Ego or "You got to know when to fold 'em".
28 Nov 2024
Ego or “You got to know when to fold ‘em”. After running in Biathlon finals Saturday night a friend asked if we were running in Nationals final or running in the Challengers round the next day. Neither dog had made it into the finals round. I’d given her question a lot of thought.
The UKI US Open is often described as a marathon. Five days, course maps released at 6AM, walking starting 6:30AM, running until late afternoon, and then finals afterwards. I was running two dogs at different heights so I’d walk/run in 4 different rings each day. In between you have to find time to eat, drink fluids, take care of your dogs, obsess over courses, and cheer on your friends.
It takes a toll on you and your dogs!
Spark was in the 300 dog 20” class and it was extremely unlikely we’d win Challengers to earn a spot in the finals.
I was tempted to run Snap! in the Challengers round; he’d been in all three finals so far, he’d been running well all week, top 5 placements whenever we ran clean, 20s only had about 30 dogs, so we had a good chance to make it through. Last year in 22” he’d been 2nd in Challengers…
On the flip side his Challengers run would be in an outside ring, where he’d splatted hard on the up ramp of the dog walk that morning; it had taken a while to have his front end realigned and trigger points released afterwards. I’d also been nursing a groin pull since our first finals runs.
It occurred to me, we could be done. Geez, Snap! certainly didn’t need to “prove” anything to me. Sure it would be cool to say we’d run in all the finals! Even cooler if we’d earn a podium spot!
Some folks would say to suck it up, you are already there, what’s a couple more runs, this is what you train for, etc.
But, I was feeling as someone said in the parking lot at the end of the prior day, “I think I’ve done enough agility for one week”. So Sunday morning I put my ego aside and scratched both dogs from the Challengers round as we left bright and early to drive home.
We all have to decide “when to fold ‘em” for ourselves and our teammates.
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