NOFA: Hare’n'Hounds & Waldridge Fell

Posted on May 23, 2011 by Leanne

I love Redcar, even when it’s blowing a gale. Best venue ever.

Dylan and I had a terrible half-week though. The best way I can think of to describe his first few runs is out-of-focus … he was clear, or had 5f, but without any speed or drive or focus to speak of. Nothing I could pinpoint but very much reminded of Scunthorpe and the BAA Finals last year.

We finished 10th in the Redmills Open Jumping (doing the 6 weaves twice caught out so many dogs!) and picked up a 3rd in the Grade 5 Jumping; it was still a little drifting with some very wide turns, which was a shame as it was a super course that I thought would really suit Dyl! Being brutally honest though, there weren’t many dogs in G5 and in a normal size class we would have been well outclassed. We picked up 5f for a pole in the other Jumping and I can’t even remember the other 2 agility classes!

Friday, and we had Julie Buchanan’s class first thing. She always uses the Brush fence and Wall in her classes so I was looking forward to that and thought if Dylan was running well we might be in with a shot. Dylan has never bothered with either before, so of course he stuttered into the Brush and ran out on the Wall. And then fell off the seesaw. Not a good start!

Generally it was a similar day to Thursday, with more focus but less confidence. Best run was in the G4-5 Jumping, we finished 3rd and Dyl worked the contacts well and responded nicely to the turn cues so we made up time that he lost on the flat.

Saturday and Waldridge Fell; The KC Novice Olympia was such a nice course and I really wanted to do well! I knew we had no chance of qualifying but it would have been good to see how Dyl held up against the good G5 dogs who were trying to qualify. Unfortunately he was very slow on the seesaw and hesitated before the dogwalk, and never really ran flat out. Compared to how he normally runs I would have said it was a pretty poor run, but it was our best run of the week which probably says something. Finished 12th.

Two jumping runs were ok but not great, we were clear and out of the placings in the more difficult straight G5, and then E’d in the G4-5. Both nice courses that should really have suited Dyl!

Final run in the lovely G4/5 Ag was the absolute worst run we’ve had for years. Dyl was hesitant, stuttered into the jumps, and then totally bailed off the seesaw as soon as it began to tip. We went back around to do it again and he bailed again, finally did it on the third attempt. The only good thing about the run was his Aframe, which was very nice, and that he did the Wall without flinching.

It was pretty obvious that Dylan wasn’t enjoying himself this weekend, at all. I don’t know where to go from here; I can’t ask him to run if he’s not having fun, but I also look back at videos from previous competitions where he is so clearly loving it. I don’t know what was different this time, and I don’t know how to avoid that next time.

Photos on Flickr.

NOFA 2011, a set on Flickr.

Redcar Flyball

Posted on September 28, 2010 by Leanne

The girls ran well, we broke our seed time again and clocked a 20.15 in the afternoon. Mollie was slightly off her normal form, I think Saturday took her edge away. She gets so excited and then exhausts herself by getting all wound up and silly when she’s not running. She and Kim still ran line-to-line 4.9-5.1s all day. I am especially pleased with Kim, she ran all day as she was the height dog and she clocked a 4.99 in the afternoon. No idea what she’s up to, getting faster at her age! It was really good racing though, and we finished 3rd in the Division.

Dylan’s team also finished 3rd. Dylan was not running at his best. He was running with the top-team dogs again as they were missing two of the usual dogs from that team, and he wasn’t happy. As soon as I tried to do a proper change into Norah, Dylan started stuttering into the first jump, slamming on the breaks. My assumption is that this was to avoid Norah, because on wide changes he wasn’t stuttering. I’m getting a little bit frustrated with his stuttering into the first hurdle – it’s something that has only developed this summer and it varies depending on the competition.

What made this more frustrating was that Dylan’s box was lovely! He had a few mishaps after our new boxloader dropped a ball as he was approaching the box, which confused him no end, but by the next race he was back to neat, tight turns. It’s probably the best boxwork I’ve seen him doing all summer, but instead of improving his times, he was slower due to the run-in. He clocked 5.1s consistently all day (including changeovers, not line to line), which isn’t good enough. He clocked a 4.81 in singles the day after his first ever competition, and that is the standard I have been holding him to ever since.

Luckily we went to the beach afterwards. Despite the windswept grey sky and the wild grey sea, Redcar is always worth the trip because of the Stray.

Quiet Weeks

Posted on September 23, 2010 by Leanne

My computer unexpectedly died late last week, and it doesn’t look like we can get it looked at until the end of the month. I’m hoping that we’ll at least be able to recover the hundreds of photos and videos I had on the hard drive of the dogs, but I’m feeling a little disheartened by the idea that it’s all lost. At the moment, it just means that my time on a computer is limited to maybe 20-30minutes a day at best. It’s a struggle!

As a result, the dogs and I have been alternatively lounging around or going for impulsive walks to the local parks. We’re so bored we considered taking up Geocaching, although the fact we don’t have any kind of GPS device scuppered that plan.

The weather too, is scuppering all plans. It’s gone very autumnal this week, which of course means endless downpours. It’s been raining for a week and already I’m looking forward, rather desperately, to next summer. Dylan and I are forced to practise our heelwork inside, which means it’s taken a bit of a backseat. We can only walk around 10ft before having to make a sharp left or right, and then it starts looking more like very small heelwork circles, which I don’t think is doing either of us any good. I’m having problems with it anyway, as I decided to start using the clicker, which turned out to be a complete disaster. It’s too specific – I can end up clicking him for for head position, hind position, left or right paw off the floor, moving, and if I get my timing wrong, general bouncing and enthusiasm. That’s too many things in one click, and I can’t simplify any more than I have. So we’re using verbal markers, and it seems to be working.

We’re flyballing at Redcar this weekend, in rather unexpectedly mixed teams, but there is always a beach to console us if it all goes wrong. This is probably my favourite venue in the country (although I wish it had better showers!) but I have a feeling this weekend is going to be very damp. Unless we all freeze to death, as the weatherman is happily anticipating — but then, he’s been wrong all summer, so I’m not inclined to start believing him now.

Northern Festival of Agility: Part Two

Posted on May 25, 2010 by Leanne

Beach.

The beach at Redcar is gorgeous, all endless miles of sand and sea. Dylan and I spent a couple of hours there by ourselves earlier in the week, but the girls arrived on Thursday and Dylan was ridiculously excited to see them again so we spent all afternoon there.

Probably one of the few times you’ll spot me on camera; Mum took over camera duties whilst I tried to persuade Kim to swim. She didn’t, but she went much deeper than normal and didn’t flail like an idiot, so maybe her one and only hydro session did her some good.

Also, have I mentioned the weather? Because the weather. Wow. Every single picture looks bright and sunny and warm because it was.

Northern Festival of Agility: Part One

Posted on May 24, 2010 by Leanne

Most perfect agility holiday ever. Redcar is a fantastic venue; I’ve raved about it before, but it’s a huge rugby club/football club training ground, so perfectly flat mowed lawns, nice big exercise areas, and 400m away is the Stray, a beautiful and huge dog friendly beach. What could possibly be better?!

Hare’n'Hounds ran the first half of the week, Saturday to Tuesday. Due to some flyballing issues, I didn’t enter Saturday so we travelled up on Sunday morning with Dylan.

We had a so-so run in the first Grade 3 Agility, it wasn’t a very hard course but I held his Aframe contact and we were very wide and messy around the turns. And the dogwalk was slooooooow! Came a surprising 5th, and Julie’s Winnie won it.

I can’t even remember what happened in the two Grade 3 Jumping runs, so it can’t have been particularly good or bad. I have a vague recollection of one being fiendishly difficult, can’t remember where we went wrong but I know we did!

The other Grade 3 Agility was a nice smooth course, nothing really difficult about it and all I wanted from Dylan was a fast dogwalk. It was reasonably quick, but not quite what I wanted, but he flew around the rest and did a beautiful seesaw for me. I messed up at the end because I ran ahead of Dyl and then heard him crack a pole, but I wasn’t sure if it had fallen or not. I was so busy thinking about that I forgot about the pull to the last jump, and poor Dylan went very wide and then kind of scrambled over it. Eek, bad handler! We got another 5th anyway, good start!

Monday; Grade 3 Jumping was a smooth course, ideally needed a wait start which I don’t have anymore. Made completely the wrong handling choice for the start as a result, we were very messy around the first turn, but still finished 4th. Very pleasantly surprised by that one, I didn’t think we had much chance as it was a nice fast course.

Lovely Grade 3 Agility course, again needed a wait start to get the fast dogwalk from Dylan, and so again he was a little slow to start. A little wide to the weaves as well, but apart from that it was a really nice run, fast and smooth and we came 2nd, behind a cracking little Pointer. We’re getting closer though, so near to that 1st now!

Combined 3-4 Agility … I think we’ll pretend this didn’t happen. I missed the course walking and then tried to run it anyway, and just made a complete hash of it. Trained Dylan’s contacts and bless him, he tried really hard anyway!

The Combined 3-4 Jumping was another superfast course, there were loads of clears so I decided to gamble a bit and leave Dylan in the weaves. I do this at training all the time, but I’ve never dared just run off and leave him in competition. It paid off anyway, he stuck in them and I could get the front cross in and keep him tight to the finish. We finished 12th, not a bad result for my slow Grade 3 dog!

Tuesday … smallest classes of the week and I so wanted the win, I thought we could do it! Had a blitzing run in the Graded 1-4 Jumping, although I called it perfect on twitter and it wasn’t (we were really wide to the second tunnel, I didn’t give Dylan enough information and he wasn’t sure if he should be going on or not). We came 2nd, best ever placing in Jumping. Not really disappointed, Dylan ran like a true pro and was fast, sharp and extended in his jumping. Couldn’t have asked for better from him. (Fab course from Nigel Staines too, loved it!)

The Combined 1-3 Jumping was a basic box type course, all a little tight without much room to stretch. We ran a clear that bagged a 7th but Dylan never really had room to speed up and I didn’t find it all that inspiring. Can’t remember the Graded 1-4 Agility at all, apart from that it was quite hard and I sent Dylan the wrong way (nice contacts though!)

Bit of judge switching went on the afternoon, for various reasons, and so Dylan’s Combined 1-3 Agility was judged by Nigel Staines. He set a fab course with a really tricky pull-thru at the end; Dylan smoked the course, fast contacts and beautiful turns, and then we got scuppered on the pull. Arg! Heard everyone sigh in sympathy, so know the run was as good as I thought it was, and we finished up with a smile.