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EMDAC Midsummer Madness

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Hmm, where do I start?!

Thursday. Thursday … happened. EMDAC always run the Thursday classes in the evening, usually starting around 5pm and finishing around 8:30-9. It’s usually fantastic, running on cool summer evenings and under the floodlights. It started so well …

I elected to run Kim NFC in Introductory for Thursday. I can take a toy in Intro classes, and they are smooth, fast, flowing courses, which I thought would be a good way to see if I could get Kim running again. She was a little surprised in Agility when I got the toy out, and so we made a bit of a mess but had a lot of fun, which was the intention! Intro Jumping was a super-fast up-and-down thing, and Kim just went out and crushed the course. She ran like a 5yr old, proved to me she is physically fine, and loved it.

Dylan threw in some good runs, ran well in the Novice Plus Agility and finished 2nd, just behind Lottie.

And then it started to rain. Dylan finished his last run at 11:15pm, and I know some people didn’t run until 11:45. And the craziest thing? Nobody really complained. We have clearly lost the plot, us agility people.

Friday was a better day, only occasional rain and done by 5pm. Mollie had her first run and got E’d, which was hilarious and I apologise unreservedly to the judges for making such a hash of their lovely courses all weekend.

Kim was back in Novice and although occasionally loping around at cruising speed, she ran with more enthusiasm and speed than she has for a long time. She pulled off a 2nd in Novice Medium Helter Skelter anyway, and generally just made me smile.

EMDAC Novice Agility (July 2010)Friday was split classes by height, so Kim and Dylan were running over the same courses without being in direct competition. Dyl did a smooth but not astonishing run in the Novice Maxi Agility, and came 1st – the course was difficult but nowhere near impossible, so I was surprised no-one else got around! Still, first win towards Graduate Agility, go Dylan! Kim got 5f in the same class for a refusal, my fault as usual and it was a shame as she’d have been well up there.

Kim was 2nd in the Jumping and then 2nd in the Up-and-Under too, what a good girly! Dylan was 2nd to Tri-Dylan in the Jumping, just like Kim (!) and just wasn’t fast enough in the Up-and-Under (think we were 4th overall?).

Novice Triple-A was a bit uninspired and I wasn’t much feeling it, so went in and held all Dylan’s contacts, and then got him E’d. Oops. Kim ran it fantastically though, until I pulled her off the last straight and got 5f. Oops againn!

Saturday was slightly crazy, both dogs were running the same courses again but with split results, but Kim just upped her game. Her run in Novice Medium Agility was blitzing, I was so shocked I burst out laughing and then got her 5f for a refusal. Oops! Dylan got E’d, but he had a really nice run, I just made a mess of it.

The Novice Jumping course was horrendous, all call-offs and tight spacings, and I knew I had no chance of getting Dylan around. I figured we’d try the first bit and then see what we could do, which resulted in an E, of course! Scratched Kim straight off, she would have hated it.

Novice Triple-A was a lovely course, really suited both my dogs. Kim was running clear until she got to the final jump-weave-jump combi, where she steadied for the weave entry and then spotted her lead and ran straight past the poles and over the final jump. Pure naughtiness, but I should have been watching for it!

Dylan also ran it beautifully, and then did the same as Kim and popped his last 2 poles in the weaves to get his lead. Arg! The lovely Rae Blythe, who was judging, came over and spoke to me afterwards though to say what a shame it was, because he really did run it fantastically.

Steeplechase to finish, super-fast course that both dogs enjoyed, although I think they were both a bit confused! Dylan was 2nd and Kim was 3rd.

EMDAC Evening

We were back to combined height classes on Sunday, which turned out to be a low to high day; I walked Dylan out of the Novice Agility, because he was being such an idiot. It was a shame as he did a lovely dogwalk, but he was floating about like a complete idiot and ignoring me, so out he went. Fetched Kim for the same course, and she whipped through and won it by nearly a second. Kim = awesome.

Novice Jumping was an interesting course, really spread out and using every corner of the ring, but still really nice. Kim was slow to start and then picked up, Dylan ran it ok but not fantastic. Dylan was 2nd, Kim 4th – I really though Kim was faster!

Kim was 4th again in the Helter Skelter, but she was easing up a bit by then. Dylan did a beautiful run, and then skipped the last jump to get his lead. Arg!

The British Open Championship was in the afternoon. The Agility was a bit of a killer course, but I felt moderately confident that Dylan could handle all the tricky sections, and he did. In fact, he did an amazing run, blew me and everyone else away, and finished 3rd. I nearly died! He beat some really good dogs that we can’t touch usually, so I was so pleased.

The Jumping round was a straight speed course, a few traps but nothing truly horrifying. Dylan’s run was amazing, he was sharp and tight and then he ran past the last two jumps to get his lead. I nearly cried. Brought him back around to collect the 5f rather than the E, but that was our hopes dashed. I felt like such an idiot too, I should have asked the lead person to leave his lead outside the ring. We finished 10th overall, and I think we’d have been pushing for top-5 if we’d gone clear in the Jumping. I’m still a little disappointed but Dylan stepped up three gears for me and so I’m still proud of him.

Finished off by running both dogs in the Time Gamblers, placed 6th (Kim) and 7th because they were both too fast. Heh, can’t complain about that! Had it been a normal class they’d have placed 1st (Dyl) and 2nd, which is kind of awesome.

Weekend

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Oops, nearly a week since the last update! I guess I just don’t have much to discuss at the moment, and it’s nice to have a weekend free of competition!

The dogs all ran well at flyball training on Wednesday and Saturday. Dylan has been working his socks off for me. He’s scheduled to make his “official” Open debut at York in the Night Owlers, and he hasn’t run with any of the dogs in the team before so we’ve been making sure he’s ok with changeovers etc. Thankfully he is! It should be a decent team, but hopefully the weather will be a bit cooler this year. Our lead dog Big Archie is a heavy-set black Lab who can suffer in the heat, and I have no idea how Dylan will work as we’ve never had to deal with higher temperatures yet. On the other hand, it was pretty warm yesterday and he didn’t seem affected (unlike Mollie, who got a little too toasty!) so hopefully he’ll be ok.

The girls are both running in Marsh Owlers again, not sure how we’ll do as we have a couple of dogs running who can produce some cracking singles times but who can also really not! Plus we have the two manic black hairies Mollie and Lolly, who won’t stop if they overheat so we’ll have to keep an eye on both of them.

We’re also camping for the first time with ‘Owlers next week, it’s the club’s 4th Birthday and we’re having a bit of a party. The venue at York Racecourse is fab and Dog Friendly are hosting, so it should be a good tournament.

The results from EMDAC went up on Tuesday, along with the updated League Tables. Kim should qualify for the Primary Jumping Grand Prix Finals without much issue, she’s 5th in the League at the moment and I don’t think she’ll drop out. We almost certainly aren’t going to qualify for the Agility though, unless we have a great placing in Saturday’s Last Chance Qualifier! We are also going to get automatic promotion into Novice Jumping at the start of the new season, but it does look like I’m going to have to apply for promotion in Agility unless we do particularly well at Midland Counties. Our issues with agility this year haven’t been with the contacts, just generally with the courses and bad handling or simply being out of the placings, so hopefully we’ll get the OK. I’ve known for a couple of months that Kim wasn’t going to get the Primary Medium Dog of the Year, we sacrificed our chances to do flyball earlier in the year. Both the dogs in front of her are fantastic dogs though, I’ll be thrilled if either of them wins!

As I said before, I was really hoping Dylan wasn’t going to go into the promotion window for the Jumping, but unfortunately he has. The top 53 dogs are automatically promoted, and Dylan is currently 48th. Arg! I’m confident that he can cope with the Primary Jumping courses but I would have liked to stay as Introductory for another season, it would have been a big boost for both of us. I’ve still got my fingers crossed that some of the other dogs might overtake him, but if he does get any more placings at our next 2 competitions it’s very unlikely. Thankfully he does get to stay in Intro Agility, and I think our chances of qualifying for the Agility or Jumping Grand Prix finals are about very slim.

Our running orders have also come for Dylan’s first KC show. I chose to enter the Thursday only of Northern Week in the hope that the classes would be smaller and therefore the atmosphere might be a bit more relaxed, and Dylan also would be able to do the 1-2 Combined courses rather than the 1-4. Might as well take advantage of entering as a Grade 2 whilst I still could! My guess paid off anyway, his classes are squidgey small (45 in Agility, 47 in Jumping) so feeling pretty optimistic. Kim has two Medium 1-4 classes which ought to suit her as well, with 9 and 10 in Agility and Jumping respectively so no exactly a huge amount of competition! Still, getting placed does rely on getting a clear, so it’s not all plain sailing … !