Arctic Streakers Agility Club

Last Sunday, while on a bike ride we ran into a bunch of tents in the Waldron Park off Tudor Road east of Seward Highway.  We discovered the Arctic Streakers Agility Club.  

Wikipedia seems to have the best description of agility

Dog agility is a dog sport in which a handler directs a dog through an obstacle course in a race for both time and accuracy. Dogs run off-leash with no food or toys as incentives, and the handler can touch neither dog nor obstacles.

Consequently the handler's controls are limited to voice, movement, and various body signals, requiring exceptional training of the animal and coordination of the handler.
In its simplest form, an agility course consists of a set of standard obstacles, laid out by an agility judge in a design of his or her own choosing on a roughly 100 by 100-foot (30 by 30 m) area, with numbers indicating the order in which the dog must complete the obstacles.

Courses are complicated enough that a dog could not complete them correctly without human direction. In competition, the handler must assess the course, decide on handling strategies, and direct the dog through the course, with precision and speed equally important. Many strategies exist to compensate for the inherent difference in human and dog speeds and the strengths and weaknesses of the various dogs and handlers.

The North American Dog Agility Council website tells us:

The North American Dog Agility Council (NADAC) was formed in 1993 to provide North American dogs and their handlers with a fast, safe and enjoyable form of the sport of dog agility. NADAC sanctions agility trials sponsored by affiliated clubs.

The purpose of a NADAC agility trial is to demonstrate the ability of a dog and its handler to work as a smoothly functioning team. With separate class divisions for Veterans and Junior Handlers and a variety of games, NADAC dog agility offers something for everyone!

Looking a little further, I found the United States Association of Dog Agility Clubs.  I wonder what the story is about these two organizations.

As evidence of the pioneering spirit and leadership role of USDAA and its supporters, we count among our accomplishments -

Introduction of the sport to North America in its international form (1986)

• First organization in the world to separate competition into four jumping height divisions, fostering participation among competitors with virtually all sizes of dogs
• First officially sanctioned event in the United States and North America (1986)
• Introduction of the first competitive tournament series in North America - the "Grand Prix of Dog Agility^®" (1988)
• Introduction of the first certification tests in the world in five distinctive classes of competition (1990)
• First U.S. canine sports authority to field teams in "world" competition (FCI World Dog Show, Germany, 1991)
• First championship tournament series on a major national television network when the USDAA Grand Prix of Dog Agility^® Championships was telecast on Animal Planet (1999)