Friday 30 April 2010

Dordale this weekend

Another week down, its always nice to reach friday which means its nearly time for agility. This weekend we are at Dordale, it's Kody's first Grade 4 so im slightly apprehensive as his weaves have taken a dip since we won out, however, we have done some training this week and he now appears to be weaving correctly again so im just hoping we can continue the success in competition.

It's funny how it can be such a roller coaster ride, one week the dogs can be fine and then all of a sudden we get a problem, still it keeps me on my toes and I guess it would become very boring if all the dogs ran like robots.

Zippy is in action again, im so looking forward to running him, he is a mixture of Keisha (very easy to run) but incredibly like Ronny too, in agility training this week he broke his dog walk contact to go into the tunnel, daddy all over !!!!

Monday 26 April 2010

More Results

Thanks to Alan Score for taking this lovely picture of Keisha and thanks to Lisa for sending it me


Ive finally had time to sit down and put all the results in the dogs agility books, Keisha has now got enough points for the Gold Agility Warrant and Ronny is only 40 points from getting his Silver.

I would just like to congratulate a few people with their results over the weekend.

Well done to Amy and Summer for their first placings getting 2 x 13th and of course 12th with Dylan. Well done to Ellen and Hamish for their 4th in jumping and a huge well done to Emma and Maisy, I know your still waiting for that final win to take you to the next grade but it is so so close and im sure it wont be long, your running as a great team and the reward will come very soon!!!

Finally a massive well done to Jackie and Speedy, im glad that he ran brilliantly for you at your first show, I cant wait for pairs at Hinckley.

Here is a video of Speedy in action and thanks to Kate for filming it.

Sunday 25 April 2010

WBSDS Show

This show has been fantastic, Zippy’s first show and we have come away with some great results, his first ever run was in agility which he gained 16th, he then went on to run a lovely jumping round to finish 18th. Today he was running with lots more confidence and speed and after a couple of naughty handler errors from me we finally got it together to run a really nice jumping round to finish 8th, I am so chuffed with my little Zip.


Keisha has had another successful weekend, another 2nd in agility along with 2 x 4th, 8th and a 9th. Kody has not been so good this weekend, we now have a weave issue as he keeps coming out at the end, I think he might have lost confidence in them so I’m going to have to work hard on them during the week, especially as next weekend is his first grade 4 show.

Ronny has just been fantastic, some really brilliant runs but just knocking a pole or a silly mistake mainly due to either him or me rushing, however he did have a dam good run in the jumping to finish 1st which means he is now in the same position as Keisha, 2 x wins to the next grade !!!

So I’m beaming from ear to ear, I can’t wait until next week.

Tuesday 20 April 2010

Water fun

So it's week 2 of the dogs fitness regime, Ronny and Keisha are happily swimming for the toy, Puddy is just happy swimming and Zippy is still a little cautious but is starting to swim alot better without all the splashing about, I managed to film three of the dogs but didn't want to chance leaving Zippy alone whilst I picked up the camera.



Zippy's weaves are progressing nicely, he is still struggling with single footed when the poles are upright but I think that will improve over the next couple of weeks, the main thing is he can weave and his two footed action isn't that slow anyway.

So thats it, im on count down, 4 more days to go and then Zippy will be fully in action, we are at the WBSDS Show this week in Newbury, im very very excited and although there will probably be a few teething problems I know Zippy will definitely be up for the challenge.

Sunday 18 April 2010

Wallingford Show

So another busy weekend, not many rosettes to show for the dogs good work, generally due to a silly mistake, mainly a pole, in Kody's case the first one !!!

Still Kody gained a 5th in jumping and we worked on holding the contacts in his agility rounds, he did some really nice runs during the weekend so im really pleased with him.

Keisha wasn't really on form this weekend, it appears we have lost our mojo again, out of the four runs we only manged one clear, she left it to the last run of the day to have a really nice agility round, and yes you guessed it, to finish 2nd AGAIN !!!

Ronny has had no clears this weekend which is such a shame, he is looking so good though, generally knocking one pole in each round, we even got the contact before the tunnel today so there is hope yet.



Thursday 15 April 2010

Swimming and Training

The dogs have started swimming, Ronny and Keisha love it, Zippy and Pudsey are getting used to it but Kody absolutely hates it, he has never really been a fan of water so I think I might stop making him do it, after all it is supposed to be fun as well as fitness !!!
This week has flown by, I cant believe its nearly friday, this weekend we are in Newbury for the Wallingford Show, Ronny and Maisy are doing pairs together which will be mega fun, well for the dogs anyway, Emma and me might have grey hairs by the end, flyball pairs to agility pairs, will it work ???

I took Zippy club last night, over the last two weeks he has started to run under jumps around corners, especially when the following obstacle is contact equipment or tunnels etc, it appears he is rushing to get to the next obstacle (just like his dad) so isn't sighting the jump, it's definitely a training issue although he doesn't do it at the field, I guess it will resolve once he gets a bit of experience in the ring so im expecting the first couple of shows to be good training ones.

Monday 12 April 2010

Spring at Shuttlewroth

This weekend has been another positive one, although not as many placings as last week (I guess it was a bit greedy) the dogs ran very well and all of them had areas I would like to improve on. Kody has lost his confidence in the weaves again ( haven't worked out why yet) and although he is completing them, they are not as quick as normal. Keisha still has tendencies to jump those contacts, especially the A-Frame, I find it quite frustrating as im running out of ideas of how to solve it. Ronny, well lets just say tunnels after contacts is just a no go, I think im really going to have to train this one, I do ask myself if he will ever have self control in front of those tunnels !!!

Saying all that we had some great results, Keisha had a 4th in jumping and 5th in agility, Ronny had a 1st in jumping and every round we had a good solid wait so im really pleased with him. Mum managed to film some of the runs but sadly not the best ones.



During the weekend I managed to get some weave training in with Zippy, he is starting to get frustrated with himself as he wants to go faster in the weaves but his double footed action is preventing him, I decided to get my v-weaves out and teach him the single footed action.

Thursday 8 April 2010

The swimming pool is up

I have finally got round to putting up the new swimming pool for the dogs, Ronny, Keisha and Zippy all seem really keen, its a good job as it is massive, I think we will start our swimming programme next week, 5 mins each night and they will soon be mega fit, hopefully it will help prevent the dogs getting injured so easy.

This weekend we are off to the Spring at Shuttleworth Show, I love going to this venue and it always seems like a nice relaxing show, I noticed last week that we didn't video Ronny in action so hopefully we will get a few clips of him this time.

Monday 5 April 2010

Kody goes Grade 4

This weekend has gone really well, Kody has been the star of the show gaining 5 trophies, 1st in agility, 2nd in agility, 1st in jumping along with another 2nd and 3rd in jumping. I cant believe the difference in him, his confidence is beaming and we finally got it together to pull some great rounds out of the bag, mum did catch him on video but unfortunately they were not his better ones, still a good chance for me to look at what went wrong.

Keisha and me have had a very frustrating weekend, the curse of the "2nd's is back after gaining three over the weekend, two in agility and one in jumping, infact on one of the agility rounds we had to do a run off for 1st place, obviously we lost, all the other rounds we just didn't seem to get it right, still it's the start of the season so there is plenty more attempts.

Ronny has been that nearly dog, generally knocking a single pole in each round, im proper chuffed with him though, he has come on so much and we had a solid wait in every class, we were rewarded with a super jumping round to finish 2nd so at least we didn't come away empty handed.

Pudsey ............ Well to be honest didn't go quite as well, his first jumping round looked really promising, after that it went down hill, he no longer wanted to run so kept running under the jumps, I decided to stop running him for the weekend and just concentrate on my other three.