On Friday Huld earned her third leg for her Rally Excellent, RE, title. In rather rapid succession she has earned her Rally Novice, Rally Advanced and Rally Excellent titles.

Rally is one of the dog sports that is becoming more popular especially with novice handlers. It’s a great way to get acquainted with dog sports like agility and obedience because there is less pressure on both the dog and the handler to do things perfectly, especially at the Rally Novice level.

There are three levels of rally: Rally Novice, Rally Advanced and Rally Excellent.

To earn a title at each level a dog and handler must work together as a team and successfully do all the exercises on a rally course. A qualifying score is 70 points out of a possible 100 points. Points are subtracted from 100 each time a team doesn’t do the exercise correctly. Judges can take off points for things like not performing the task correctly, having a leash that is too tight, excessive barking, etc.

Each time the team qualifies, they earn a leg toward the title. Three legs are necessary in order to finish and get the title. Beginning dogs can earn their Rally Novice, RN, title. Exercises in Rally Novice are done on leash. Exercises in Rally Advanced and Rally Excellent are done off leash and require increasing amounts of skill.

Frankly, Huld and I were not going to go as far as Rally Excellent. We had earned titles in Rally Novice and Rally Advanced and, I at least, was ready to retire.

She finished her Rally Advanced title in three shows but we had entered four shows. The closing date for future shows often comes before you know if you have qualified for current shows. So you may be entering your dog in a Rally Advanced show before you know if you have finished or qualified for a title.

If you have earned your three legs for a title, the Show Steward will let you move up to the next level if you ask. Because we had already paid for the fourth show, we went to the show, asked to be moved up, and were moved up to Excellent and qualified.

Let me say this about Huld: she loves to go to shows and do her stuff. Me? I’m not so crazy about the whole thing.

She - and I - are getting older and getting around has become harder for me (and her). Well, once we had one leg towards the RE title, we had to go on. Two more shows and we had earned our three legs.

My friend, Cathi Winkles, is the Training Director at Sportsmen’s Dog Training Club and also takes photos at dog shows. (The link to Sportsmen’s is below.) The attached photos were taken the day Huld earned her third leg in RE.

Huld insists that we be fair and mention the other dogs. Korpur has finished his RN title and was the first of my dogs to also earn his RA title. Kata and Kria also have their RN and RA titles. Kappu, the younger male in our pack, has his RN title. Totty earned her CGC the same weekend that Huld finished her RE title.

http://www.sportsmens.net/
http://vinlandsicelandics.blogspot.com/
http://www.icelandicsheepdoginternationalbreeders.com/