Another Year Over

2009 - What a year!

My aim for the year was to get Rum into a Novice Final but that wasn't meant to be as he won up to grade 6 in July. Another aim was to get Emz into Grade 7, she is just one agility win away. For Cas it was to stay healthy and she has done that even had some high Grade 6 placings along the way.

Agilitywise I am not sure how I feel anymore, I haven't done a show since the end of October and haven't trainined since before my gastro - mid September. And to be honest I have not missed it. I decided to retire Rum from indoor shows when he just wasn't able to cope with the stress of the UKA show in Cheltenham, there really isn't any point putting him through it. And so I didn't think it was worth doing any with just Emz.

So 2010, am not sure what I am doing. Rum has got as far as he can as I struggle with training him - our only group lesson available is indoors and he doesn't cope well, when in a private lesson outdoors he switches off and plods round, so neither benefits us and we struggled in Grade 6 as he just isn't getting any training. Ember will be 7 this year and is never going to be the most consistent dog in the world. Cas will be 10 and it's only a matter of time before she starts to struggle. So I really don't know whether agility is for me anymore, I just don't have any motivation, nothing to aim for. Plus Rum is a lot nicer to live with when he isn't doing agility, he is so much calmer, he really struggles with the stress of agility shows.

So we shall see, I may see you around, I may not. If I no longer do agility I will really miss all the friends I have made during my time competing.

Happy New Year!

Happy Xmas

Catch Up

Again it's been a while, Ember won up to Senior Steeplechase at Cheltenham UKA. It's my birthday this week so am out a bit though have got a cold and feel dreadful!! I have heard a song I would quite like to do a new HTM routine to and hopefully enter Rugby in January, I haven't done much this year as was concentrating on agility with Rum but I want to get going again next year.

The Jeremy Edwards video has now been finished, am really pleased with how it looks:


Also here's a pic of Lee and I in Castletown, Isle of Man from our training weekend, was a great weekend everyone was lovely:

Don't forget the LGT Workshop DVD is still available and will make an excellent Christmas present!!

www.leegibsontraining.com

RIP Kali

I know it's not a dog related post but Kali really was one of the pack, she was just like a dog and even did some media work, if only I had thought about it earlier she could have done more as she loved going out in the car and meeting everyone on set. She was a real star and a one in a million cat, there will never be another like her. Before the dogs came I had trained her to sit, spin, jump a jump and also fetch a stick as I was desperate to have a dog I treated her like one and I think she thought she was one. She had a massive cancerous growth and had to be put down today, she was in pain and they couldn't make her comfortable.

It's been a while....

I hadn't realised it had been so long to be honest. We haven't done much since KC Festival really and work has been quite manic, personal life has been busy so I haven't stopped really!

We competed for a day at Dordale and Cas picked up a 4th in Grade 6 Jumping which I was dead chuffed with as she is almost 10 now so she's still going strong, Ember had a win in Combined 1-7 Jumping. Then the show at High Peak was cancelled and I was so looking forward to it. We did a day at Bromsgrove and Rum had a place in a blast of a Combined 1-7 Jumping course however this was the beginning of my illness and I got worse that week only to find I had gastroenteritis after a trip to the Doc on the Thursday. I was totally gutted to have to pull out of judging at Dashin on the Saturday but had to spend the day in bed, on Sunday I felt better until I got up and felt horrendous again, I lived on toast for a week which was a great way to lose weight (1/2 a stone!) but that's soon gone back on!

I was just about up to fitness for UKA Top Barn where Cas won Senior Steeplechase 1, Senior Steeplechase 2 and Novice Jumping, Ember won Novice Steeplechase 1 and Novice Steeplechase 2, Rum had a 2nd in Novice Agility and a 4th in Novice Steeplechase - they were flying that day!

I have just got back from a training weekend with Lee to the Isle of Man, take a look at his blog as he has uploaded some piccies. It was a short stop and we didn't get to see much as our flight was soooo late on Friday (thank goodness for Weatherspoons in the airport!). But it was a great weekend, fantastic company and everyone was really receptive to our ideas and I hope everyone has gone away inspired! Well done everyone and good luck for the future. And thanks to Christine for looking after us so well despite her not being well!!

This week am doing something for Burgess involving training a celeb's dog to do agility! Will post more when we are done.

Ember's win @ Dordale:

Cassie's 4th @ Dordale:

Blog

Haven't had much time to blog, went to Spain instead of DIN (had an amazing time :))) )and did my packing instead of all of KC Festival lol. Rum had a 2nd in G5 Agility at Lincoln and Ember and Cas both had places in Comb 4-7 Jumping too. On the Friday at KC Festival Rum had his first G6 classes and coped REALLY well (apart from a bit of an all over the place run in G6 Jumping) so I was really chuffed.

I want to say well done to Chris Hickman and Fiddle who is my fav black and white collie ever, she's a stunner for winning this g3 jumping class and KC Festival and since winning another at DIN:

3 Down 1 to Go

I was so pleased with Rum at Derby he went clear in pairs with Carol and Calca and they came 3rd. He had a bit of a hesitant clear in Combined 4-5 Jumping and came 3rd (0.05s of his brother lol!) and 2nd in Grade 5 Agility with a gorgeous run round a tough course and held contacts - I was dead chuffed with that run round Mavis Sherwin's course. Sunday wasn't so good he skipped a weave in Jumping, missed his entry in Chum (I rushed him) and dropped a pole in 1-7 Jumping with another lovely run.

Cas was all over the place this weekend or I was! We had poles here and there as I was pushing her too much.

Ember had a bad Saturday which resulted in me taking her out of both agility classes and knocked a pole in C6-7 Jumping which she would have won by 2secs. No matter though as she won G6 Jumping on Sunday so just an agility to go now! And also had a 2nd in Comb 1-7 Jumping. Her other agility was a bit better but she's started flying her other two contacts now and before it was just her a-frame so am getting rather fed up of her pushing me all the time!

What a Weekend!

My life is just mega busy at the moment and I am not at home one evening in the week so I wanted to have a break but I dragged myself out! So considering on Friday I didn't feel like doing either of the shows I had entered at the weekend, we actually did pretty well.

Rum and I didn't have that great a show at UKA, he picked up a 2nd Q in Novice Snooker because he went back over the start before pink and black. Then in Novice Jumping he had a pole down, I took his tuggy into the Novice Agility and worked his contacts, last run was Novice Steeplechase and he again had a pole down - it's not like him to knock poles so I was unsure whether he needed to see chiro. However he didn't knock one at Chipping Norton so must have just been having an off day. We started off with Combined 1-7 Jumping when he had a lovely clear but I came out saying he was slow but being so pleased with a super tight turn round the corner of a box, went to have a look at the results and he was 3rd, just over 0.1 of a second off the winner! I was so chuffed with that. Then Greaded 4-5 Agility and he jumped off the top of the dogwalk landing on the contact, I was so annoyed and shocked I lost track of what I was doing and pushed him too far past the A-frame, shame because the rest was nice and I managed to get a super smart finish with a blind cross at the end of the weaves. Then Graded 4-5 Jumping and I did the stupid thing of changing my plan having watched others go and we had a refusal early on then made a right mess of it!

Cas had a 1st in Novice Jumping at UKA and a 2nd in Senior Steeplechase. I think it's a shame as she is going to be stuck in Novice forever as she doesn't do agility so I am contemplating training some UKA agility classes so I can try and get her up. Then at Chipping Norton she had a pole down in Comb 1-7 Jumping and am not sure why and in Graded 6-7 Jumping she missed her last weave as I pushed her out too soon.

Ember had been so naughty in some of her classes last weekend I had ended up taking her out of the ring, but this weekend she was fab! At UKA we had a 3rd in Novice Snooker, not sure how many points but it wasn't a Q as she had a pole down on one of the early colours. Then a storming round in Novice Jumping - 1st. She almost had a flying round in Steeplechase but right at the end decided to change a flick flack into a pull through ha! Her agility round we trainined. Then at Chipping Norton she had a nice round in Combined 1-7 Jumping but flicked left round a jump and back jumped. Followed it with a storming round and won Grade 6 Jumping with a time that was 1 second quicker than the winning Grade 7. Her agility she was NAUGHTY!! Anyway for her win we got a portrait shot off the photographer there - DS Event Photography:

Rum is Grade 6!!

Just a quick post to say Rum won G5 Jumping at RVA so is now Grade 6 - KC Festival will be his first G6 I think, which was his first G5 last year! So that's nice he has spent a year in grade 5, I have been holding him there this year (contacts and not competing in jumping lol!) but thought it was about time he moved! He also had a 3rd in G5 Agility, Cas a 2nd in G6 Jumping, Emz a 2nd in G6 Jumping and 5th in Steeplechase. Videos to follow at some point.

France!

Last year I decided I would really like to experience agility abroad and I love France so I picked a French show and had the dogs – Rum and Ember (I didn’t bother with Cas as she is 9 now and only doing jumping so I thought she could stay and keep Diz company) vaccinated.
So we set off down to Poole to catch the ferry to St Malo, found a park for the dogs to have a run in at lunchtime and stumbled across a lovely little Italian restaurant by a lake. I was a little concerned as to how the dogs would be on the ferry but they were fine and they didn’t stress out at all. The ferry crossing was fairly smooth and we arrived in St Malo early evening.

I had decided to rent a cottage in South Brittany in the hope we would get some sun, well the cottage was more in Loire Atlantique in a little village called Les Moutiers ens Retz. On our way down we stopped at a service station to feed the dogs and let them off for a run and arrived at the cottage late evening.

We were up early to go to the show in Ploermel, it was quite a big show as there were two rings rather than the usual one – makes a difference from the 14 at Thames! We had to look up what our ring number was on a list then book in, at this point the competitors hand in their licences to compete which are then handed back out at the end, because I didn’t have one of these I handed in my record books. Then the running orders are listed for all your classes. I had four classes with Ember and 3 with Rum as Rum is not KC reg so he doesn’t get to run in the level class.

Ember was running first in the Open Agility which was a qualifier. In France you have to have your dog off lead while the dog in front is competing and you then walk to the start with the dog under control (you are unable to touch your dog, well you are once but sometimes this can be interpreted as more than once by the judge and you would be E’d so it’s best not to at all!) and wait for the judge to tell you to go. I was pleased that I managed to get both the dogs to the start without them bombing off over a jump lol!

So Ember, in the first agility she had the first pole down (she was in category A which is our equivalent of small but the jumps were a bit higher), she then missed her A-frame and had another jump down but I was really pleased otherwise as the weaves are spaced further apart, the tyre was tiny and she has never seen a table in the ring. This was then followed by another Open Agility (not a qualifier), this was a disaster, she knocked that many poles down I lost count!! And she slipped at the end of the weaves (the metal bar was really thick in the middle). Unfortunately I missed her level class as I thought she was in 2-eme degree but she was actually in 3-eme degree, these level classes are the only classes that count towards progression, so you could win hundreds of opens and stay in level 1 as it’s only the level one classes that count. All dogs start in level 1. Finally the jumping class, she was fab in this, had a pole down near the start so I didn’t really work the tunnel entry as well as I should have done and she went in the wrong end but otherwise she ran really nicely.

Rum had the Open Agility (non qualifier) first and did a lovely run but I just lost him in the tunnel – grrr shame as he ran really well. Then the other agility and he missed his down contact on the dogwalk but then I struggled to get him in the tunnel and when he landed after the wall he took the wrong jump I didn’t work him into his turn. In this class the judge had said you must leave the ring when E’d. Finally jumping and grrr he went into a tunnel again when he shouldn’t have – obviously something we need to work on!!

Everybody has to wait until the end where you all sit and watch the presentations, after this you then get your licence back with a copy of your results for each dog. It was a great experience, thank you to Theresa for helping me with everything. Am so pleased with the dogs considering they learnt the table at home last week and have never done it in the ring and the weaves are a lot further apart which Rum seemed more comfortable with but Ember just looked like she was running between them ha!

Well we had a lovely week, a lot of the time it was too hot to take the dogs out during the day so they were better off stopping in the house which was kept cool with the shutters closed. It was lovely to go for a run along the promenade first thing in the morning with the dogs off lead not having to worry about traffic etc. The one day it was cool enough to take the dogs to the beach late afternoon, so we all went for a swim which was fab – Rum is such a strong swimmer!! He easily pulled me back to shore.

Here are a couple of piccies: