Fi's first agility show

Saturday morning we headed over to Huddersfield for the Springers Winter Warm Up, unaffiliated Agility competition. I thought this would be perfect for Faith's first competition, a nice small relaxed show with nice easy baby courses for building her confidence. The class I entered her in was running at medium height (18") and there were no weaves or tyre (and as it happened no seesaw either which was a shame because she likes those! lol). Although no clears it was good experience for us both, I made some really stupid handling errors and she had momentary laspes in concentration but on the whole I was pleased with our effort. We got e'd in agility because she missed a jump and took the next before I could stop her; totally my fault because I said her name and she looked at me instead of looking for the next obstacle. The jumping was gutting because she had a pole down (yes...an 18" pole!) just 3 from home and her time would have easily seen her placed. Gemma ran her in the Helter Skelter which is probably better left unmentioned, she wasn't exactly focused in that one! Ah well, maybe next time. On a plus note, we did actually come home with a rosette because they were doing a fun bale scurry and Teal came 3rd!! lol

Fi's Agility run...


Fi's Jumping run...

(yes, I know I have my arm held out the whole time like a total moron!! Thank god Gemma videoed it so I could see it...I think I must have just been worried Fi was going to miss something but why has no-one told me I do this before?!! lol
The photographer is John Clarke from Sunnyside Photogrpahy who is a friend and fellow flyballer which is why Faith is so keen to say 'Hello' at the end of her run!! lol)

Gemma had a couple of nice runs with Bailey (when she remembered the course!) with just a couple of unlucky poles down.

Here's his second agility run (sorry, I missed filming the first jump!)...


It was a really nice little show, very relaxed and friendly and very well organised. The food laid on was superb and it was a lovely venue with a good exercise area. At the end I took the opportunity to take Sea in and spend some time moving him up and down and round the indoor arena, it's almost identical to the one we'll be in at North West in a fortnight. He moved beautifully, I'm going to really enjoy handling this lad in the ring if he moves like that, he totally suits my long legs and stride! :) Guess we'll have to wait and see.

We left about 5.30 and headed to the M1 and straight down to Joy and Becca's where we were staying the night so that we didn't have too far to travel to Gatwick with Noah in the morning. It was a horrible journey through lots of traffic in the dark and rain and I was really suffering having to wear my glasses on my poor injured nose(!) but we made good time and arrived just in time for 'spag bol' and X factor! lol By bedtime I was in a lot of pain with my nose again so had to take a few painkillers before finally heading off to sleep...totally exhausted!