Tuesday, June 22, 2021 - Conditions - Day 4

Beautiful in Wisconsin!

The contestants are gathering waiting for the judges to start the trial. 

A heavy dew on the grass. Not a cloud in the sky so things will burn off quickly. Gleam is rising from the ponds and shadows are still reaching across the sparkling pasture. The ponds are like glass. No wind at the moment. The wind is supposed to stay light out of the west to southwest today. The temp is in the mid 50's topping out at 70 today. Should be a chamber of commerce weather. :)

Gunners are in place and test shots are being fired. We will be underway soon.

End of Day Announcement

 The Field Trial Committee has announced that we will be stopping at dog #60 depending on the lighting conditions.

Tuesday June 22, 2021 – Morning Instructions:

The gun stations should be in the field by 6:45 am

The single test dog will run at 7:00 am

Dogs 61, 64 and 65 should be in the holding blinds and ready to run by 7:30 am

Pat's Perspective – Third Series

Pat’s Perspective – Third Series

First of all, I would like to applaud the judges for their test design here in the Third Series. They were faced with many challenges. The first was the sheer number of dogs to look at and judge. The second was designing a test that was going to be effective with dramatic wind changes. And the third is what all national judges face when setting up the first set of water marks in a National. That is time management. I had an interesting discussion with Ted Shih. Ted judged the National Amateur here in Mondovi eight years ago. Ted said that he fretted about setting up the Third Series water marks. He studied past issues of Retriever News and specifically Third Series water marks. He commented that it is one of the toughest series to get right. You can’t afford to take the time for large swims. However, you need to get answers. And you want to get them for the right reasons. These Third Series types of water marks are never the test that you first see when you look at the pond. It takes a lot of thought to envision just the right situation. You need to use less water due to time constraints. However, you don’t want to reward the dog that cheats. These judges used a nice angle on the right hand retired gun. The dogs that squared out early on the left were faced with a challenging recovery. Especially with today’s wind. The longer middle retired gun also required the dogs to angle. This angle was after the dog exited the pond and started up the hill. The bird was well placed up next to the wood line and was difficult to wind. This test is going take more than two full days to complete. But without a doubt will play a huge roll in rewarding this year’s National Amateur Champion. Good work Judges!

~ Pat

Scratch - 3. FC-AFC LJ'S RENAISSANCE QUEEN, "Bess" BLF, Mark Littlejohn

 Bess scratched from the event. Congrats to Bess and Mark for qualifying!