Miles did his first lure coursing run with another dog (a whippet) to get his QC -qualified courser on Sept 3rd. He had to run clean, chasing the lure and not the other dog. Since he had never run with another dog before and there was a risk of him trying to play since he is a goofy pup, I had him do the QC run with his muzzle on. He was totally focused on the lure as if he was running alone and never gave the other dog a glance.
Photo of his qualifying run
Another one
Miles was able to compete in the AKC lure coursing competition that day and won the competition and also Best of Breed. He hit his toes on a pulley during his last run so wasn't able to run for Best in Field. His runs were all beautiful and and very fast. He forced the dog he was running against to cut across the field several times just to keep up.
Photo from the competition
Miles wasn't limping after the initial injury and the only sign was a red line across both middle toes on his back left foot. After a couple of hours of rest the toes started swelling and he started limping and not wanting to put weight on them. The whole foot was swollen by the time we got home from the competition. We had an X-ray to rule out any serious damage a couple of days later. None was found. He was lucky. Hitting a plastic pulley at 40 to 45 miles per hour can really do some damage.
Just to be safe Miles is not able to run around for 2 weeks, then can run by himself only for a week. He hasn't been able to go to his competition obedience classes or his agility classes and life has been pretty boring. Normally he gets a lot of exercise and seems like he has calmed down from the wild pup that he was. When he can't exercise I can still see how much of a pup he really is. We are doing a lot of swimming to try to keep the edge off but it just isn't enough.
