One of those mixed sort of posts...

Well this is one of those posts where there are about a million things I think I want to talk about, and it will go one of two ways; you will either have to contend with reading masses of waffle, or I get bored and summarise quite shamelessly. We will see...here is our week...

Saturday

I went to Doncaster with my Mum to captain and generally help out. My little team were super and Lucy, Kim, Stripe and Chip clocked 20.03 (although it has to be said, Chip did put in a fairly crazy fast run!)! Even though it was getting hotter, they were staying around the 20.90-21.20s mark most of the day - fantastic! They came 4th in the end, but similar to Rotherham, they probably should have won the division - tiny mistakes, lights by fractions.

Sunday

Jet's turn at Doncaster, running in div.3 on a declared time. We had our super subs from the second team, in the form of Dylan and Buddy. We ended up coming 3rd. Jet ran all day, except for 2(?) legs and when she ran lead in the last leg of the day, she wasn't great. For the rest of the time she was ok, and had some good runs, but she hadn't run over 14" for quite a while. It was hot I guess, but I came away feeling like Jet wasn't quite herself. I had her checked by Kath just to be sure there wasn't anything wrong in her opinion...nothing. I think sometimes I am maybe just a bit harsh on the poor dog.

Monday

Away from flyball and back to agility, I found out on Monday that Jetly has qualified for the British Open Championship class at Asfordby in July. I had no idea, but a few weeks ago when she got her two wins she amounted enough points to go through - who knew! Anyway, according to Leanne, there are jumping/agility rounds, just like a real champ class. It should be exciting anyway!

Tuesday

I came home from university for the night, partly to have my hair done (good god I feel BLONDE!) and also to bring back some junk....oops, I mean very important items of high value. Having clearly lost a few brain cells with my hair going several shades lighter, I thought it might be a good idea to go to agility with Jet. First off, we helped Emma with one of the new beginners whilst Leanne did some work with my Mum and Chip before the weekend. Seeing as we were very quiet (unusual at the moment!) I decided to bring Fly down to soak up the atmosphere....goodness me she was driving me mental! "Arhooooo" and throwing herself about like a total monster watching Chip. That and trying her damnedest to throw herself over any jump we walked near, safe to say she was put away before Jet came out.

Jet did some nice work, she was neat and tidy, but her seesaw wasn't great. To be honest, her seesaw needs work, but I just haven't had the time. In the ring she doesn't seem slow on it and *touch wood* never flies it, but at training she's quite creepy. I tried everything from quick release to having Leanne with treats at the end, throwing a toy....she just wasn't having it. Ok, she did marginally improve, but I didn't want to push it and put her off completely. She did a couple of reasonable ones, so she got a lot of praise and left her at that.

Wednesday

Back to university, oh I do love motorway driving....almost as much as putting petrol in my car everyday...grrrrrr! Well, to be honest, I do really like driving, I just hate paying for bloody petrol. I saw that we had 4 hours of lectures of behaviour and hoped that it would be interesting...and it really was. It was a bit of a revelation to be honest, as a lot of what I thought I knew was pretty much send out of the window. All four hours was on dog behaviour and it was great, but it really did make me think. Anyway, through one thing and another I have come to the conclusion that Jet is actually quite an anxious dog at home. Everything that I thought was confident about her, is probably actually a diffusion behaviour...I make her worse with some of the things I do. I don't want to bore anyone with the details, but it definitely made me think. I keep considering getting her a DAP diffuser, to try and ease things as well as me changing? Answers on a postcard.

Thursday

I came back from uni for the summer, all my stuff packed into the little car. I arrived just in time to set off to flyball training. I did some stuff with chasing Jet off the box, but she kept ball spitting the little git. It was kind of like the toshy thing, and I had Jane release her and me running after her....she was quick, I'll give her that, but she spat her bally out every time. Hmph. I asked Jane if I could train her over 14" as I felt she was struggling a bit with it, she was good and her box was nice but she slowed quite quickly. I'm in two minds about this really, as she is a very fit dog. Now, I keep asking myself, is she a) unfit (unlikely!) b) struggling with 14" due to her stumpy legs (possible, but she did a season of sub4.6s over 14" not too long ago!) c) just not giving it her all, as she was running lead and needs winding up d) has an underlying injury. I feel like I'm so totally overanalysing (congrats if you're still here....welcome to my musing!), but I think it's possibly option C, as she just doesn't get wound up going lead....

However, I can't help but feel like there is something else. I watched Jet walk as she got out of the car when we got home, and there was just a small amount of stiffness in her right fore...she also occasionally skips one of her back legs. I don't know if I am being overly keen, but I keep thinking she's maybe just one tenth lame. I have kept her on yumove (double dose after training) and she wears boots, and she is checked regularly by Kath! I have recently changed her leg supports to some which we bought from the USA, as her Dog Boots Active ones have lost the stickiness of the velcro. I will revert back to those after getting my Mum to re-velcro them. Might be worth considering.

Anyone still reading now will think I'm totally neurotic, which I am. Also, anyone that knows me will know that I'd never ever tell/show to Jet that I wasn't pleased...she's my little sweetie.

This weekend we have Dogs Unleashed and on Tuesday I drive to Bristol to meet up with Nat for the Euros....exciting times!

Rotherham Flyball

Very tired so not too much to say. We were there both days, on saturday to captain/scribe and on sunday to run Jetly. Ghost came 2nd in div.4 in the end having declared a time and run with Lucy from the second team - we ran 18.84s, so not too bad.

Nat also let me have a go at running Faith in division 2, she was fantastic and I really enjoyed running her - she said I can run her in Belgium now too - eek how exciting!

Division one was amazing to watch, with Live Wires running 16.63 over 13"...absolutely amazing stuff.

Fly enjoyed herself too...

Midland Counties

I finished my exams on Friday (woohoo!) and whilst incredibly tired, I was very happy to be driving back to Huddersfield that evening. My parents had set off to go on holiday that morning, so Leanne kindly looked after Jet for the day....after a satnav-led mystery tour, I arrived in Meltham at 9pm.

We were having a weekend off flyball and had been persuaded to do agility at Midland Counties in Chesterfield. On Saturday, I was totally out of it as I was exhausted from 4am-1am days of revision, and made daft mistakes. The first run was Primary Tunnel Teaser, she had a nice run but was very wide (me forgetting how early to call her), then she ran around a jump so needed taking back. In the end she was 1.8s off the winner (who was Dylan, so we can forgive her for not winning it hehehe), so I'm pretty confident she'd have done well in that class. Her second run was Primary Agility which I made a total hash of, but her contacts were lovely - including the aframe she ran behind me and did! I had to laugh....

Next run was Primary Helter Skelter, Leanne and I decided to have a bit of a swap, so she ran Jet and I ran Dylan. Poor Dylan was a bit confused, and although he did some very nice bits, he just had to check in with his mum a few times. Jet on the other hand was fantastic, she didn't care about me and just wanted to do the agility - she did a super run but got E'd three from the end...she was the fastest thing I saw go around anyway!

The final run was Primary Jumping - a massive course with some close work too. She set off like a bomb and did everything really nicely. I can only think we wasted fractions at a pull off the tunnel but she was fabulous and won the class....!

Sunday was full of yet more "if only" runs. In Primary jumping I slipped and fell (!) but she was fantastic, and had we not had that massive blip in the middle I think we'd have won that too as she was only 3.5s off the winner even with me floundering on the floor for a while. Our next run was Primary Agility - we were a bit messy but she won! Yey! We won't go into what happened in TFO....but she had an awesome run in Primary Circular Jumping, shame about the pole! She was 23.80s and the winner (again, Dylan!) was 24.98....clearly they just felt the need to equal out their wins!

We had a good weekend all in all, with 2 wins and I feel like she could have had a few more with little blips ironed out. So she's halfway to Novice after just one show....and one win away from her BAD Bronze....so fingers crossed for Dogs Unleashed!

Congrats to Leanne and her gang on their various wins, Jane & George on their two clears and Katie & Bonnie with two clears at their first show!

Ravensknowle Farm

Well, a very quick update as I'm in the middle of my revision!

Jet was brill last weekend :D. It was a blisteringly hot weekend in Pontefract, so we had cool coats at the ready and plenty of water on hand. Barneys (Norah, Brooke, Jet, Murphy) were in division 2, seeded on 18.56. We were a bit unlucky in a few races, losing legs by an inch or dropped balls. We did pull off an 18.25s though, which was fantastic! All the team were running well, but I was so pleased with Jet as it was so hot and she didn't waiver at all - still as crazy as ever and not noticeably slower at all, fantastic for a black dog in the heat.

Nothing this weekend but revision for me and training for Jet! Midland Counties agility the weekend after!

What was I saying about her box?

Look at that stray left foot! But then I suppose a good turn isn't always a four footed one, on the plus side she is tight and looks to be getting a good push off too, with a pretty nice angle coming off it. Bless her, good girly....even if you do have a stray paw. There were a few photos in succession so I could more or less see exactly what she did on it (I won't show them all...the camera isn't kind to my poor girl!) and on the whole I was pretty pleased....no double hitting.

Ravensknowle this weekend for flyball, then exams....(which the dreaded revision has started for already!).

Dinnington Flyball

We've never been to Dinnington before, but it was a nice venue and it was pretty easy to find. Jet was racing third in the ring, so a bit more of a leisurely start to the morning. We were racing in div.1 with Norah, Brooke, Jet and Murphy - George still out due to injury. Those 4 had run 18.56 at Drax, on pretty good ground, but Julie had convinced us that we had to go in and give it our all. Christine ran Brooke and her changes were cracking - her and James seemed to get the Brooke-catching down to a tee. Jet ran ok in the morning, she didn't seem to be completely herself but it wasn't helped that her ball was put in the wrong side a few times! Easy mistake to make I suppose though, and she got back into her stride. Luckily, we only had 2 in the morning but it was getting quite hot and the rings were on a fair hill. We didn't seem to have really got it together!

When I got Jet out for a wee over lunchtime, she did some quick boxwork as Jane had it out for George. She was fab, throwing herself on and off as usual, and I think this really helped as in the afternoon she was fabulous - like a different dog. I was really pleased with her and the runback was clear for her so she was really chasing me back. After two losses in the morning, we managed to win one against demons and took Tyne to a nailbiting five legs - just a light for us in the last leg. We also took a few legs off Brigg too! We managed a best time of 18.57s in the afternoon, so not bad at all as the teams we took legs off had been doing 18.1/20s in the morning, so we know there's more in us yet! We ended up 6th, but it was fantastic racing.

I also captained Barking. It was Lucy, Chip, Buddy, Buffy and Stripe in a seven team div and initially seeded sixth on 22.19. I wasn't sure how they'd fair as it was a lot of racing to ask any of them to do, and it was a hot day, but we were going to give it a go. First race in, I told them we were against the top seeds and were going to have to really push it and scream their dogs back...Buddy was out for this one. Well they all ran fabulously and did 20.84 over 14"!! We lost two in the morning, but went on to win another 4 and they were around mid21 all day - maybe mid22 with no Lucy at the end of the day. A lot of other teams must have been running quicker as there were a few high 20s times - all very close to the 20.50 division breakout. They came a fabulous 2nd in the end, I was dead pleased cos they were all amazing!!!

At Drax I'd been eyeing up Rotherham's new box, made by a team member of theirs. An interesting twist on the hybrid idea (http://www.rotherhamrocketsflyballteam.com/d-style-true-hybrid-box.html) and when Kath said Jet could have a go whenever she liked, I decided to take them up on it. When Barking has finished, I got her back out of the car (with a quick warm up) and took her to Rotherham's camp. I did a few "go box" with just the jump in, and she got a few "wow"s - lol - the on/off motion is second nature to her she does so much chute work, really driving off to the ball. Then we had 3/4 with the ball in and Kath released her while I chased her off. Finally we did it without the jump and she turned just the same. She was fantastic, and she got lots of lovely comments, it made me realise that maybe I should stop being so harsh about her turn - it is fairly good, especially for on a boomerang, and it was nice to try her on a more upright shaped box.

Updates

Well Jetly is taking to our new addition pretty well, she's so good with her and plays so nicely. Sometimes Fly needs a bit of a telling off though, if Jet wants to sleep for a bit. It has made her so much more eager to please though, she watches my sessions with Fly, intently watching from behind the gate looking as if to say "I can dooooo that!!!".

We had Drax last weekend, Jetly was a good girly! We hit 18.56s, but were unlucky in a few and came 6th in the end. I also ran Charlie for Dog Friendly, and they came 2nd in their division - he's great fun to run.

I passed my driving test and was a very lucky girl to receive a car for my 21st birthday, so Jetly and I will be going on a small trip to see Sarah and the gang this week. Then the revision starts!