Anglesey-Wirral Tour

We packed up the van and caravan and ALL the dogs (yes...all of them, including Kes and her 5 week old pups) and headed off over to Anglesey on Thursday evening after work arriving just after 10.30pm...thank god for Paul and Alison who had gone over the previous day and helped us get set up! We were all sat down for a few bevvies by 11.30 when 'Mr Leek' arrived (didn't I say he was banned from the Demon camp after Rotherham??? lol) but we all had a good old natter and hit the hay around 2.30am (well it was a day off after all). Friday we just had a relaxing day...walking the dogs and playing with the pups and waiting (and waiting and waiting) for Trish to arrive. The older pups (Orlaith, Eabha and Viggo) were allowed to come on one proper walk each day with the big dogs and they absolutely loved it! Eabha is a real speed demon and thoroughly enjoyed being able to race the big dogs (no way they were going to lose her...she's like a greyhound!), Viggo we discovered, is a total water babe and we struggled to keep him out of the river...he's already a very strong and accomplished swimmer and little Orlaith-bear...well...she just enjoyed pottering about with me...she is SO like Quinn!!

Saturday was the first day of competition; we had decided to have a bit of a switch round of dogs for Anglesey and swapped Pip and Dottie with each other so started the week running...

Demonz - Dylan, Bailey, Lexie, Mist
Racers - Mac, Frost, Pip, Drake
Pawz - Faith, Teal, Dottie, Ethan, Spud

we had some difficulty settling on the best running order for the Racers and tried swapping Pip first for a while but ended up with Mac going back start dog. These teams ran ok together, Faith just seems to be getting faster and faster over the 9" jumps and is now consistently running 4.5-4.6, putting her in the Pawz also seems to have fired Teal up (they aren't the best of friends and have a real healthy rivalry with each other!). The Demonz won div 2 on Saturday as everyone had expected they would (doesn't always work out like that though!) but only ran a fastest time of 17.95, it does mean we've now had a 1st place with all 3 teams over our first 3 tournaments :) Drake was a little erratic so although we ran a decent time of 19.66 in Div 4 with the Racers, we weren't consistent and ended up 5th....our first time out of the rosettes! The Pawz ran ok in div 9 on Monday but it was quite hot and Dottie certainly wasn't on best form, she didn't adjust to running over the 9" jumps as well as I thought she might, this team finished up 4th with a rather dissapointing time of 21.11...oh well!

Sunday evening Gem and I did some agility training at Ruth Hobday's (next door) with Nat and Orienne. Bailey was his usual fab self but I was very pleased with Fi who was focused and motivated throughout. She definitely seems to work better in a smaller group with less going on (attention span of a gnat!). It was nice to see Nat and Kai working too and of course Orienne with the lovely cocker Murph (son of Drake and Teal).

Tuesday was a day off flyball but they ran a 'Flygility' competition. Basically a short course of agiltiy equipment that ended with a flyball lane, the dogs ahd to complete the course, then the flyball lane and return back over the course again. They only had to carry the ball out of the flyball lane but Gem and I competed with Bailey and Fi who both brought the ball all the way back over the agility equipment too! Equipics were on hand taking photos and while they got some nice shots of Fi I just couldn't get my head round her being in full stretch over an agility jump with a tennis ball in her mouth so didn't buy any! lol Needless to say, Bailey won the Open Flygility (again!!) and Fi ran really well and was placed 4th in the Novice.

Mid-week saw the Pawz running again on Weds (just one day off in between for this lot), we ran the same line up and finished 1st (yippee!!) with a fastest time of 20.55. It was much coooler this day which seemed to suit the dogs better. The Racers ran Thursday, again in div 4 and with the same line up and finished 5th with a fastest time of 20.09 (rrrrubbish!! lol). The Demonz were running in Div 1 against some of the fastest teams in the country but the wet weather seemed to level the playing field with some very unexpected race results which saw consistency win out and we finished up in a very respectable 3rd place with a fastest time of 17.88. I have to add that Lexie had started to come down with some sort of bug and was not very well, I really wasn't too sure about running her at all but she seemed ok, was just totally exhausted at the end of the day.

Friday we packed up camp and moved to Eastham on the Wirral. We were packing up on the 3rd day of rain on Anglesey, trying to get as much as possible done between torrential showers and light drizzle, so were pleased to be heading towards the sunshine and blue skies further East. We got set up and walked over the road to the excellent little chinese takeaway that Gem and I discovered last year 'Swallow House', ordered a banquet and ate far far too much food!! Poor Paul was suffering from a pulled back (overdone it trying to lift caravans out of the mud back on Anglesey!) so was a bit miserable all evening (bless!). I think we all needed to let off some steam after the stresses of the day so we drank lots of cider, vodka and wine! lol Stayed up late (or is that early?) with some of the Dolphins (Trish was rather...erm...merry!! lol) and had a good evening to end our week long holiday.

Saturday we were up bright and early, we just had the Demonz running but were also running dogs for Sam and Andy in the Rotherham Runaways. This team consisted entirely of Sam and Andy's dogs which of course included 3 of their 'Brynings' in the form of Ollie, Keston and Barney. We won the division with a fantastic time of 19.11, not bad for only their second outing together! Last div of the day was Div 1, Sam boxloaded for us as Paul was still suffering with his back and we had a slightly altered Demonz lineup as Lexie still wasn't on top form so we moved Mac in to cover her... Dylan, Bailey, Mist, Mac. It was a very warm day at the end of a very long week and this seemed to take it's toll as Dylan started dropping his ball before crossing the line giving us light after light. We tried various different things...swapping him last, hiding his tug-toy, changing the running order...we did also wonder whether it was Mac putting him off but nothing made any difference and we lost all our morning races. Very frustrating. By the afternoon it had cooled off and Dylan came out and ran fine, when we thought back to other times he's done this it's always been the end of a long day or when it's very hot so have concluded that all the other things had no relevance and we're just going to have to work on keeping him cool and rested between races in future...silly boy!! We ended up 5th (out of the rosettes again!! lol) but ran a decent fastest time of 17.68 which was encouraging. We enjoyed the evening sunshine and had a team BBQ then hit the showers and off to bed for an early night!

Sunday morning arrived and while they were calling for our paperwork we were still having a little team conference about trying something new (oops...sorry Bridget!). I quite fancied trying a little experiment but it was going to be just that...we had no idea whether it would work so it was a gamble the whole team needed to be happy to take...after the previous day's racing I think we were all quite carefree and decided to give it a go so we moved Faith and Teal up into the Racers, swapping them with Pip and Drake, on the basis that Fi was running so much faster over 9" jumps and hopefully Frost and Lex would too that we could afford to run the slower height dog and still run a faster team. It all hinged on how Teal would run (you never quite know what mood she'll be in!). I have also been thinking that Ethan runs better over higher jumps and Pip, Dottie and Drake don't seem to change whether running 9 or 13" so the Pawz should be better off too.

Well...the Racers went in first and what do you know....it worked!! Faith went start dog with Alison (a position they both seem to have made their own now) followed by Frost and then Lexie...the 3 of them running around the mid 4 seconds and Teal going in last running mid 5's and the team were achieving consistent sub 19.50 times and finished up 2nd! Teal was really fired up, she seems to relish running with her arch-rival Faith and the noisy duo of Frost and Lex. The Pawz also ran really well in Div 7, fast and consistent times...20.49 was their fastest and they won the division too! I think both teams have more to give but we'll have to give some thought about what we do with Mac and Lex...swap them back or leave them where they are?

I also really enjoyed judging Div 2 on the Sunday, some excellent close racing in this division and really nice to see the Ramsey lot over from the Isle of Man too. Not sure about the ring party though (the ones in pink that is!! lol).

All in all we had a brilliant 10 days, good weather (most of the time!), great venues, great racing and great company! Can't wait for the British Championships in 2 weeks time!