What do I do at the Trail: Oops, that wasn’t a great run …

The nature of agility is that most runs are not qualifiers. When a problem happens, whatever you do don’t get mad. It doesn’t help you, or your dog. Everyone loves to see handlers having fun regardless of how the dog is doing.
Learn from your mistakes. What happened? How did my handling affect the dog? Do I need to train something specific?

It is surprising how tense you can be and how that transfers to your dog. The best part about getting a fault [making a mistake!] during a run is that you can relax. No Q this time so you can try things you would not normally try, like handling from further away. This is an opportunity to try different handling ideas in a trial environment.

Also, at every agility trial there will be distractions and a big part of training is learning to focus through those distractions. Trials are busy events with many of people and dogs. In multi-ring trials there will be cheering and whistles in the other ring.  There will be clapping and cheering when ribbons are handed out. Dogs will bark during your runs. Occasionally, your dog may be growled at by other dogs around the ring, maybe even during a run.

In all runs there will be a judge and ring stewards in the rings.

In standard a judge will give a table count. This can be an electronic count over speakers at some clubs.

In team, there will be another dog and handler in the ring.

In gamblers and snooker the judge will be calling out numbers and there will be whistles.

The equipment at every club is different.