Sunday 1 August saw us heading for Prissick Base in Middlesbrough for the Hare n Hounds fun day. These are great fun competitions arranged by Chris Hare, suitable for any level, you can run any height and even run on lead if you want. There was one jumping ring and one agility ring with the courses and judges changing at lunchtime.
We arrived too late to walk the first courses - big mistake on the agility! I watched for a bit and thought I had the course in my head, but got to the complicated jump sequence and got completely lost. We picked up and got to the end but with a big fat E!
So on to the jumping - again, I hadn't walked it but it wasn't too complicated, a nice run though some awkward corners... but the real benefit was no weaves yey! So with OH and our other poochies keeping watch we set off, Freddie ran like a dream, never took his eyes off me and we got our first clear round. Woop woop!!! I was so happy, clever little Freddie. But no rosette - prizes were awarded to 3rd place but our time put us 4th.
In the afternoon we had a terrible jumping round, but it was pretty hard. I was very nervous about the agility - it was a nice course but started with a really tricky jump sequence. I thought there was no way I would get Freddie round, but gave it a go. To my delight he concentrated again, and did fantastic over the jumps, carrying on to a great round with only 5 faults for cornering too fast and slipping off the dog walk. We would have got time faults too but not a bad round, we came away very happy.
The next weekend had no agility in it as I went off to be a bridesmaid for my little sister, but we headed to Gainford on 14th August for the Hare n Hounds Summer Show. I learnt a lot at this show. Our club was running a ring so I spent the morning pole-picking and watching some great grade 4-7 dogs, and handed tickets out on the afternoon so got to say hi to some lovely people and dogs, and get harrassed by some not-quite-as-nice people who seemed to think they were very special and could dispense with the rules. Thankfully my club mates kept me right and I got some good advice from some more experienced people. I guess the agility world is like every other and has all types of characters in it...
However... our runs weren't good! I wasn't good, and Freddie wasn't really on the ball. We only had two runs - the first was graded 1-2 agility. We got a good start but Freddie got so far ahead of me on the dog walk that he carried on and did the jumps however he fancied, and back-jumped when I called him back to me. Our second run was combined 1-3 agility. This time he did the first two jumps ok, but in my haste to get him to pull through to jump 3 rather than go into the tunnel facing him he back-jumped again, but again the rest of the run wasn't too bad.
So our KC record so far - 5 runs and 5 eliminations! Still waiting to get round with a few faults never mind that elusive clear round. But I think this is quite normal for beginners, we won't give up!
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