Good grief - again!

I'd entered an obedience show the Sunday before last....right up til the last moment I was umming about going because it had been sooo wet. Eventually decided to go because the forecast looked nice, and had a backup plan in case it was just too squelchy underfoot!

Elton was drawn 3rd in Pre-Beginners. Not the best round he's ever worked - his HOL was very distracted (he's hyper-aware of his surroundings atm) but not too bad a position, then we did the recall which was fine except for crooked present (always a problem), and that relaxed him more so his HF was much better, though still not quite as focused as he used to be - which led to him noticing a Cavalier outside the ring on one turn and nearly leaving the ring to go and say hello! As it was he just stood for a minute and thought about it, then caught me up. Expensive! Though even with that, his HF mark was much better than HOL.

Just need to do some more work on his confidence, getting him to relax and enjoy again. At the point he can relax away from home enough to play, then we'll start getting somewhere :-)

Highlight - Elton did his stays on wet grass! He wasn't overkeen on the prospect of lying down (tried to see he if could get away without lying down properly lol) but once he did he didn't move :-D which was somewhat unexpected. (Solei did his too - but (touch wood) Solei is a pretty solid stays dog)

I was really pleased with Solei. His Pre-Beginners HOL was gorgeous, he was actually concentrating and attentive - which he hasn't been for the previous 2 shows. HF was quite nice except he tried the same old trick of opting out! Once he got going the middle bit was very nice, end bit was a touch laggy but then this is Solei - can't expect miracles :-P

Had the most fantastic steward that asked me if this was normal for him, and when I said he'd never done it before but had started doing it at the last couple of shows she said to me "we're going to sort this out!" and told me what to do to do some training in the ring (he was the last dog). Really helpful for both of us.

The other class I'd entered them in was the Pre-Beginner Stakes. We had two absolutely torrential downpours - the first was just before their Pre-Beginner stays (wasn't going to do them, but it stopped) and the second was just as I was waiting to work Solei in the stakes.

So we dashed for cover in a nearby tent, and he was sitting on my lap in there for quite some time whilst it absolutely deluged and then went in to work "cold" (no pre-ring practice) and it was v. v. wet and muddy (though not actually raining significantly). I'm putting it down to the above, cos it was a disaster! Well, it was actually all ok (though hw was pretty crap IMO, but it must've been consistent and can't have looked so bad to the judge cos he got a good mark) except the recall was just all wrong in every way! He's never done anything like that in his life, and it cost him a rosette.

The wait was ok, almost - he did that too well, had to call him twice (or three times - can't remember), then he came in to the side of me instead of the front and just stood there, was completely confused and completely forgot what he was meant to be doing...wouldn't come to the front of me, ended up jumping on my lap! Sometimes I despair of that dog :-P

Elton was a star. His heelwork was lovely (it was an interesting pattern - anti-clockwise circle around cones, about turn at the end and back around about a quarter of the circle, right turn across the middle of the circle and then halt), in fact it was all lovely. Really pleased with him. At the end of the round the judge asked me who I trained with and when I said on my own he said he was a credit to me :-)


At the end of the day I was absolutely thrilled to find he had come 2nd, only ¼ mark behind the 1st place dog...which was a Border Collie. So, drum roll....

as the highest place ABC (Anything But a Collie) dog, Elton has qualified for the Special Pre-Beginner Stakes Semi Finals at Discover Dogs in November!

Arrrgh scary...lots of work to do lol