They had fun by the sounds of it despite the appalling weather! Brax got a 3rd in the pairs with Lians fantastic young dog Sizzle, she also got a 2nd in the graded agility, 4th in the combined agility and WON the grade 6 jumping. Now she only needs one more win to be Grade 7! Matthew drew me some of the courses and they looked challenging but fun.
Matthew also ran Brodie in the G1-3 jumping and the C1-3 jumping. He came 3rd in the combined class which again wasn't straightforward. Brodie was one out of the places in the graded class so thats now the 18th time that has happened this year! I was really pleased with 2 clear rounds though and that Brodie is running so well for Matthew.
Today (sunday) we had the annual sheltie society agility training day and this year it was with Natasha Wise (new World Champion!!) I was a bit dubious to begin with as I'd been put in the more advanced class but I quickly felt at ease as Natasha is really helpful and encouraging.
The first exercise we were working on was getting tighter turns round wings. This is a bit of a problem for me and Brodie and he demostrated his wide turns by going off up the dog walk (miles away!!) We repeated the exercise and as I improved my handling his turns got much better. My lack of coordination became apparent - Natasha was very patient luckily!! Matthew and Brax were superstars at tight turns and Matthew got some good tips to improve her turns even more.
I was really proud of Brodie on the next exercise as we worked on push throughs and I was brave enough to work the A-frame from a distance which paid off. Natasha liked the consistency of his running contacts although we did find he was a bit 'sticky' on the see-saw so I've got a few tips to improve his speed over it. Brodie's push throughs were ok but again my handling needs some work. Luckily one of my trainers, Lisa with her super fast sheltie Tyler was also at the training day so we can practise some of the sequences again!
One of the things that was a real weakness for me was (as usual!!) pull throughs. I need to be giving him an 'in' command much quicker once Brodie is committed to the jump and make sure I'm in the right place!! As we will be getting more pull throughs in shows I know this is something I need to work on without slowing Brodie down too much.
Brax was fantastic at most of the exercises but contacts again were her major issue! Natasha said she felt that contacts had become tense for both Matthew and Brax as he gets worried and shouts touch and she isn't sure about what he exactly wants. More work needed over winter!! Here is a little video of Brax getting her dog walk contact. Sorry about the quality of the videos as they are on my phone!
All the shelties had so much fun and it was so nice to catch up with all our sheltie friends! Here is a picture of Brodie trying hard to impress Genie (who is actually his half sister) but she only had eyes for Lisa's Tyler-there was some serious flirting going on and Brodie does look a bit put out!! I have also added a pic of Tyler looking very chilled out at lunchtime.
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