendant says he can't find her first run's score. (Alex said he was just about ready to cry at that point, ha.)

...They did eventually find it. They wrote "Pit Bull" as her breed, but... FastCAT is an AKC event, and the AKC does not recognize pit bulls as a breed. Bella has to run as an "All American Dog," which is basically their no-breed "pet" registry. So, not mad that they recognize what she is, but... not sure why they wrote a category that does not exist per the organization.

Alex was then trying to go get the second score, and again with just tons of people cutting in front of him in line. (He was trying to leave enough room between her and any of the other dogs in the tent; a bunch of wound-up dogs in a confined area can go bad if any of them get upset about personal space, but people just kept crowding in in front of him.) He ended up getting so frustrated that he left without picking up her second score. It should still be recorded for her, it's just our sticker for the ribbon that he didn't get. I wrote the time down on a sticker later so that we have it, but still annoying.


That second one should be the "10.82" score.

Ugh. What a mess. I'm less sad than usual about missing her events.

We thought this would be the last one of 2025, but a different organization has one for December 6th. Still a weekend, so I still can't go, but maybe they'll have another shot before the end of the year.

(Bella's silly face from a few days ago.)

Today, Alex took Bella to another FastCAT! (I so wish that they were ever held on days that I have off, but they almost never are.)



She did well! Apparently on the first run she slowed down midway because she was distracted by the mid-field judge, ha.

I still hope for her to someday break 10 seconds, but the 10-12 second timeframe seems to be about her "normal."

She has another next Friday, so we'll see how that one goes, too.

The whole dog show up in Greeley, where Bella ran a FastCAT on Thursday, ran from Thursday through the weekend.

Since she'd had a chance to rest for a couple of days, Alex decided to take her back today.


She did it!



Her first time was really good. Her second one wasn't great, but Alex said she was slowing down at the end of it. It was a hot day again, so not terribly surprising. He said they had some kiddie pools set up on the "go" line for the dogs to cool off in, but even so.

She was certainly completely full of energy again by the time I got home from work, lol.

On Monday, we took Bella to a FastCAT competition. It's rare for them to be on anything other than a weekend, so it was nice to get to go for a change! This is only the second time I've been able to go with her.

Alex let her go at the start of the run, and I caught her at the end. The first run felt really slow, but was actually a better time than I'd expected. The second one was a fairly decent time, though she'd started to slow down a little bit by the end.


It's Bella!


I was using the selfie camera to try and get a better pic of Bella in the car, but then we took an actual selfie. Sort of, haha. Me, Bella, and Alex. I am not actually choking her.

Five more pictures:

This event was at the Adams County fairgrounds, which had a nice little pond to look out on.


Pelican attaaaaack! (Half-flying across the pond to check out whether some people might feed it.)


Bella's times weren't amazing, but were respectable! Not her best times, but it wasn't *that* long ago that I didn't expect she'd ever get times like these, ha. (They accidentally wrote "2" on her first run tag, but the top one was run #1.)


Little Bella no-ears.


Too Many Pelicans.

After the FastCAT, we were reluctant to head straight back home. We ended up heading out east toward the plains a bit, just to kind of take a drive and see if there was anything interesting. We were hopeful maybe some dramatic thunderstorms might come up, but those didn't happen until later in the evening.

We did stop at a rest stop for a while, and I got to see a bunch of great-tailed grackles, which are quite different than the usual common grackles we get. They're much bigger!


Looking up through the branches of a tree, lots of grackle nests!

We also saw turkeys! And a hawk swoop down and come up carrying a snake, which was pretty impressive. (Sadly, no pictures.)

It was a nice drive, even though we didn't actually get any exciting weather.

Back on Sunday, right after Alex got back from Kansas, he took Bella to another FastCAT competition. I wish they weren't always on weekends - I'd rather be doing that than work!




Second run was a new personal best! (I do not know why they're labeled 3 and 4; it's a max of two per day.)


And then she took a nap.

Alex bought a few prints from the photographer at her previous FastCAT at the end of February:

3 more pictures of the pictures from last time:

Running!


Tongue flailing!


So intense!

After the last FastCAT competition we went to in Estes Park, we'd checked for any other upcoming events, but there wasn't anything until February.

Last Saturday, Alex checked again just in case, to discover there was one that was reasonably close... that weekend. Finding out on Saturday meant it was too late for that day, but they were also running on Sunday. I had to work, but Alex could take her!

This one was presented by the Irish Wolfhound club!

The huntmaster from the one in Estes volunteered to release Bella so that Alex could catch her at the finish line.


Pictured after her two runs, apparently wanting to go again!

Her first competition each of her runs was over 30 seconds. Her second event, the one I got to go to, her first run was over 30, but her second was less than half that at 14.21, and I was very proud!

And how did she do this time?


SHE DID SO GOOD!

11.84 and 10.80 seconds!

She really seems to "get it" now, and that was way faster than I expected! I'm so impressed!

-

And speaking of FastCATs, I never got around to posting her professional pictures from the one in Estes. They had a photographer down past the finish line who photographed the dogs, and then you can buy copies if you want. We bought a couple, just because it was nice to have shots of her running. :)


Liftoff!


On the hunt!

Such intensity for the lure!

On Sunday, Alex took Bella to her first FastCAT competition. (CAT stands for Coursing Ability Test, not anything to do with cats, lol.) It's basically having your dog run as fast as possible for 100 yards. Since Bella loves running and chasing, it seemed like something she'd enjoy doing.

She... was not very good at it, lol. Sounds like she was mostly just distracted, in part because they had a technical difficulty right at the start of her first run, which delayed her for a few minutes, and by the time she could go, she was more excited to play with the person who was releasing her at the start line. (Alex was at the finish line.)


But she got participation ribbons, lol. (Picture from Alex.)


Bella continues to enjoy wildlife rehab shows. She was very charmed by a seal! (And Cy as a pillow.)


Summer "Berry Mad" Refresher, having had a nice caterpillar from my mom's garden. She is quite round.


I wanted a picture of Cy with his current favorite toy (a crinkly rainbow bagel). The way he was gnawing on it made his head look weirdly shaped, lol.


Here he is, looking a bit more proportional, laying on the bed.