Gap Farm December

Posted on December 12, 2011 by Leanne

Rio’s first visit to a flyball competition!

That is the most important thing that happened all day, of course. Dylan ran very well, not as well as he could have done simply because he was running with unfamiliar dogs, and so was I. Our changeovers were not consistent! He ran steady 4.8s over 11″. I have to admit this was a bit disappointing as I feel like he has been running his heart out at training, and I definitely did not have that feeling from him at Gap Farm. On the other hand, his boxturn was reasonably good, he was running into the first hurdle without flinching on his changes, and he swapped for his tuggy 95% of the time (he’s 100% at training but it tends to drop in competition; like any retrain, it doesn’t always hold up under a competitive atmosphere!).

Both the older girls stayed at home in the warm, and I sadly did not get to pick up Kim’s Ice Blue Moon as apparently they weren’t posted or something. Hmph.

I was really impressed with my crazy puppy. She took the atmosphere, the noise, the hundreds of dogs and people, the Christmas costumes/tinsel/hats into her stride. She was polite with every dog she met, and we ticked lots of boxes, meeting hairy dogs (Bearded Collies), big scary looking dogs (Dobermans), tall pointy aloof dogs (Madeleine the Saluki), noisy small dogs (JRTs), some lovely lovely Staffies (Roxy and a big brindle gentleman), plus all the collies/crossbreeds/others. She played with Lolly, who is the least likely puppy lover ever, and she also played with Diva. She and Diva are going to be a pair of troublemakers, it’s clear already! Almost all the dogs she met were polite but disinterested, barring a few over-friendly Spaniels who she said hi to and then walked away from, and grumpy Ella, who gave her very clear “go away” signals which she obeyed. Very pleased with those responses.

She met all the people without any bother, not demanding attention but happy to go say hi if they asked her to. Not bothered about the hats/costumes/reflective jackets etc etc, which I was very pleased about. She made me laugh by noticeably favouring the people who had fed her, but she does recognise Emma and Claire now anyway. Also wasn’t bothered by the people carrying boxes or other weird items, or prams/wheeled objects.

I wasn’t sure whether to let her offlead or not, but we hit the enclosed exercise area with Roxy, George, and Lolly and it was empty apart from one other dog on the other side of the arena. I’d already done some recall-rewards with her there earlier, so I let her off for a mooch around. She was very well behaved, explored confidently but knew her limits, played with Lolly and did a few mad laps, and then came back when called. I like puppies to have plenty of freedom as early as possible, otherwise being off-lead becomes a massive adrenelin rush and all the training falls out of the window. So far this is working, let’s hope it holds up!

She freaked out a bit at the very loud and static-y tannoy, but it kept making me jump as well so I don’t blame her. She also wasn’t very happy about the unpredicable 7yr old girl doing weird things, but I know we need a bit more socialisation with children. I don’t know anyone with dog-friendly kids, so that needs thinking about.

She also didn’t much care for the flyball, which is fine by me! She was relaxed and maybe a bit bored when we sat watching the rings, not interested in the noise or the action at all. She is a tugging fiend however, she stole or tried to steal every passing tuggy so I bought her one of her own and she turned into a fierce little tuggy monster. There is no doubting her tug drive, it overrides even tasty food.

Everyone we met mistook her for a Collie, I lost count.

Sutton Fields

Posted on September 12, 2011 by Leanne

Lovely day at Sutton Fields. I love this venue, I am going to continue my pestering of the team and hope we get to go again next May.

Two mix teams as we had several dogs on holiday (how inconvenient!), although Dyl’s team was actually the same as usual but with a fifth dog change.

Dylan and Mollie ran brilliantly, the team ran a new seed time of 20.16 and finished … last. Well, 5th. We can’t have everything. The 20.16 was on a break out and yet we managed to lose nearly every leg all day, oops. Really do feel like this team is gelling now, the dogs are getting comfortable running together and we’re pushing down the seed time even though ditzy Biba still isn’t running as consistently as she can. Unfortunately we now have the winter break and by next summer who knows what the team will be!

Kim’s team was made up of three top team dogs and then Kim and Bailey from the third team. We were on a DF time but I always thought we’d be pushing for break-out and we did, but nearly everyone in the division was. Lovely fast ground at Sutton! We ran a fantastic 19.40 with Norah, Roi, Kim and Bailey over 11″, and both height dogs were running over 5s. With Jet in there and a fast height dog this team would easily be running 17s times, so we’ll have to see what winter brings!

We finished 1st but it was tough racing, especially against Fylde in the last race where we were a leg down and had a dead heat before pulling it back. Super stuff!

I have all my fingers crossed that Kim has picked up the final points for her Ice Blue Moon at this venue as well, for various reasons, but we’ll see what happens when the points go up.

Hayfield Lakes

Posted on July 18, 2011 by Leanne

Good weekend, close racing and Notts were excellent hosts. Shame the venue wasn’t as wonderful as everyone else seemed to think (we camp in a tent, flat clean ground is important).

Dylan’s team broke their seed time and won their division, which was great. We also managed to get splits on the dogs for all their races, which was useful for a variety of reasons but from my point of view, confirmed what I already knew about Dyl. He sat out the first race, and then in the second 2 races in the morning session he was running into the same dog (Roi). He clocked consistent 4.8s for those races. In the afternoon Roi was dropped and he had to change into Norah, and his times dropped immediately, and then got worse when he switched back to running into Roi in the second afternoon race (I think his times dropped off to 5.3s at that point, and he normally runs better in the afternoon). He has to change into the same dog otherwise he begins to stutter into the first jump (which is also awful for changeovers).

So, I’m not sure if Dylan will continue running with this team, and if he does, we will have to change the lineup which is not the best option a month before the National Championships. This is slightly frustrating as there’s very little I feel we can do at training; Dyl isn’t comfortable with these dogs away from flyball, it’s not something that will be overcome by practise (although that will help). I feel bad for our team as well, as we’re the weak link.

The girls were in two mixed teams as we’d lost height dog Bailey to injury. We bumped Mollie up a team so she could run 9″ (12″ is too much for her all day), and Kim took up height dog duties in the bottom team, with usual second-team dogs Chip and Buddy to bring a little more speed.

That all fell apart slightly anyway when Mol’s team lost a dog through injury, leaving a 4-dog team! They finished 5th in Div 5, but ran 21s which really wasn’t bad considering we had 12-yr old Mollie, blonde Beardie Biba who is really only in her first season, and 10-yr old Beardie Buffy who hasn’t trained for 9months! Poor Ronnie was the only one left of the original team.

Kim’s team won their division but didn’t run great times, we weren’t exactly on top form but we got lucky on a few legs and pulled a few nose-in-front legs out of the bag.

Champs prep at Nantwich next time, another new venue for us. We’ll be giving our Champs lineups an outing (barring disasters) although I don’t think we know what they will be yet!

Dogs Unleashed

Posted on June 22, 2011 by Leanne

Saturday was flyball day, as per usual for this weekend. We only had two teams in but both were 6-dog teams, which I hate, but as we had some dogs coming back from injury etc it was really the only option.

Kim and Mollie both ran very well, Kim back to her usual self and being her usual Kim-of-all-trades, running in every position, even lead! We were a bit off on the start (0.09) but not too shabby to say we haven’t done it in forever. Think we finished 3rd. Or 4th, I can’t remember.

Dylan did not have a good day, and I ended up pulling him from racing. There was nowhere for me to keep him away from other dogs and so he spent the whole time getting more and more stressed and unhappy, and that was before we’d even got in the ring. Once we were in the ring, we had a minimum-distance type runback (about 70-80ft?) with crowds down both sides, and there was just too much going on. Really disappointed and frustrated with the situation (not with Dylan!) but there was no other option.

Sunday was agility day. Lovely lovely courses all day and loads of room to let Dylan chill and relax before his runs. Because Dyl’s classes were small, I was able to warm him up off lead and then walk him into the ring lead-less, which keeps his stress levels low, and it worked brilliantly because he ran fantastically all day. Super happy and super keen and smooth, perfect. We got a scrappy clear in the Novice Plus Agility but finished 2nd, and then had a nice clear with some wide turns in the N+Jumping and finished 4th, just out of the rosettes.

Fantastic Wicked Weaves course that Dyl and I rocked, except for the refusal on jump 12. I pulled him off too soon and I was kicking myself as we’d have been pushing for first or at least second, but oh well!

Kim was in her first Veteran classes, she wasn’t fully convinced by the Micro height but kicked up the gears in every run. She absolutely loved it, and we promptly got E’d in every class apart from the Circular Jumping where we came 2nd. Mollie picked up a 4th in the same class, and had a couple of high 5f placings as well in her other classes. Love running my old ladies, they’re so much fun.

Photos will be added to this post once my computer stops being a complete arse.

Pontefract Flyball

Posted on May 16, 2011 by Leanne

The girls’ team wasn’t quite on form, it still feels like a very new lineup and we aren’t all on the same page a lot of the time. Kim was much better this week, lots of comments on her improvement. Many thanks to Kath for that!

Dylan’s team was … weird. We had a 4-dog lineup that should really have been reasonably fast, but we never really pushed under 21s all day. Lead dog Lucy was back to clocking solid 4.8s and Dylan was absolutely flying as anchor, steady 4.8s when we got the splits at the end of the day. Just not sure what happened! We had nothing on starts (0.08 at worst) and absolutely nothing on changeovers.

I have to admit that Dylan’s box was terrible, I finally figured out why in the last race and we kind of fixed it in warmup, which it made an immediate improvement. Kicking myself over that! He loves running over 11″, it’s a height that really suits him, but he’s back over 12″ next time with Kim in the team and he’s losing his nice anchor spot.

More importantly, we’ve got plenty of time off to train and it’s Redcar this week, I’m so looking forward to me and Dyl off on our travels!