There are a couple FTs near us each Spring and Fall, so I decided to enter 10.5 month old Brandi in the Puppy Stakes, despite the fact that we’ve never seen a field trial before. After I entered her, the worry wart in me couldn’t decide whether we would show up or not. I had nightmares of her chasing her brace mate all over the field, getting into a fight, or catching birds...and some of the recent training threads I’d read didn’t help console me. 
This past Saturday, I ran her with her first new dog (not Roxi or her regular dog friends). I figured if she was a chasing fool, that I’d cancel the next day. But she did terrific, so we trekked a couple hours yesterday to our very first field trial—put on by the Iowa Brittany Club. We were welcomed to the event, and everyone was good about answering questions and making sure we were where we needed to be. Brandi and Clint were in the 2nd brace of 4 for the day. I didn’t get any pics, because I chose to not go out into the field and possibly confuse her as to who she was running for. She chased for a minute at the start, but then hit her stride and went about working the field. Clint said she left the horses alone and did a really nice job covering ground, until she got tired towards the end. He used his whistle a couple times in the 20 minutes, to give her direction, and she listened very well. After her run, we sat a couple hours, waiting for the results and pondering how she did. I was purely happy that Brandi had good field manners and made it around safe and sound. When it came time to read the results, I couldn’t wait to hear her name, and am probably the happiest person to ever receive 4th in an 8 pup entry. No matter how she’d done, she’d still have had a place on my bed, but the placement makes the first time experience a little sweeter. 
I'm also adding a little video link of some bird launcher training with Brandi, that we did on Friday to give her a little reminder, since we hadn't worked many birds since hunting season. Despite our planning, training didn't go perfect
, with the first launcher being popped a little late. Then she walked a few steps before the 2nd point on the video, because the launcher didn't launch due to low batteries, and we ended up reworking it and throwing the bird. Amateurs... 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2P-3aH17tU4
