Agility Club

What a hot weekend!!! Went up on the Friday and got set up nice and quickly. Saturday was the first time Jag would be doing any agility since his two weeks off!! To say I was a little nervous is an understatement. I know I should have put it to the back of my mind and just run Jag normally but that was easier said than done!! The champ classes were interesting.... don't let our judges go to Europe! (only joking!). I managed to mess the first bit of the champ class up, think I was just worried. Still never miind. We were better in champ agility but I wasn't really "up" for it after being e'd in the jumping. Crufts class Jag had a nice clear but was too slow.

I am now wondering if Jag had been carrying an injury for a few weeks before hand. He had knocked poles the previous few weeks but not enough to make me worry, just thought it was odd poles. But then agilit club weekend he didn't knock any. Maybe the going lame was a good thing in its way. Made me do what I should have done a few weeks earlier! Bad owner!

Sunday we had our last Olympia qualifier and Crufts team. Olympia qualifier... well what can I say... marked on the a-frame. I shouldn't really say much more except dogs have four feet not just two at the front!!! Not sure it would have been quick enough though. Jag is off the pace at the moment so I think we will be doing lots of trotting walks to get him a bit fitter!

Crufts team was good fun. We are not normally that worried but this was our last chance and I think we kinda wanted to qualify again because we won at Crufts this year. Would be nice to go back and defend our crown! Any way it all worked out just fine and we won the class. So I will get at least one day at Crufts!

Twix and I were just not together. Not sure if it was the heat (affecting me not twix lol). But it just wasn't happening!!!! Never mind. Perhaps I have chilled now I have achieved what I wanted to this year.

The weekend was a good one though. Lee won the ticket with Bold. It was a great run and really showed Lee and Bold's qualities. I think people underestimate this little dogs potential. He is very much like Toni's Kite and still such a baby really. There is a lot more to come from them!!

Was booked into Aylesbury yesterday but really didn't feel like going. I need an agility break! So I am depriving myself of shows this weekend and next in the hope that I will be up for D.I.N. Am looking forward to camping with friends for the week and maybe more looking forward to drinking and having a laugh than the actual agility. So not sure I expect any spectacular results but it will be a week away from work!!!

Rugby and Newlands

Rugby... well what can I say, what a waste of diesel!! lol. Went up on Friday, not a bad journey. Saturday saw an Olympia heat for Jag, course was tricky but do-able. Jag got half way round before he knocked a pole. I kinda gave up at that point. Clear in his 1-7 agility and he ran clear in the team. Hm if only I could have swapped that 1-7 agility for the Olympia one!

Twix had a clear in her grade 5 agility with nicely held contacts so no place. I pulled Twix off a tunnel in the 5 jumping. All my fault, had been working on calling off of tunnels on the Monday at training as it was something I was bad at! The 1-7 agiltiy with Twix was a nice trained clear. Not that it would have mattered as they had entered Twix in the wrong part. So I guess it ended up as an NFC run.

Saturday night I got Jag and Twix out of the car just before going to bed and Jag was lame. I had hoped it was just that he had been laying awkwardly in the car but alas he was still lame Sunday morning. So no classes for Jag! I didn't really feel like I had my heart in running Twix. I think it showed and we messed up all our runs.

On a good note I did get to relax and watch the champ class. Toni won the ticket with a great run in the final. With Lee winning the reserve. Hard luck Lee but just goes to show how woman always come out on top!! (well most of the time!)

Jag was sound by Thursday of this week but I decided not to run him at Newlands. It just wasn't worth the risk. I would prefer for him to have a couple of weeks off. Twix had a good day. We started off with 2nd in the grade 5 agility. That was followed by winning grade 5 jumping!!!!!!!! Very pleased as this was her 3rd jumping win so now moves her up to grade 6! Go the blonde dog.

Watford, Bretons, Dartford and St ed's

All those shows and all over two weekends!! No wonder I spend so much on diesel.

Watford was pretty much a complete waste of time. Will think twice about this one next year if it is at the same place. Mind you they can't help the weather. But it drizzled all flippin day. The grass was really really short and the ground underneath really hard. It was evident quite quickly that a lot of dogs were really slipping. As a result it seemed stupid to try and push the dogs round anything. Jag slipped all over the place in his jumping. Twix was more sure footed in hers and ended up 4th but I left with a feeling that we could have had a much better place but I wasn't going to push and Twix doesn't work well with me running her like that.

Bretons was a good show :-) Our club were ring partying. So it was a case of run off to a ring when possible. This weirdly seemed to work well for me. Jag had two
6th places which I was pleased with as more than anything we were clear!! His touch points were lovely and very controlled. Twix was e'd in her agility.. my fault totally. I forgot to call her before the weaves. Oops. But in her 4/5 jumping... she won... yay. Good little Twix. She really did run well and won by a good margin, well for agility these days it was a good margin.

Dartford wasn't the most successful show for me. Jag did do a lovely round to come 2nd in his 6/7 jumping. And most importantly I released him from the start rather than him deciding when we were going! Twix had a pole in her 4/5 jumping and a clear in her agility but as I trained her contacts we weren't placed.. well at least I don't think we were..oops.

St Ed's today was a good show! Ok Jag had a pole in the chum, grrr. But he was clear in grade 7 agility, lovely contacts had another 2nd in 6/7 jumping and just a pole down in the grade 7 jumping. Although I can't believe I actually managed to remember where we were going... nice course, but I was still thinking about Twix's success when I ran.

Twix came 4th in her 4/5 agility, which was good with nicely held contacts. She came 6th in a 5/6 jumping. Really pleased that she beat some nice grade 6 dogs. Maybe she will be able to hold her own up there. And even better... we won another grade 5 jumping. So two down one to go. Twix again won by a good margin. So very pleased.

Chum semi on Thursday.. gulp! I hate these. Really really hate them. Olympia is lovely but the semi's are nasty. So would love to get through but who knows. So many good dogs. Watch this space!

Well done to Nancy and not at all naughty Niamh for qualifying for a chum semi today. Just go for it out there! Think Karen and Todd had a rather good day to!

Hinckley, Thames and Axstane

Well after the wet weekend at supadogs, all I wanted was a nice dry Hinckley!! Went up on Friday. Toni drive me up there (Lee followed Sat am). We had a nice journey up, always seems to go quickly, mainly because we seem to manage to chat all the way. Set up the tents and then sat down to drink. Had a pleasent evening chatting and drinking.

Sat was at least dry! Champ, hm didn't go well. Actually Jag just had a pole but with something like 43 clears in the jumping we had kinda got no chance. Twix for some reason felt very slow. I was told I was babying her too much. So in her last run I made an effort to be a bit more pushy and it worked. We did get an e but she felt so much better (looks like Toni was right again!). Best result of the day was Jag's 4th place in the Crufts singles qualifier. Nice to get some points under my belt.

Toni won the medium ticket with Minx.. yipee.. another one. Was really pleased for Toni. They are working so well together.

Sunday I was judging a 3/4/5 agility. Was pleased with how the class went. There was a nice tight bit and then a flowing finish. Course below. I was pleased with the way it ran. There was the normal mixture of good and bad handling but was quite happy with the winners run.



On to Thames. Went up nice and early on Friday afternoon, was set up really quickly and was sat drinking rather early!! As for agility, some more Crufts points for Jag. Clear in the Chum but a very competitive class and due to a turn in the wrong direction, Jag was well down the places. Twix had a couple of nice middle of the road places in agility with trained contacts. Missed out on Novice chum because of a pole. Champ was pants again... will I even make a champ final this year. Hm!

Saturday night at Thames is always fun. And that is as much as I will say. But I did feel slightly tired on Sunday and had a slight headache. But nothing to major.

Axstane is a lovely show. Always enjoy it. Jag had a 4th in his agility on Sunday with nicely held contacts. He came 8th in the celebration connection class. Which very scarily qualifies him for the final. Gulp! The best result of the weekend had to be Twix's 5/6/7 jumping on Saturday. She finished 3rd. Now I know there weren't a huge amount of grade 7 dogs there, but the first two places were good grade 7 dogs and there were several good grade 7 dogs behind her. Twix did the best round I think she has ever done. Amanda Rodgers was the judge and course was big and flowing. Not the sort of thing I would expect Twix to do well on. I was very chuffed with Twix after that one. She seemed to work really well all weekend and I had lots of people commenting that she suddenly seems to have gone up a gear. Which is what it felt like running her. So long may this continue. Oh and just for good measure, her dog walks were great!

Axstane and Thames were also debut shows for 3 of the dogs in my puppy class. All three have had clear rounds and these shows and a few places to boot. Is really nice to seem them out there running and work well.

Supadogs, rain and river banks.

Sunday night was, well, interesting. It rained all bloody night. I can cope with rain on the tent. What I hated was the wind. The wind was so strong that it was blowing the tent in and onto me. I didn't get a wink of sleep. I have to admit that by the early hours of the morning I was getting pretty worried. Any way I got dressed at about 0530 just incase I needed to make a quick exit. I then just lay on my bed trying to think how I was going to make my course safer given the horrid conditions.

Any way fairly early on in the morning, Linda made an announcement that the show was to be cancelled for the day. A wise decision in my opinion. I didn't really want those grade 6/7 dogs throwing themself at my course and feeling responsible for anything that happened and believe me it was pretty bad out there.

I spent most of the first part of the morning drinking tea in various peoples caravans, contemplating what to do. I had said the night before that if it rained again in a big way, I was going home. I stayed last year through all the mud and rain and wasn't going to do it again. It is no fun for anyone, even less so in a tent.

Whilst I was sitting with my friends Sue and Andy contemplating, we heard lots of calls going out for people to return to their units as they needed to be moved. Linda kept saying about a river coming over but we were unsure of where she meant. It was at this point I left Sue's caravan to go and speak to another friend, Hazel, who was going home for the day as she only lives 20 minutes away. Hazel pointed down through the caravans and said look you can see where the river is coming over. I went back into the caravan to tell Sue and Andy that the river was in the field we were in. So we all went down to have a look.

At this point we all started to wonder just how far this water was going to move. We were camped about 200 yards from where the water had got to. I did say that if I had to take my tent down, it wouldn't be going back up and I was just going to go home. A few others said the same as none of us live that far so we could have popped back up on odd days.

We kinda then watched the water getting closer. The water then started to come over at other points along the river. Basically the watter was coming in from two different sides of where we were camped. I made the decision that I was going. I couldn't have laid there all night on Monday wondering what was going on outside. Home seemed like a plan!! With that I started to pack up and others started to prepare to leave if neccesary. Then came the call that everyone in that area had to move. So most of our group decided to go home.

What I love about agility people is that as soon as something like this happens, everyone keeps smiling and laughing and just gets on with it and helps each other out. I think I had about four people helping me get my tent down. Then when we were finished we all moved on to someone elses unit.

I left the venue around 1500 and by the time I got home the whole show had been called off. I believe there had been a visit from the fire brigade and the envrionment agency. I think, hard as it was, Linda made the only decision she could. Moving units in the dark later on in the day would have been a nightmare and it rained pretty hard all that evening at home.

Then of course last night we had major rain again and horrendous thunder. I would NOT have wanted to be in my tent for that!

So that was supadogs for another year! I have spent the days at home dossing really. Guess I am just hoping for a better DIN. Haven't done that one for the week for a few years. Hope I don't bring the rain!

BATS and Supadogs

BATS wasn't a bad show for me. Jag only had two runs and they were both agility so it was two training rounds for him. He worked really well so was pleased with the day. Twix had two agility and one jumping. I trained her contacts in her first agility. Her second agility was the KC Olympia Novice qualifier. I decided to push for this one as I am pretty sure she is capable of getting there. Sadly for me the course was very spreadout. This is exactly the sort of course I like for Jag but not for Twix. Twix needs something just a little more technical to gain an edge on turns. However we gave it our best shot and ended up 3rd. Very pleased but very frustrating as it is only the top two that qualify. That said of course her contacts were good and she did work well. Even more frustrating was that the other part of the class was a lot more twisty and would have suited her far more. Hey ho. Luck of the draw I guess. Twix also came third in a really nice grade 5 jumping. From memory she was .02 or something behind the winner and we could easily have made that up. I check Twix before the weaves as the weave entry was really quick and there were an awful lot of dogs slipping into them and banging their shoulders and I really didn't fancy injuring my dog just to get a win!!!

Next show was Supadogs. I am usually very disorganised before this show and am running round like a blue arse fly, packing stuff the day I am meant to leave. Well for some reason this year I was very organised. Even more surprising was that I was organised enough at work to give myself Thursday afternoon off (spent usefully at the gym.. followed by the steam room and jacuzzi!!!)

Any way I went up to supadogs on Friday. Pitched my tent and then came home. Yes mad I know but it meant I started on Saturday feeling all fresh. Not that it helped! Jag had a pole in each class but worked really well. Twix and I were on different planets all day and Twix and I got 3 e's.. very rare for us. But hey ho. The best result of the day was on of my friends getting a 9th with is big red and white BC in the 3/4 agility. A good result as his dog is only grade 3.

On to Sunday of Supadogs. After lots of rain over night we woke up to a misty day but that soon cleared to leave bright sunshine. I have a mediteranian tan!! Just from Sat and Sun though. Any way Sunday was better. Twix had a couple of clears and places. They weren't the greatest runs for various bad handling reasons (must try harder!) Jag had a 2nd a great 6/7 jumping. It was really spread out. Just the sort of thing we love. I finished off Sunday by setting up my course to judge on Monday. I was really pleased with my course and looking forward to judging it. It wasn't to be.. I will save it for a "rainy" day. Pun intended.

Next post.. Monday at Supadogs!!!

Gulp.. that long ago

Oops I didn't realise that it was that long since I had posted. Oops!

So dog walks..... Well they have continued to be good in training. I even had a wonderful dog walk at the Vyne show. Which netted us 3rd place. So it's there or there abouts. I have made a discovery though that I think might be affecting things... not saying what yet because I want to check it out first and see if I am right.

Show wise well I have been to Vyne and Tunbridge Wells.

Vyne was frustrating for Jag and I. He actually worked really well. We just ended up with nothing to show for it! He had a pole in the chum but was flying and I got him e'd in champ jumping but again he worked well. Twix had an if only day. A pole in 3-5 jumping at the time she ran her time would have put her 1st. She had a 3rd in agility and 12th in grade 5 jumping, a few wide turns saw us done the places. So all in all a good show.

Tunbridge....eek... lovely show well done to the organisers. Agility wise, there was a lot to be desired.

Jag, well in the chum first off he broke his wait (bad Jag lol) then I fell over then I released him from the see-saw and I think he thought I was joking as he wouldn't come off and then finally we got e'd! In the Crufts singles, this was Sunday, I think I had lost the will to live so really didn't work it properly. Team, hm the rest of my fab team went clear, Jag and I got e'd. We did have 3 clears. One in grade 7 jumping and 5th place. Then another clear in grade 7 jumping on sunday but out of the places!! Not something I am used to and a clear in grade 7 agility with trained contacts so didn't expect a place.

Twix, well there were if only's. A couple of rounds where Twix turned so tight she missed the next jump. I think Twix and I had 5 e's and a 5 faults. I was disappointed by the end of the weekend. But on reflection again she did some good stuff. I think I am guilty of chilling too much with Twix. She has been such a good girl the last few weeks that I am almost expecting her to go clear and therefore I am not working her hard enough.

So next show.. BATS! I am going to work hard and I am going to do well!! I will tell myself this all day every day until Saturday lol.

Following week is supadogs, so I feel like I have lots to do before then.