Last week in notts :(

Well this week was my last two agility lessons in notts :(

Elliot:
Well when he tried weaves again straight, first time he flew threw them all and did them perfectly!! After that he went back to how he was, he keeps missing 3-4, it is very odd because every time he does it wrong this is where he goes wrong!! The plan is to take him back to channel weaves, with them on the tape and jsut really re-inforce these - we shall see how he gets on bless him. We did some flick flack work and he did really well, got it in an instant :) His jumping has also improved, although he started going under jumps again but we got this sorted quickly enough - little tinker!! With his contacts we will be working on some techniques from bridging the gap - once pen has watched it and let me know what i need to do- the basic principle being to proof the sit so that the stay on the end of the contact is proofed (i think!!) !!

Jemma:
I will be doing the same work with her as elliot on her contacts. her weaves are really coming on - she is getting better at her angles, we shall be working more on these!! She is also reading my body language a lot better, especially the middle arm which is good :) My aim is for her to win us out of grade one in the next year so fingers crossed!!

Agility Nuts 23/08/09

Jumping:
J: well, she was of on one again, doing her own thing and so I made her sit three quarters of the way round and start again, she listened much better for the end, monkey!!

E: Sadly I missed the end of the large class with elliot as I had to go meet someone. This was quite annoying as there were no weaves or anything he couldn't do in it. I did however run him NFC at medium and he would have been eliminated because in a long stretch between jumps he took one at an angle that he wasn't supposed to because he is always so eager to be doing something and so looked for the nearest jump and took - tinker!! Other than that he ran really nicely and I was very pleased with him :)

Agility:
E: well i took him in the practice ring first and did quite a few a frames with the target and he did them really really nicely, however in the ring he just flew off the a frame so i put him on again and he did the same thing again so I took him out the ring because I dont want him to get away with taking the p*** like that, little terror!!

J: she ran really nicely except she went back to her old self on the aframe and dawdled down!! she still got a third place with a time of 33.00 (the winner was 29.2) :)

Gamblers:
E: He did really well bless him, I just made him do jump tunnel jump tunnel jump tunnel etc and then took the gamble which he did - he only had 4 points less than jem bless him and came 12th :)

J: we did weaves a couple of times - she did them nicely once in them - her angles really need work now as all weekend she didnt come out of 6 once when she was set up almost straight!! :) She ended up coming 9th :)

TYOL Jumping:
J: we got round about one and a half times I think but then she did something that shocked me so much i just stood there aghast for a while - she wondered off to see the people near the edge of the ring!!! what she was doing and why she did it i don't know - something else she best not do again!!

E: bless him, he really enjoyed himself but sadly knocked the 6th pole (his first of the weekend!!) but I tried to work him to the end but I think he was a bit confused as I didn't really know where i was sending him bless him!!

So all in all I had an amazing weekend and was really pleased with how they both ran!! I bought I picture of them each this time as it was jem a year on and it was elliots first comp - looking at them though I discovered elliot really does have an odd jumping style - he crosses his front paws and tucks his back ones up and crosses them as well - jumping grids are for practicing with both dogs me thinks :)

Agility Nuts 22/08/09 - Elliots first day at his first agility competition!!

Snakes:
J: Well Jem was in a funny mood and got round the course in a funny haphazard way but ended up going clear and got a second - she was 1st until the last dog ran!! Jems time was 22.04 and the winners 19.97 - just shows how much jem was messing about!!

E: Hmm, he was a cheeky monkey and went over the first two jumps and then ran - in the direction I was going, just round all the jumps!! I stopped him when he got silly, sat him and we started again and then he did the next two, had a bit of a run off and then I kind of got him over the end - not a great start but at least he didnt just bomb off and ignore me!!

Agility:
J: Well, I am not really sure what happened here, but we managed to get ourselves eliminated - I think she was just far too overexcited and not really concentrating - and then she didn't stop on her dogwalk so I took her back and made her do the whole thing again and she did it well then :)

E: As predicted the contacts were too much of an excitment and so he just did them and then bombed off :( we did however do the jumps in the middle nicely after i set him up again!! Little tinker!!

Jumping:
J: she was on one again and just bombed off at one point, once I got her back she did something she has never done before - she barked at me!!! This something I don't want to encourage and if she does it again I will take her out - this time I just got hold of her and made her sit before she went again. What a little terror!!

E: WOW is the word to some this up!!! If there had not been weaves in this course he would have been clear with a time in the 34s!! He didn't run off once and did all the jumps, after the other two courses I was really amazed and really pleased but I had made a conscious effort to make sure I ran this properly and made sure I worked every single jump and didn't just leave him or expect him to do any of it, and it worked!!

Power & Speed:
J: lovely lovely contacts!! :) and lovely lovely jumping ----------> 2nd place :) I was much happier with this 2nd as I felt she deserved it more :) Her time was 21.29 and the winner 21.24 so it was really close!!!

E: we were eliminated as I didn't do the weaves with him - he bombed off the end of the a frame, slowed on the end of the seesaw, came of the dog walk but put himself back on sideways!! :S He did the long jump and spread nicely though and then did the jumping nicely, only ran round one jump at the end of the straight bit, before the tunnel (think i said tunnel too early!!) but other than that he was really good :D

Pairs:
J: Took a few wrong jumps because I tried to do a front cross in the middle of a box and she went over on an angle and not the jump straight on - not really sure why!!

E: A little star again, sadly he ran round one of the jumps but I was still really proud of him!!

Its a knockout:
J: Got 4th place out of about 32 :)

E: sadly missed out a jump again - I have just started seeing a trend here bless him!!



Something I have just realised now I have got to the end of this and havn't mentioned Jemmas weaves - this shows me how far she has come, she did them fine in both courses (agility & power/speed) but that I didnt feel the need to comment on this fact is amazing :)

Bloody wind!!

Jemma:
We did some jumping lane work with her, which she did ok on, eventually, bless her, despite the wind keep knocking the jumps down!! She also did some nice 12 weave work and then we finished off with some tight course handling work - I am really looking forward to the weekend, we should have fun!!

Elliot:
He did a lot better on his contacts, he didn't bomb off the end of any of them which is definately a step in the right direction :) He also did some work on 6 straight competition weaves, and did them well whilst I did a straight recall, but as soon as I moved slightly to the side he kept missing out the middle two - v odd!! We did some jumping lane work with him too and he was ok, although he kept trying to take the last two jumps as one for some reason and then went under a few of them towards the end - we put the height back down to where he had got them right so he didn't learn to do them wrong!!

For the weekend my plan is as follows:
Call him to me and work him past the weaves
If he misses a contact by just flying off the end I will make him do it again - the whole thing, if he does it again I shall take him out the ring
If he stops on a contact but doesn't wait for me to release him I shall carry on as he does this in training so it is something I know needs more work
I shall start him off at an angle, especially if there is a tunnel/contact in sight as I dont want to risk him going under
If he goes under just one jump I will carry on, if he goes under 3 I will take him out as I dont want him to learn to do it
MOST IMPORTANTLY - TO HAVE FUN AND ENJOY RUNNING MY DOGS!!!!

Champs and Agility

Well, the champs didnt go quite to plan as they didnt have singles/pairs so I only went for the afternoon but the teams did really well, winning division 2!!!

Onto agility training today:

Jemma:
I was very pleased with her today, we worked on doing course, with lots of handling practice for me, we also had twelve weaves out and she did really well, both with entrances and doing them independently :) Her drive on her contacts was much better too, I think this weekend should be good with my little star :)

Elliot:
Hmm, well, I tried an agility course with him and he flew all his contacts, and refused to go in the cloth tunnel, naughty boy!! We soon sorted the cloth tunnel out :) His main issues with his contacts is that I have mostly been behind him whilst training and so as soon as I go to move in front of him he comes off the end of the contact, after some work these were better although not as good as I would like yet. He did all full height jumps though and didnt run under any of them :) And he did the long jump and spread without any problems at all :) His weaves we good, we got him down to straight again, lets see how it goes tomorrow :) I have yet to decide on my plan of action for him at the competition at the weekend - his first one :)

A better day!!:D

We had a much better day today which was good!!

Jemma:
She got her weaves right every time today apart from one which is a definate improvement. Her contacts were much better too, we worked a lot on her drive, we now need to work on it with me crossing behind because that seems to really slow her down. Not much else to say, apart from that I was just generally really pleased with her!!

Elliot:
I used his tuggy as a reward after his weaves instead of food and whether it was that or something else but he did really well, he was flying through them and we got him back down to just on the tape!! He did quite well on his jumping although started running under a few jumps, pen worked out this was when I ran forward to tray and get in the right place to do a front cross and took my eye off him and dropped my arm slightly. This meant it was always one on a corner as we were doing some close jumping work. What we did on his contacts was good too, although the first time we did the a-frame in a course he literally flew over the top, he must have been over a foot above it and consequently there was no chance he could stop on the bottom (he did however touch the white bit!!)!! So all in all a good day for him too!!

Next thing on the agenda for us is the flyball champs on sun, although neither of them are competing in the teams I am hoping to do singles and pairs with them :)

Good and not so good week

I started hydrotherapy with both dogs a few weeks ago to help improve their fitness. Well neither of them are particularly impressed - the first session Jemma realised in the supportive harness she didnt actually have to swim to stay afloat so next time she went in the h-harness and now has to swim, although she often tries to chew through the lead that is attaching her!! Well this week she actually managed two minutes in the pool swimming up and down after her ball before she tried to escape and had to be clipped in again, cheeky monkey!! Elliot just doesn't really like it, and starts off splashing a lot but soon settles down and swims quite nicely!! So thats for the good news, now for the not so good part, agility today.

Jemma:
Well in the hour she only managed to do about 3 different rounds and that was it!! It was quite warm so she kept disappearing but also she was really into just wondering off and sniffing and rolling. She then wasn't particularly switched on and so kept going wrong. We also discovered that we need to do more work on her weaves when they are an almost straight entrance but in a long line of jumps as she doesn't check herself very well and ends up missing the two middle weaves!! She did do some very nice contact work though - got to find a positive bless her. Although as Elliot had a rubbish day too maybe it was something I wasn't doing right subconsciously, just hope im not getting ill!!!

Elliot:
I really don't know what has happened to his weaves, we went back out to two inches and he did them brilliantly, all 6 straight off, then tried him back down to 1inch and it all went wrong again!! When he gets it wrong he then looses interest completely. The plan is to back to where it gets it right and get him really confident and then just gradually move them in quarter of an inch at a time!! He did ok on his jumping too but ran under a few and his contacts again were ok. He did do the tyre in a course though. :) So he wasn't bad but nothing was really great.

Hopefully we will have a better day tomorrow!!

Raining again!!!

Jemma:
We need a bit of jumping lane work and she was rubbish bless her!! This is definately something we need to do more work on as she is really rubbish at judging the jumps and just tends to run and then throw herself over them!! We then did some contact work and she was loads better with the target at the bottom and me revving her up, she even did a really a good seesaw!! We then did some work on weaves and she did really well, I am so chuffed that we seem, touch wood, to have cracked them, for now anyway!!

Elliot:
We put him over the jumping lane to start and he did really well, flew over all the jumps at full height. The lead out is still something that needs working on but at the moment I am not that concerned about it as at the competitions I am likely to go with him as I dont want to loose him off the start line!! We did some weave work and he is now on straight weaves!! I just need to work on them over the weekend to get the walk etc because today I just did recall. We then finished on some a-frame and dog walk work, he was better than on monday but if I run he likes to just carry on running off the end of the contact, although if I tell him touch he does tend to stop, so although improved he still needs lots of work!!

Poorly Pen

Pen was poorly today so paul trained us.

Jemma:
We just did loads of course work today, I seem to be getting a lot better at working out the best way to handle things which is good!! There were lots of contacts in the courses today so I trained them but I wasn't really happy with them. She still isn't really driving to the bottom as much as I would like, we shall have to work on this!!

Elliot:
Another step on the ladder- we had the jumps at full height today and he went over them all, apart from a couple of times at the beginning he went under the one before the dog walk but we seemed to sort this. We put the contacts in courses for him too and he did well, I don't feel the nose touch is really ingrained in him yet and certainly feel this needs a lot more work, as I think this is where I will loose him in a competition. We did a little bit of weave work with them on the tape and he wasn't getting them 100%, i get the feeling he has got bored with doing them as after each go he wanders off and I have to really work to get him back, hmmm, mayb i need to find some more exciting treats!!