Agility For Great Britain

Firstly how nice was the weather?!

Laura and I rocked up to the show ground on Friday evening at 10... came in through the wrong entrance... then got stuck in the wet grass. Oops! Thankfully Yvonne and Graham were there to help us.

First run on Saturday was the EO wild card class. The dogs finishing in the top 5 qualified for the European Open try-outs the next day. Pie and I managed a scary clear round and finished 8th. However, 3 people who finished above me had already qualified
which meant we got the last place to get us through to the try-outs the next day. OH MY!!

Then was Graded 6-7 Agility. I decided to train this and we managed another clear - Weird! 2 clears in one day!

Graded 5-7 Jumping was quite a tough course for me, because there were several places where I would usually dummy. I was late sending back over after a pull through so Pie flew past me taking another jump whilst barking! Haha!

Last run of the day was Combined 5-7 Agility. The course was too quick for Pie, and I had already decided that I wanted to train his contacts ready for try-outs on Sunday. On the start line, Pie managed to get his tail over the ring rope and got caught. He wasn't happy in his wait, so I did a quick release, which meant I wasn't able to handle the beginning of the course as I wished but meant I didn't have to leave him on start line unhappy and also meant I had to do a cross behind further on. We managed to do it woo!!

I was really looking forward to the EO try-outs. Lee was judging which eased my nerves a little. But on the whole, I was quite calm about the whole event.
I missed my normal entered courses as Pie had 3 try-out rounds and potentially a 4th final round, if we finished in the top 30.

Here is the video of Pie's clear in Round 1 Jumping. Couldn't believe we managed it!

Round 2 was Agility. Unfortunately, we got E'd at number 16... :( We were soo close aswell. Tried not to think about it too much as many people were getting E'd so I just had to focus for Round 3.

Another Agility, I was running fairly early. 13 or 14. I was worried about pulling him off the jump after weaves as I was hoping to make the second reverse. Again, it was all a little messy and we got 2 refusals for it. Then Pie took off too late and I was in his way which meant he had the pole down. We finished the round with 15 faults, hoping it would be enough for us to finish in the top 30 in order to qualify for the Final 4th Round. We finished 29th!! The final ran in reverse order which meant I was running 2nd! I over worked the weaves and got a refusal... oops! I don't really know why I over worked it, as if it was any other round, I would of let Pie pick up the entry himself as I KNOW he can get it, but I guess the pressure and things, I just thought I'd play safe - which back fired!

Overall, I was so pleased how we both coped with some of the 'big boys'. Pie is still Grade 6 and it's both of our first times under proper pressure, and our first 'proper' class. It was a great day and I thoroughly enjoyed trying-out, and it was a great experience for next year in case we manage to get in again. Just want to say a quick thank you to everyone who was supportive on the day and thanks to Lee for fab courses, and also being supportive too. Well done to those who qualified too!!

p.s. Laura is still uploading other videos, so I will put them up once they're on YouTube.

L x