I saw it mentioned by someone on Facebook that their was a discussion on the NADAC page on increasing NADAC entries. Since I can't seem to track that down I will share my thoughts here.
In regards to increasing participation and trial entries, we discussed this at length during a NADAC event several weeks ago. Our Club is small and is only able to support a few trials a year so this topic is of great importance to us. The group involved in the discussion consisted of all agility experience levels from Intro to NATCH recipients (club and non-club members). One of the factors seemed to resonate with the vast majority of the group. This was the perception that in NADAC’s pursuit to provide new challenges to participants, particularly those who have earned numerous NATCHs, the only thing that has really become more challenging is the level of distance skills required to “succeed” in NADAC. The group agreed that this was consistent throughout the levels, for example Novice, Open and Elite courses have become increasingly difficult over the last 5-10 years. This has actually served to discourage many from even entering the distance challenge class, Chances, or pursuing a NADAC Agility Championship with their dog. I find this disheartening but true. I realize that every agility team may not be able to achieve a NATCH but if you make it increasingly difficult and unobtainable you will not encourage new participants to the venue and you are likely to lose long time participants to other venues. I liken this to dog training principles; we want our dogs to be driven to continue with their training so we set them up for success. If your dog is failing to perform the behavior 80% of the time you take a step back and increase their success rate. With exhibitors, a high rate of continued failure will most likely lead to the pursuit of different sports or venues in which they feel with training, success is actually obtainable. Please do not misinterpret this to be making things easier so that people do not have to work to obtain these goals. I completely support distance work as the heart of NADAC agility and the dedication it requires to develop this skill. I am simply saying that the distance challenges should not be made so difficult that only teams with dozens of NATCHs may be successful at them. If these people are seeking more difficult challenges, perhaps they should be moving on to bonus lines and boxes instead of NATCH 49, 50, etc. NADAC could consider other ways to increase distance challenges for multi-NATCH teams rather than making them impossible for those that are still working hard to perfect these skills.
Another point noted regarding distance challenges was the inconsistency in criteria among the different levels. The NADAC Handbook specifies minimum of 10’, 15’ and 20’ for Novice, Open, and Elite levels. Keeping in mind that these are minimums, there is a wide variation in the challenges we see. Many of the Novice level courses at recent trials have lines nearly at the minimum Elite distances. We have seen Elite courses where dogs must blindly run 30+’ out and straight away from us. Some weekends the Novice lines may be 5’. The inconsistency is increasingly frustrating to teams. Finally, it should be kept in mind that the distance challenges should be balanced to provide challenges for dogs of all sizes as most of the courses seem to favor large long striding dogs. It takes a lot more effort for a Chihuahua to go out and complete a 30’ distance challenge than most Border Collies and natural herding breeds. It was a rare joy to see a 10 year old Pomeranian earn his first NATCH at a recent trial.
I am enjoying the new challenges we are seeing on NADAC courses that are unrelated to distance work and find the technical challenges refreshing. It has been nice to work more tight boxes, serpentines and even an occasional wrap rather than just continuing to take whatever obstacle is directly set in your path. I appreciate the flow of NADAC courses but it is ok to offer some sort of challenge to the teams. Again, though I think distance work should remain the highlight of NADAC, it does not need to be the only challenge that continues to evolve within this venue.
I have recently had great success in recruiting exhibitors from other venues to play NADAC and will continue to do so. They enjoy the games and the atmosphere but do shy away from the distance challenges. I think in order to hold their interest and retain their attendance we need to look at ways to make certain aspects of our venue less intimidating and other aspects more challenging. Finally, we should continue to recognize accomplishments of teams at all levels as these are frequently overshadowed by teams earning yet another NATCH.
I hope these thoughts will be helpful in supporting the future of NADAC agility.
