[00:00:00] If you train, compete, or teach dog agility, you're in the right place. Hey there, I'm Megan Foster, creator of Fostering Excellence in Agility. Join me as I share key insights on all things related to dog agility and help find your team's path to excellence and unlock your best year yet. Let's get started.
Hey there, this is episode 45 and we're gonna talk about how I prepare for events. This question often comes up when we're thinking about preparing for a big event, and I am here to tell you that my process is pretty much the same regardless of the size of the event or the importance of the event, whether it's local or I'm driving to it, or if I'm flying.
Pretty much all of it is the same. I really like to have a consistent plan. That I am [00:01:00] executing every single time I go to an event. The more that I execute this plan, the easier it is to execute on a larger scale for those really big events where there's a lot of different pieces or maybe there's more newness to certain events.
So first and foremost, I do this. No matter where I'm trialing. So this isn't a how to prepare for a big event podcast, but just how to prepare for an event. So we want to reduce the mental load that you have to take to each event.
So we want to do as much decision making ahead of time before we leave for the event, so that on the day of the event, we're not having to use bandwidth to answer small questions. Right? So this is things like. Planning your meals, planning your dog's meals, what are you gonna eat? When are [00:02:00] you going to eat it?
What is your dog going to eat? When are they gonna eat it? Because depending on the schedule, your eating habits might have to change, right? If you're having to travel to that event, where are you shopping? This is either because you've flown in and you're not able to bring your. Own groceries or you've gotten somewhere and you have forgotten something that you really need.
So just knowing where a grocery store, maybe a pet store, maybe a pharmacy, are already as a screenshot in your phone or written down in your notebook of just an address can save you that little bit of panic time when you need to get somewhere now. And. You don't really have the bandwidth to search Google and figure out where the nearest spot is and have all those things, right?
Because if you do this research ahead of time, you know when that store opens, you know when it closes, right? Those are important things when we are [00:03:00] maybe driving in long days. And we're getting in kind of late or we're flying and we don't have full control over When we get places when we are flying, we don't have control over those delays.
We don't have control over our luggage arriving on time. We don't have control over how long it takes to get that dreaded rental car. So having that can avoid any sort of panic or meltdown. That may happen later. And honestly, my entire process is not meant to like feel you with doom and gloom about the event, but I do try to prepare for all things that could possibly happen, right?
So I could get somewhere, it could be late at night, I could be very tired, and I could just not have the mental bandwidth to then search Google for hours. If I've done this ahead of time and I have that information saved in my phone, I can grab that and get straight there, get what I need, [00:04:00] and get to sleep.
Um, speaking of sleep, if you are not staying in your own bed, I have learned a lot of things about sleep hygiene and like staying in hotels or Airbnbs sometimes really sucks because there's a lot of lights, so. If light bothers you when you sleep, and I thought it didn't bother me, but turns out it does.
And so being able to cover up the lights, um, close the curtains completely, so having some like binder clips or chip clips to close the blinds completely, um, stickers or towels or clothing to just cover up all of these things that shine light can really help. So really taking some time to. Focus on your sleep hygiene is also going to be a big part of preparing for an event and making sure that you're able to show up your best self, um, what are you gonna wear even for a local event.
[00:05:00] Even if I'm doing this just the night before, I always choose what I'm wearing the night before so that when I wake up. It's very easy. I don't have to think about it. I don't have to scramble because what I thought was clean isn't clean. So again, I'm not preparing for doom and gloom. I'm just preparing for things that are real and happen in our real lives.
So picking out what you are going to wear. So for a multi-day event that you're driving to or you're flying to, this is a little bit harder because we want to then look at the. Forecast for as far out as we can. And again, even if it means packing a bunch of things that you don't, you may not need, it's better to have them and not use them than to need them and not have them.
So for an event that I'm getting ready to fly to, I have probably way more than I need, but the forecast is all over the place. And I don't like to be cold and there's rain on the forecast, so I don't know if [00:06:00] I'm gonna need a change of clothes, if I'm having to walk the dog in the pouring rain. So all of these things are just covered by packing the additional layers that I might need for that forecast.
Okay. Where are you going to walk the dogs? So this is either, you know, if you're planning a drive, where are you stopping along the way to walk the dogs? Get yourself outta the car. Get the dog outta the car. Get some really, really needed decompression time out in nature, especially when you're gonna be in the car for long days, or you're going to be on the airplane and in the airport and all of that overstimulation.
You need some time outside to decompress. So either talking to people in that area that you know and they can share their favorite spots with you, or just doing a little bit of research ahead of time. I'm very known for just stopping at public parks where there's, grass fields and playgrounds, and just having a 20 or 30 minute walk a [00:07:00] couple times a day is really, really helpful when I'm driving these.
Really long road trips that we have to do on the west coast to compete in agility. Okay. Um, and then especially when you're there, are you planning for downtime for yourself and for your dog? Okay. Again, events are draining. Sometimes the lights in the building can really make, take a toll on us. Um, I know that most of us in agility kind of.
Recharge more introvertedly because we can't help ourselves but be a bit more extroverted when we're at agility and we are seeing people that we haven't seen in a while. So, you know, when you get your schedule, where are you gonna schedule some downtime to kind of recharge in the middle of the day, especially when as the events get bigger and the days get longer, you know when course maps are released at 6:00 AM.
And the schedule says you're gonna be running dogs until 8:00 [00:08:00] PM That is a long day, and I love agility, but that's a lot of agility to love. So preparing for some downtime and making sure that you give your body what it needs is really important. One of the exercises that I did early on to prepare for competing internationally for the first time.
My mentor, Dr. Catherine Alise, had me do this, was to really write down just kind of the normal day to day that I do. When do I naturally lull and energy during the day, and when do I naturally take those kind of recharging moments during the day? And if I can mimic those at the competition, that's gonna be a lot easier on my body and my brain.
Obviously this isn't. Going to be perfect because of time zone changes and things like that. And we can't control the schedule and when you need to run your dog, but we [00:09:00] can at least be aware when we're starting to feel a little bit drained. And we look at our watch and we go, oh, this is normal. This is natural.
How can I help support myself through this energy change? And of course, we want to. Think about the dogs the same way. Sometimes if they're not used to waking up at dark, going to an agility event and then leaving after dark like that is going to be harder for them. So again, being able to think about their day and thinking about how to best support them throughout the day to make competing at different events as easy and normal as possible for them.
Really, really important to me that I plan for the downtime for both of us. Um, I personally like spend a lot of time just hanging out with my dogs, and I want to build that into my competition schedule as much as possible. With that, we are also going to plan ahead [00:10:00] for our travel plan, so we're going to, if we're driving somewhere.
We know when we're, even if it's local we think about these things already. We know when we're gonna leave. We know if we're gonna stop and get a coffee on the way there or not, or a second coffee on the way there. We know if we're gonna stop for breakfast or if we packed our own. So we need to do that on the bigger scale as well.
Like how many days are you gonna get to there? Where are you gonna stay? Where are you gonna walk the dog, how are you going to adjust and acclimate for any time zone changes that may happen? So I am a big advocate again for like the sleeping and the down timing we, I want, if I'm flying into a new time zone, I would really love it if I have.
A day per time difference. Okay, so the event that I'm headed to next, it is a two hour time difference. I am flying in [00:11:00] Monday afternoon, getting in there Monday evening for an event that starts on Thursday. So that does give me two full days to reset my clock. And I know that is unique privilege that I have, um, that I can take my work anywhere and that I have someone at home that can watch the other dogs for me.
So I do have that freedom, but it is something to think about that if flying is hard on you, and I know it's hard on the dogs, even if it's not obvious that it's something to consider if we can't drive. Okay. So that is like the mental side of things. And maybe that was a bit more than you expected especially from this episode because Sure, there's training involved, but I want to say that your training shouldn't change dramatically just for one event.
And I'm gonna explain more about that, is that even if you're [00:12:00] preparing for. Like a big event that is months away. All of that training should be supporting what you need for any of the local events that you have coming up too. So what I'm saying is the local events that I choose support that long-term goal of heading into that bigger event.
And this is important. I think when we're, when we have so many more events, um, in UKI that are open, so we don't have to qualify for them. So it, it makes sense when we're trying to qualify for an event like the A KC, national Agility Championship, you have to qualify for that and to qualify for that, you have to run courses that are similar to those that you're going to see at the national.
So just by qualifying, you're preparing for. That event. But when you have an open event, you have freedom to go compete at whatever local event you want. So that [00:13:00] is where the exception lies. If you are primarily competing in something like a KC agility that isn't necessarily going to prepare you for a UKI event or an A-K-C-I-S-C, the international events.
So that does. Change things a little bit when I'm making my preparations, but that is the only exception. So if I'm preparing for a big UK I event and I am primarily running UKI local shows, any training and preparation that I'm doing is preparing me for both. And those local events are also preparing me for the bigger event when I do enter something.
Like a local a KC show where the style of agility is pretty different or the ring size is different, or just the designer's style is going to be very different. My training [00:14:00] shifts a little bit and I focus on helping them be prepared for the different type of style. And then when that's over, I try to clump those together like I did.
Three or four regular A KC trials very close together, the end of the year and the beginning of the year, and now I'm kind of done with that so that I can shift my focus to a different style of agility. And this matters for me because it's very hard for sprint to go back and forth. If your dog goes back and forth e more easily and doesn't seem, it doesn't seem to bother 'em to go back and forth, then you don't have to think as hard about this or plan your schedule.
As precisely as this, but it is something to think about, um, especially when we have so many different options for competing on any given weekend. We wanna make sure that whatever we've been training is actually what we're going to see on the weekend. And this applies no matter what level I'm at. [00:15:00] So before I first debuted Sprint, she wasn't doing super complicated things.
She was doing novice and starters level courses. Very straightforward so that it wasn't a shock to either of us when we got to the competition. So that's really what I'm always trying to avoid is any type of surprise or things that we didn't prepare for, especially those things that are out of our control.
We want to try and control as many variables as we can, and so focusing our training on what we're likely to see coming up at the event is always gonna be our best bet.
Okay. I think that about covers how I prepare for these events. I've been thinking a lot about this lately as I head into this event with sprint's first flight, and it's my first time attending this specific event, and so there's a lot of newness. So I have been doing. A lot of this pre-planning and going over all the scenarios in my head, and because [00:16:00] of that, I created some worksheets that I have added to my event prep program that can be found on my website, and I will link below in the show notes.
And I hope that this gets you thinking about how you can help yourself and your dog be better prepared for any event, so go forth, train and take care of yourself.
Thanks for listening. If you enjoyed this episode, I really appreciate some feedback. You can leave me a review, engage on social media or share this with a friend. I hope you'll be back to listen to my next episode. In the meantime, you can find all of my offers on my website, fx agility.com. Happy training.
