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Jackson's Achilles finally golden
By Steve Bowman MADISON, Wis. — J. Paul Jackson finally feels vindicated.
Jackson and Achilles won the gold medal Wednesday in the Retriever Trial, silencing the team's biggest critic on whether they were good enough to do it. Never mind that Jackson is his biggest critic, or the fact that he's really not silent. Jackson, who is known as one of the Great Outdoor Games more gregarious retriever handlers, finally feels like he can take the chip off his shoulder. "I've waited a long time for this," Jackson said. "I know a lot of folks didn't think that Achilles or I was good enough. But I knew it. And I've been wanting the chance to prove it." And prove it he did. The retriever/handler team from Dyersburg, Tenn. literally swept through the medal round of the competition bypassing one of the more storied groups to ever make the final round.
They included, Alex Washburn (the Queen of retriever handlers) and Ready, who won the silver after a week of battling Lyme disease; Jerry Day (the Dean of retriever handlers), who won bronze for the second straight year, but this time with Nike and Stacey West (the hot newcomer) and Rankin who lead every round of the competition until the final.
The brash Jackson and Achilles scored 29 points, to Washburn's 53 points, Day's 55 and West's 82. West's final-round total was more than his point total in the quarterfinal and semifinal rounds combined. The final test was to pick up four marks, with one of those actually disappearing from the field and returning as a blind retrieve. The marks were thrown at varying distances from 15 yards to 140 yards. And at face value is was a basic straight forward run out and pick them up kind of test, except for one big twist. The disappearing bird defined the outcome of this event. And in reality, one whistle within the round turned out to be golden. It was blown by Jackson. "That turned the tide right there," Jackson said. "That one whistle. At that point it could have gone either way. But Achilles followed my command and did everything exactly the way he should have." The way the test worked was like this. The first mark (the disappearing bird) was thrown at120 yards to the extreme right of the field. A crossing bird that zipped in front of the line 15 yards away from right to left followed it. After a delay, the third mark was thrown to the extreme left of the field, landing 140 yards away and the final mark was thrown in the center of the field, landing in water, 120 yards away. As in most retriever trials, the birds were picked up in the reverse order they were thrown. And for the most part, the marks were picked up cleanly with very few deductions for any of the four finalists. That is until they started on the final retrieve or the first mark thrown. While it is described as a disappearing bird, in reality it was a large rock wrapped in white that was shot into the air and landed squarely on the side of a pond before rolling into the water and disappearing. Once the rock was out of sight, a Dokken DeadFowl Trainer popped to the surface near the entry point. The bird was attached to a rope and when the dogs swam up to it and right before they put their mouth on the easy retrieve, the bird was jerked under water to simulate a crippled duck in a waterfowl hunt. In each instance, the dog simply twirled on the surface waiting for the bird to reappear. But after a five second count, the handlers were then required to direct the dog away from the dive point to another bird that was hidden some 30 yards away. "It was a true-to-like hunting scenario," Jackson said. "Ducks do that all the time. But most of the time they come up close by. I was scared to death of that retrieve. "I thought Achilles would just blow by it or he would just sit there and twirl and twirl and not listen to me. When that duck went down and I blew that whistle and Achilles followed my cast, that was the turning point. I knew we were rocking." But it wasn't over. Calling the retriever off of the vanishing duck was only half the equation. The other half was getting the dog from that point, over a sliver land, back into the water with an angle entry and to a stand of reeds on the opposite side of the pond. "I was standing in the holding blind listening to Jerry and Nike run right before me," Jackson said. "And I heard him give these big verbal 'overs' to Nike." In retriever handling, the command 'over' is used along with hand signals to send the dog right or left of its position. The command 'back' is used to send the dog straight away from the handler. "I told the girl standing near the blind, 'You never give those big verbal overs in a situation like that.' "That just makes the dog want to dig in and go back. We use big verbal commands to get them to go back and away from us. But when I got up there and had Achilles away from the diving duck, my first two commands were these big verbal overs. "I finally caught myself. And on the third cast, just gave a silent sweeping over with my hands and Achilles took it right on track." While Jackson and Achilles were holding things together, the rest of the field had big trouble on that retrieve, as a matter of fact 80 percent of all the deductions in the final round came on that one retrieve as the handlers tried to maintain control of a confusing situation. "That mark was Ready's Waterloo," Washburn said. Tenn. retriever team wins gold ESPN Outdoors Communications — July 7, 2004 MADISON, Wis. — J. Paul Jackson didn't give his Labrador retriever its name, but he helped the canine live up to it during Wednesday's final round in the retriever trials of the ESPN Great Outdoor Games presented by Dodge. Achilles, who earned the name of the mythic Greek hero after injuring his left hind leg as a puppy, turned in the best run of the retriever trials to grab the first gold medal awarded at Great Outdoor Games V. "I'm so, so pumped," said Jackson, a registered nurse who also has been a full-time dog trainer for seven years. "Achilles never argued with me. He worked with me, and that was the key."
Jackson, of Dyersburg, Tenn., and Achilles scored a competition-best 29 points, easily surpassing the silver-medal team of Ready and handler Alex Washburn of Oxford, Miss., who finished the medal round with 53. Nike and handler Jerry Day of College Park, Ga., took the bronze with 55. In retriever trials, dog-handler teams earn points for a variety of faults in the competition. As in golf, a low score is best.
In fact, Jackson said the team's score should've been lower. "I messed it up a couple of times," he said. "I should've left him alone on one of the marks. He knew where it was, but I handled him anyway. I should've just left him alone and let him do his thing." After the first round on Tuesday, the field of 12 dog-handler teams was trimmed to eight for the semifinal round on Wednesday morning. Four teams advanced to Wednesday afternoon's final, where Jackson and Achilles all but dominated. The other two medal-winning teams were no strangers to the champions' stand. Handlers Washburn and Day each have Great Outdoor Games gold from previous outings with other dogs. Washburn's Lab, Ready, earned his silver medal just 10 days after he was diagnosed with Lyme disease, Washburn said. Still battling health problems that haven't yet been fully diagnosed — the dog has an enlarged spleen and liver — Ready still turned in a solid performance. "I'm amazed," said Washburn, who won the retriever trials gold in 2002 and a silver last year with Ticket. "This dog has just got a lot of heart and a lot of go." Bronze medal handler Day took gold in 2001 and silver in 2002 with Nike's mother, Super Sue. Nike's registered name is "Sue Says Just Do It." "She got the bronze for her mother," Day said. "Gold is great, but bronze is OK, too." Rankin and handler Stacey West of Louisburg, N.C., who had the best score in both the opening and semifinal rounds, faltered in the final and finished fourth with 82 points. "In my opinion, it was a lack of experience in a 3 1/2-year-old dog," West said. "When something went wrong, we weren't able to come back from it." Admission to the Great Outdoor Games is free. The Games will be televised on ESPN, ESPN2 and ABC from July 14 through July 19. Top outdoor athletes from around the world compete for entry into the ESPN Great Outdoor Games, held in Madison, Wis. July 8-11. The ultimate championship of outdoor sports features one-of-a-kind, head-to-head competition in timber and target events, sporting dogs, and fishing. While entertaining large crowds on site, the ESPN Great Outdoor Games also draws a worldwide television audience airing on ESPN, ESPN2 and ABC Sports. The Games are sponsored by Dodge, Miller Brewing Co., Stihl Inc., Valvoline Durablend, CITGO, Eukanuba, Johnsonville Brats, the National Shooting Sports Foundation, the Recreational Boating and Fishing Foundation, Tinactin, and Beretta USA Corp. Retriever Trials - Final Results ESPN Great Outdoor Games Retriever Trials – Final Results 1. Achilles/J. Paul Jackson Dyersburg, Tenn. 29 The following teams did not qualify for the final round: The following teams did not qualify for the semifinal round:
Lone Oak Retrievers
J. Paul
and Melanie Jackson
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