Dig It Show

We went to the Dig It UKA show, our first time at UKA and had a great time. Ruger was consistent with 5 x E :( I was really pleased with alot of his performance as he got all his contacts the only problems were the weaves and turning him into the correct jumps, difficult at his speed. Zara was good, although surprisingly had placings with faults, not something you get at Large Grade 3, the classes were alot smaller than we would have had at KC, so I was taken by surprise when they called our names out at the presentations. She got the following places in the UKA classes: 2nd Novice agility 3rd (Q) not sure which class 4th Novice steeplechase For the Dig It pay on the day classes (she ran lovely for these with clear rounds) 1st agility 1st jumping 3rd in the pairs with Maureen and Archie (double clear) Ruger ran the pay on the day classes too, and kept up with the E's, however the weaves entries were really difficult and he didn;t get get any faults on them yay!!!!

What else can go wrong?

I've been looking forward to the WBSDS show for ages, really like this show. On Tuesday night at training Zara went lame, she wasn't bad, but I knew she wasn't right, so we left early to travel straight to Wales. The M6 was shut so a nice detour round Stafford got us back on further down. Our junction to get off the M5 was closed sending us on another detour round Gloucester!!! We got to Wales at 215am aaargh!!!!! Next day it rained and rained and rained. Zara was still slightly lame. Thursday was training at Mike's, Zara was still lame, no apparent reason, so rest for her and Ruger did a 2 hour training session. He was very good just losing interest for the last 15 minutes so we stopped. He is amazing his drive is so high, he doesn't give up. We worked on checking his pace going into the weaves, as he rarely misses an entry, even at his speed but is too fast for pole 2 to 3. He also did some nice independent contacts, without me speaking yay. Friday Zara was still lame, still happy and leaping around, but not agility fit:( It was still raining too. We decided not to risk Zara at Newbury so would not go. Sadly Sunday the show was cancelled. Its really sad for the committee to have to make that decision, but they are so right to put the dogs and handlers welfare first, but so disappointing for the people who have worked so hard to put the show together and for the competitors. Saturday we headed over to Caerphilly and had an hours training session with Ruger practicing the exercises we had learnt on Thursday. Good thing is he has now used rubber contacts, I thought he would freak out, but the a-frame didn't bother him, although he got partway up the dogwalk and jumped off, as his little delicate feet didn't feel right :) After 2 weeks of rest Zara is now fit and ready to go for training tonight. We have 3 shows to look forward to this Friday, Saturday and Sunday for both dogs. Last weekend the GB team won GOLD at the Belgian Shepherd Dog World Championships in the agility, an amazing acheivement, well done!!!!!!!

Delinquent Dogz

Really pleased with Ruger's first run of the day in capability agility. He had a fantastic stay, hit his contacts with lovely 2on 2off and got all the jumps in the right order, and as a bonus got 3rd place.

Zara had some silly rounds and some unlucky with 5 faults for a pole, although she enjoyed all her runs.

K9 Skool members had a great day too.
Sharon and Ryan had a fantastic agility run ending in 2nd place, at their first ever show and a clear in jumping.
Ali and Chewie had a stunning jumping run with an unlucky 5 faults for knocking a jump over.
Michelle and Rufus had 2 clear round rosettes at their first ever show.
Dani and Jet entered the jumping class and ran 2 lovely rounds, they will be a team to watch in the future.
Mandy and Poppy had some good runs.
Maureen and Archie had clears in agility and jumping.
Heidi and Zeta had a clear in jumping.

Well Done everyone

Looking Forward to the New Season

We have joined a lovely club to train at, its good to have some direction to my training as its difficult to see where you are going wrong when you train alone. Ruger is really coming on and the next step is to start competing. He is amazing over the jumps and has lovely contacts but needs work in the weaves, his entries are fantastic but he doesn't stay in!
Zara has competed a few times since my last blog, least said about Ribble the better, don't know who she is listening to, but she seems to think that faults are points :(
We had a clear round in agility at Tailwaggers but not fast enough for a place, but it was a nice smooth clear, so I was really pleased with her.
Friday night we had the club monthly comp and Zara won both agility and jumping, with some really good runs and one really bad one.
Yesterday was Springers, this is a lovely, friendly show, and we had some unlucky runs. I missed walking the snooker and only knew about it as they called my name as they were waiting for me, I grabbed Zara out of the car ran in and someone told me the rules, Zara was brilliant, good weaves, contacts and cleared all jumps, however I forgot the last set of weaves, losing 7 points, aarrrgh, I couldn't believe it when we got 4th.
K9 Skool had a good day at Springers, Heidi and Zeta won their snooker class and Anne and Charlie had 2 thirds, Well Done
Its the start of the season and I have shows nearly every weekend, I am looking forward to getting Ruger up and running, and also I have some judging appointments over the summer.
Above are some photos of Ruger from Springers that a nice lady took for me.

1st Show of the Year

Well as I predicted Zara went in with a yay its agility attitude and was a bit mad. First class was Graded 1-3 Agility, it was a nice course for the grade mix, I didn't give het too much help at the weaves so she went past, but in training she would have done them, need to work now on weave entries, in fairness we haven't trained them much lately, she then had 2 poles and a contact, sounds diasterous but she was listening to me and we both enjoyed the run.
Second class was again Graded 1-3 Agility. I don't know what happened to Zara as I left her in the stay, walked away past the first jump when she overtook me, spun round and took no 9, I brought her back to jump 2 and made her wait, which she did, she cleared the next 2 jumps, leapt off the top of the A frame and powered away to the tunnel in the far corner, this is not Zara (I did check to see I had the right dog, this is more Mawgan style LOL), at this point I thanked the judge and left the ring, putting Zara in the down when she left the tunnel. That's the first time I have ever had to do this with Zara she was crazy, she came out of the ring with her tail wagging like mad saying that was fun!!!!
Her last run was jumping and she was lovely, missed the weave entry and 2 unlucky poles, but again we worked together.
I do wonder about whether to do the big indoor shows, they are so noisy. Wilmslow do a good job with giving as much space as possible at Myerscough, but its still noisy, which makes it quite stressful for a lot of dogs like Zara, who would like nothing more than to stand there and bark, but isn't allowed to.

Must say a big Well Done to Jules and Jette who won Grade 2 agility so they join us in Grade 3, not bad for a Lab who is going to take it easy this year!!!

Hello

Can't believe its so long since I last updated. Let's hope the New Year brings more success than last.
My main aim for this year is to get Zara out of Grade 3 (preferably by winning out but I will be happy for enough points!!!) she has lost weight and is moving faster, so lets see if that helps, we haven't competed since October when she was running lovely but just the odd pole or contact. Will see how she does at Wilmslow tommorrow, at training last week she was great.
I would also like to start to compete with Ruger but we will see, he's doing great in training but is so fast, I need to adjust to his speed, see picture below, that was him last week.



For Mawgan I will be happy to see her being happy, she doesn't miss agility and is happy just having company, her hips are no worse than last March which has got to be a good thing.

Zara's Results

Zara had a couple of shows at the end of March. Springers once again was a lovely show, and Zara ran well but we were unlucky with the second to last pole in what was a good agility run. Last class of the day was Quantum Leap and Zara listened to me, it was hard work remembering where to go next, but it was fun and Zara got first place.
The following Saturday was Delinquent Dogz, again a lovely show and Zara had a 3rd place in agility, I am so pleased with the way she is running.
Sunday I passed the KC Course Building Seminar, so now can judge at KC shows.
Last weekend I went on an agility instructors course with Mike & Claire Bacon, in Bristol. It was really good and I have come away with some new ideas for training especially with the weaves and see saw.
The picture above is of Mawgan after a swim today, I think that someone told her that hydrotherapy is good for hip dysplasia LOL