Agility folks - has anyone done an NADAC trial?

[TBFAN]

I’m considering going to my first trial at an NADAC competition. My current trainer isn’t familiar with them so I was wondering if I could get some collective wisdom from you all.
I have a 5yo aussie who has been doing agility in class for about 3 years. I haven’t trialled before due to a lot of other distractions, but my dog and I are getting to a point where I think we would enjoy getting out there. He has a great start line stay, great on 12 weave poles consistently, moderately good discrimination, and just okay on distance.
The NADAC trial is coming up and not too far from me, so I thought I would start there.
I have read their rule book, but not sure how the show is scheduled.
If I sign up for regular agility, could I add another class, like a jumper class as well? How many classes is too many for a first show? I’m sure both my dog and I will be stressed.
I was thinking of doing a novice regular agility class, and an intro jumper class. Possibly an intro weave class too unless that would be too much?

Could I do all of this on one day or do I need to stay the weekend? Ideally I would come in Friday night, do a couple of classes on Sat and then go home.

Thoughts?

[S1969]

I’ll bump this up for you; I don’t compete in agility but many of my friends do. If you don’t get a response here, I can ask someone for you. I do know that many of my friends do multiple classes but you don’t want to be stressed out at your first one…so when in doubt, don’t do too many. Hopefully someone with experience will chime in!

[LauraO]

I have not done many Agility competitions. I think I did 2 last year, one NADAC and one CPE.

You should have a show premium, which is kinda like a horse show prize list. You’ll need to register the dog with NADAC.

I would probably stick with maybe 3 classes a day. Many many experienced agility people do alot more, but I think I maybe only did 2 with my dog, to give her an easy intro into the routine and the venue.

Once you sign up, a few days before the trial you’ll get a tentative schedule of classes, so you sort of know when you need to be ready. You may need to arrive by a certain time on the first day, to get your dog measured, depending on its size. I think for NADAC I didn’t have to measure my dog, because she is over 24" (max jump size), and also doing Vets/Skilled so the very lowest jump height allowed (she was 9, and started agility classes at 8) so I am for sure trying to preserve her soundness.

I feel like this is a little general, and not so helpful, but it was really pretty easy to get everything together with the entry and just go and do a couple classes. It was also pretty fun

[DarkenStormy]

I do NADAC quite often and I enjoy it and I think it would be good for a beginner dog. There are 2 ways you can go in NADAC. You can do start at INTRO which is really basic. Maybe 6-7 obstacles and a very easy course. Or you can start at Novice - which is what I would do - maybe 12-14 obstacles and still a fairly easy course but not as much of a baby course as Intro. I don’t think you can mix Novice and Intro - I think you have to stick to one or the other. NADAC is pretty easy on the dog - class wise. They don’t have teeters, tables, or tires. Not all of the courses have jumps. These are the basic courses: Weavers - 3 sets of weave poles( 6 weaves for Novice) and tunnels and hoops, Jumpers - Jumps, hoops and tunnels, Tunnelers - all tunnels, Touch and Go - contact obstacles, tunnels and hoops, Regular - all obstacles including barrels, Chances - all obstacles, Barrelers - Mostly barrels I would guess and hoops? I have never done this class - and hoopers is all hoops. If your dog isn’t great on distance I would skip Chances.

I have a 12 yr old dog and I tend to do all 6 runs a day with him. NADAC is not as taxing to us as say a USDAA trial where the courses are longer and the runs trickier - but most NADAC trials have day of entries so if you enter 3 classes then decide you are having fun you can enter more that same day.

As for doing more than one day - that’s up to you and how you think your dog will handle it.

Oh and NADAC does allow some training in the ring - i.e. - if your dog blows a contact you can put your dog back on the obstacle for training, but you will get eliminated.

If you have any more questions feel free to PM me. The premium is confusing and a pain to fill out.

[TBFAN]

Thanks for the help!
Yes, I did find the premium kinda confusing! I have no idea what Chances are. I’m pretty sure we have never seen a hoop (we trained first at a UKC club, now at an AKC club). I wonder if I should skip jumpers if there are hoops? Maybe just the regular agility and the weaves. We can do 3 sets of 6 weave poles!
I worry about him jumping 20", because he’s a bit older. He never appears to mind, but I worry anyway!
I can’t really recognize everything on the course maps either, so maybe those things are barrels or hoops.
I’m okay with the Nov division if we can’t go back and forth. We have been doing some NADAL courses at our club, and some of them are really hard!

[DarkenStormy]

The club will usually have hoops and barrels out to practice with. I call the hoops tunnels - my dog is a little confused at first but then he gets it. We never practice hoops and he never does them anywhere but NADAC. And there will be hoops in ALL of the classes except tunnelers so you might as well enter everything. And refusals don’t count in NADAC so it’s not a big deal if they miss it just turn them around and send them back through it. The worst is if they jump over it which my dog has been apt to do. I use a “back” or “go around” command for the barrel with my dog - but he has an “around” command already from USDAA for push to the back’s

As for jumping 20 inches that’s up to you. You can put them in skilled and run him in 16 if he measures for the 20" jump height. My dog is 12 and he jumps 20" in everything BUT NADAC and that’s only bc of his age. In NADAC once your dog reaches the age of 9 they are a veteran. So they move them down a height - so when my dog and I started running NADAC again he had to jump as a veteran and jumped 16. NOW that my dog is 12 - God help me - he has to jump 12 inches - ARGH! We haven’t done it yet, but that’s going to kill me. 16 is bad enough but 12 is going to have me gasping for an O2 tank at the end of the run. NADAC is tough bc the courses are more spread out and the time is tighter but there are less obstacles and my dog is usually looking at me at the end of the run saying - " So where’s the rest of the course?". I would just go and enter everything and have a good time. Try chances. Novice chances isn’t too bad. NADAC is huge in distance work and we are terrible at distance work - but it’s fun to try.

And definitely do Novice… I think Intro would be too simple for you and your dog. Six runs shouldn’t be too much unless you are planning on running multiple days. - esp if you have an older dog. I tend to not run Reilly in more than 4 runs a day if we are doing multiple days - unless I am running Teams in USDAA.