Happy 3rd Birthday Asher and Happy 12th Birthday Tess!

Happy Birthday to both my beautiful babies! Asher's birthday is 1st May and Tess' is 2nd May (same as David Beckham :-D).

Gave them both a bath the other day, so that they would look pretty for their birthdays and so I could take some nice photos to put on here, unfortunately my phone is playing up and won't let me send them at the moment so you'll have to wait for those!

Were off to flyball in the morning at Stockbridge, really looking forward to it as training went so well last weekend! Taking both my dogs as decided that it's warm enough for Tess now and I couldn't really leave her at home on her birthday! I'm sure she'll be very excited!

Recent training and Tess update

So we were back at flyball training on Monday. Quite a small group as not everyone can do Monday nights but it was nice as each dog could have a bit longer. Worked alot on the box. Was pleased with how consistent Lacy and Jemma's turns have become, Jemma's particularly is perfect, just a shame we can't sort the rest of her out lol! Elliot is getting faster, he is gonna be one speedy doggy, he had a few dodgy turns as he is readjusting to his change in speed but his turn will end up fab! With diefer, sonny, smartie and asher we worked on box as diefer's had gone down hill recently, went back to basics and just had him jumping on and off the box which seemed to help. Sonny has always been a challenge on the box as he is so ball obsessed he doesn't think about what he's doing when the ball is in the box. So we worked with a 9" jump infront of the box instead of 6" which really made him think and he was doing lovely full runs with the ball in and a 4footed turn :-). With Asher I really wanted to reinforce his turn as it had been perfect at training but in the excitement of competition he had been messing it up. Did lots of full runs, really winding him up to get him to go the speed of a competition and left the jump in. He was a bit lazy the first couple and was knocking the jump but after that he was fab. We ran them as a team but only from about 10-20ft so they weren't quite at full speed. My project is now Luna as she has so much potential and I want to get her doing perfect turns. She will do a nice 4-foot turn with no ball but when the ball is there she is just doing 2-foot so we just need to build it up.

Went to agility training last night, hadn't been for a couple of weeks as I was so focused on flyball. He was really good but we did only do pretty easy stuff. Did some more stuff today, lots of 1 jump exercises to help him understand my body language and stop him jumping so long all the time. Found that he doesn't value jumps enough, sort of explains his tunnel obsession and that he doesn't pay enough attention to my body movement when I am behind him. He's good at changing direction when I change my arm but only when i'm level or infront of him. This needs to improve so that we can do rear crosses successfully which at the moment usually results in a twizzle. Also worked on getting him to wrap the jump wing which although destroyed his jumping to start with did get better and by the end he was really curving his body.

Finally, my little girly Tess is doing really well. She's still a bit wobbly on her back legs and has the odd fall over but generally she can still run around and play and do her circles which makes her happy :-)! She comes on all the walks again now and can manage about an hr and a half as long as she trots most of the way rather than trying to run or bounce the whole time! She's not on any medication at the moment as it just seems to make her worse but just starting her on joint aid so hopefully that will help. She will be 12 next week. This photo is of her and Asher out on a walk the other day.

Finally!!

Ok so I've been a really bad blogger and I thought it was time for an update, wanted to do this a week ago but my internet was down.

Quite alot has gone on in the last month. Went to the 2nd of our agilitynuts shows. It went ok, best round being the elementary jumping where we had 10faults. He had 2 refusals where he was going to fast, i was late with his commands and he ran past the jump. Asher was his usual nutter self and was really looking forward to the up and under class as it was so straight forward and blasty. Unfortunately he had a pole and then the next time round ran past it as he didn't see it as a jump so got E'd which was a shame as he did it very quickly! Was naughty in the agility and gamblers, his contacts were shit and he just kept heading for tunnels. It's annoying cuz he doesn't really do this at training and his contacts are usually fab. Had a lesson with Char the day before which was great. Exposed a weekness in his contacts that he doesn't have a strong enough understanding of the position and his nose touch when there isn't food there as a 'target'. Was pleased with his weaves at Chars, she did post a video of them although he did catch himself a couple of times, he is so clumsy! I've decided that he still needs more work before I enter him in KC shows, I don't want to ruin him by pushing him too soon so I will work on him over the summer and hopefully debut in the Autumn as i don't really have a free weekend over summer anyway!

Flyball training has gone well the last few weeks although I have been disappointed in some of the boxwork. We've had to rush the last few weeks as we had to have the dogs ready to compete at Easter and it shows! If I'd of had my way we would of done all the team training, full runs etc with the jump still infront of the box as it is still not fully ingrained in the dogs that they must jump on and off of the box. A couple of the starters who have only been trained using the new training looked great, there turns are fab and although they are not as high on the box as I would like they are doing really good turns. Most of the other dogs reverted to there old turns in varying degrees. It was quite disappointing after all the work we put in but we really just ran out of time. Ashers turn looked fantastic in training, even when training as a team he was still going and putting 4feet on and driving off everytime. The most positive thing about the winter training seems to be the work we have put in to power training and giving the dogs confidence in changeovers as all of the dogs including the starters I feel would be happy to run in any postion and always drive back rather than slowing on there return. I will continue to persevere with the turns even though I sometimes get the impression that people are getting a bit fed up of it and just want there dog to be able to go up and back. I can see the potential for fantastic turns in most of the dogs it will just require alot of patience and reinforcement!

So Easter FINALLY arrived and I was able to go to a flyball competition for the 1st time in 6months, Yay :-D! To say I was excited is an understatement! Friday was starters and we had our team of Bonnie, Lacy, Chelsey, Jamie, Luna and Fraggle. For all of them it was there 1st competition and a 1st for some of the people aswell. Bonnie was an absolute star running consistent 4.2secs all day with a great turn and powering back despite the slippery ground. Lacy was also super quick and didn't bat an eye lid at the changeovers or the other lane which we were really happy with as she likes to have a little look and those lilacs are renowned for being a bit crazy lol ;-). Chelsey (little choc lab) and Jamie (terrier) ran like pros, when we proof Chelsey's turn a bit more it is going to be fantastic, she really understands the jump but when you take it away she gets a bit confused so just needs more reinforcement. Jamie is going to be a quick little dog and will hopefully get us 8" jump height. Luna is just 13months and hadn't had much training due to her being in season a couple of weeks before. She had also been being quite naughty on her recall and doing little laps of honour so Carol worked on that non-stop for the week before the show and she was fab. Perfectly behaved all day, I think she was getting faster as he confidence grew aswell so hopefully this will continue and then she can be our superfast height dog as she is tiny for a collie! Then we had Fraggle our Leonberger who had quite an audience, we were a bit worried as he generally likes to say hello to everyone but he behaved himself and ran really well. Only problem is that he is really light on the box, crazy to think as he weighs nearly as much as I do! So sometimes he wasn't triggering it, not a problem in starters but won't be good in open, we'll just have to make the box really sensitive and work on him hitting the box harder. They came 2nd in the end, just losing out to Power Paws, with a best time of 21.8?secs i think. We were thrilled with how they ran so they will all run again in starters on the 2nd May and hopefully make there open debut that weekend (apart from Luna who won't be old enough).

Extraset ran in Div 8 on the Saturday, had problems with the box in the 1st couple of races, firstly it wouldn't trigger then it was too sensitive and wouldn't load. Was a bit annoying as we should of won one of those races. The afternoon went more smoothly, we managed to win 1 of our races. The ground was still quite slippery and the dogs seemed a little off there pace but I think that was mainly just fitness. They ended up 5th.

Ballistics were in Div 1 on Sunday. Was so looking forward to it. 1st race was against Maples, went to 5legs and we won! Mainly due to them having lights but we did manage a best time of 18.00secs. We were really pleased with that seeing as we hadn't raced for so long. I'm sure Angie won't mind me saying that our height dog Bunty was a bit off the speed she usually runs. She's usually 4.7-4.8secs but was doing more 5-5.3secs. We don't really know why but suspect it was the ground. Asher was sliding alot and his box was rubbish, I was gutted, he was so slow lol! When I say slow most of his runs were 4.0-4.1. It was difficult as we had 6dogs on the team so involved alot of swapping around. We lost against Stars and Bassetts but we expected to so that was fine. We thought we had a chance against hampshire and fourpaws. Both of them were really close and they both did there fastest times against us! Hampshire did 17.78 and really consistent against us and beat us. Fourpaws did 17.95 which is there fastest ever time! We would of had them in the 3rd leg but I got a light! I want Scrumpy from there team, she is lush! So we ended up last but we raced well. Sonny ran 4.4-4.5s which is an improvement from last yr where he was around 4.6. Rosie ran 4.3-4.4, she loved having low jumps as she has never really raced over them before. Asher's box improved slightly over the day and his times got better, he did a few 3.9s but still lots of room for him to get faster.

So lots of positives and a few negatives. But it's all constructive so we will get better! Can't wait til the 2nd May now where we have TWO starter teams and 3 open!

I'll post another blog about recent training!

Canine Massage, Flyball training, Agility league match

Well I had quite a busy weekend!

Saturday I went to a Canine Massage course for the sporting dog. I took Asher, think that was a mistake lol! We learnt about how to effectively warm up the muscles before competing to get peak performance and avoid injury. Also how to cool down the muscles to stop them tightening. Thought it would be a good idea to know this as Asher always goes in at 110% and I worry that he may hurt himself. Trying to practice on him during the course was somewhat tricky though as he did not want to go to sleep and refused to lie flat! It was an interesting day if a little frustrating!

Sunday morning we had flyball training. We now have our new box!! So it was the first session on it, each dog did a couple of turns on the old box before they tried the new box (no ball), it went really well. None of the dogs were fazed by it, they just did the same as they had done on the old box. Had some beautiful turns on it, in particular Perry, who I've mentioned on a previous post as struggling with the new training was amazing. He is a huge musterlander cross collie and was doing 4 footed turns. None of the dogs had a ball in the box yet as I wanted to reinforce the turn on the new box 1st. We will try to get some of the dogs triggering this Sunday if they are good enough! Asher was the exception to this rule as he has done alot more turn work than the other dogs. Did a couple with no ball then loaded the box, he was fantastic :-D, 4 footed turn, nice and high, looked the same as he does on the wall! Still panicking that everyone won't be ready by Easter but staying positive :-S! All the speed work were doing is still really paying off, we were racing them against each other on Sunday, they are all sooo up for it!

Sunday afternoon I went to a league match, Asher had 3 classes, got E'd in 2 and 15 in the other but he was actually really good. He got his weaves in jumping and agility, there were only 8 but he was going flat out to the entries and nailing them! Contacts were a bit slow but other than that we just had a few misunderstandings that resulted in the eliminations lol! I'm sure he is becoming addicted to tunnels! Wherever he is on a course he is always looking to work towards them which is becoming abit annoying! Hmmm i think it is just because he feels confident in working them so just need to work on increasing the importance of the jumps!

I'm off to Crufts tomorrow, going as moral support for Bobbie and Perry and maybe to do a bit of shopping! Can't wait, should be a great day :-)

My Blue Asheroo

Asher's Kennel Club registration came back today, got my 1st choice name and he is now officially 'My Blue Asheroo'

Chose it because Tess is Mobella My Tess so thought it would be nice to start with 'my'. Blue for obvious reasons and Asheroo because it is his nickname, as i think he is part kangaroo! He also likes to talk to you and makes a very odd noise that sounds like rrrrrooooo ooo oooo lol :-D.

So this now means we can enter KC shows, don't know if I'm happy or scared :-s!

Agility Nuts -1st ever agility show

So I headed all the way up to Nottingham for our 1st agility competition. Stayed with Sarah, Jemma and Elliot which was nice :-).

First was elementary helter skelter, was quite a nice course apart from one quite big gap between jump 14&15 which made Asher stop and bark at me (he does that if he doesn't know where he is going next). Also the last straight as you'll see from the video was tunnel, long jump, spread. He has only done the long jump once (don't seem to do it at training for some reason?) and that was ages ago and he has never done a spread. I think with it being his 1st run he was quite unsure of what was going on and wanted to stay close to me so was quite steady (for him!!) and wasn't confident going on. He was really good and just had a pole where I think I dropped my arm as i tried to get him to turn tight and then on the last straight he pulled off the spread and I had to bring him back to put him over it so we ended up with 10faults which I was really pleased with as his 1st run.

Next was elementary agility. By this time he realised what was going on and had gone in to flyball mode. He was naughty at the start (got over his go on issues lol), did 2 jumps then shot past the weaves in to a tunnel, brought him back and he completed weaves on 2nd go despite the draw of the tunnel, he flew up the next line of jumps but then just stopped when I told him right, i think he was just over-excited. The rest of the course he completed really well, flew over the aframe and stopped but just came off the end so I put him back on. It was then jump, tunnel, dogwalk. The angle from tunnel to dogwalk was ok but at Asher speed it was a bit tricky and he nearly fell off the side on the way up which slowed him down considerably but he still went to his 2on 2off. So good points and bad points to this run and will have to work on maintaining his composure!

The elementary snooker was quite funny. I don't think I handled the start very well, should of handled it the same as Sarah with Jemma. He ran past the Aframe as I didn't give him a very good angle to work with, the next time up the aframe I crossed behind him and he thought i was pulling him off so he tried to turn around, i managed to keep him going but had a sketchy couple of secs which resulted in a v slow descent to FP, 3rd aframe I think he had lost his confidence a bit so waited for me before going in to FP so need to work on his independence in this. Yellow was a tunnel, green was 3 jumps that could be completed in any order. Asher decided to do them the flashy way, don't know how we managed it, you'll see what I mean in the video! I was laughing alot by this point, brown was another tunnel with another horrible angle to dog walk which was blue. So I stopped him to send him up it but again he nearly fell off (stupid dog!) which resulted in it being slow again. He then just missed his weave entry so we finished on 38points out of 51maximum and he came 10th. Rosettes went to 9th!

Last was elementary jumping. This was right at the end of the day. I had decided between this to try get some energy out of him so he wouldn't be such a lunatic however I think I overdid it abit and made him too tired. I also didn't get chance to walk the course as we didn't realise that the same course was being used for several classes and that walking had taken place prior to them which we missed. I thought it was a tricky course as the 1st part was quite tight with all the jumps on angles even though it was worked on 1 side, I think a slightly more experienced dog/handler would of found it fine though. Well he ran past the 3rd jump and after that I think I kinda gave up. I worked him round the rest of the course but he barked the whole time and missed a few turns, he looked tired and it wasn't a good run. He did the spread out section well, which was a simple go on around the outside of the ring, up 3 jumps, right turn, jump, longjump, tunnel.

Overall I think I learnt alot from the day. I learnt where he is at with regards to his contacts. As in we need more work on going to his position regardless of where I am and alternating as to whether there is food there or not. Need to do lots more handling exercises to get him to follow me particularly on tight courses and with slightly offset jumps. And we need to work on weave entries perhaps towards the end of courses when he is most excited to simulate the competition environment as at training even if he comes out further down he nearly always gets the entry. His waits were fantastic, didn't move so much as a paw all day. But then I expected that and would of been gutted had it been any different.

I guess most of this doesn't make much sense without the videos, I only have the Helter Skelter at the mo as I have to transfer the rest of them from my phone!

One step forward...

And I think it was only one step back rather than two, could of been worse. Agility tonight had its ups and downs.

His contacts were amazing, best i've seen them, really really driving the dog walk and his final position was good too, he slid off the end once but was stretching his legs back to find the contact cuz he knew where he was supposed to be, was quite funny actually! Seesaw and aframe were excellent too, had a toy about 6 foot from the bottom of the aframe so that he was focusing ahead which worked well. Was pleased with his go ons as they have been a bit hesistant recently with him keeping glancing at me. He very much aims to please so needs reassurance all the time but tonight he seemed more confident. We worked some stars tightly and widely spaced and included front crosses which went really well but I was told I have to stop babying him as I was causing him to knock poles. I have to learn to trust that he will go on and turn when I tell him rather than calling him or bending over!

Now you know whats coming... weaves were crap! You think you might be getting there then it all goes pete tong again! He missed a couple of entries then he was coming out anywhere from the 6th pole onwards but only when he was on my right. I wouldn't mind if I hadn't practised but we spent time today working on his weaves from all angles and with him mainly on the right. Maybe it's because I don't have 12 weaves and he is getting used to doing 8? Doesn't explain the entries though. Going to have to practice more!

Oh and Asher is getting measured Sunday, my wonderful friend Sarah is taking him for me as I have to work. I have a sneaky suspicion that he may be large ;-)