Nicole...

Ok finally got myself organised - accommodation paid, entries done and paid... Our first Nationals seems so much more real now. How exciting!!!!

Thanks for finding that out for us Vickie. Will do up my online entries soon. Hmmmm what to enter, what to enter...

I'm interested to know the same thing. Bond is currently in excellent for the games but may be in masters for some of them by then but not likely by the time the early bird entries close in February. I'm also not sure what to do with him for pairs as it will depend on what class he is in as to who he can run with. I was wondering if it was possible to send in early bird entries for him for adm/jdm and then waiting til later to send in the games ones when I know what he is in but not sure if that would just make it a nightmare for the trial sec. Interested to see what others suggest

Well done Smisch! Your little guy ran so well (and I have add looked super tough with his shaved eyebrow!). Congrats on your herding work Inevitablue! I can't help but brag after our wonderful day at the Ekka yesterday. It was Lomani's 3rd Ekka and once again she showed that she is only ever at her best when there is a big crowd and plenty of cow poo around. She is so amazing to run there, I just wish that I could run that same dog all year round and not just once a year! She barked from the second she left the startline and ran flat out the entire time. We came home with a Q and 3rd place in JDO and a Q and 5th place in ADO. So close on ADM with a bar and naughty contact on the run home. It was Bond's first ever Ekka and we were really uncertain as to how he would cope with the environment. He seemed a little stressed at the beginning but as soon as he was on course he was his normal self which was a massive relief. He took out 1st place with a Q in ADO!!!!! So proud of my baby Bear!

Sounds like a busy weekend out there - Congrats to all the DOLers on the good results and good luck for those to come We had a good trial today - Lomani came home with 2 Q's from 2 runs. Pretty good considering that it was very wet underfoot and Lomani's coat acts like a giant sponge in wet weather which used to put her off. Since we started this year it doesn't seem that anything can put her off though At present we have 10 Q's from 14 runs for the year Here's some vid of her runs today ;)

I too have an English cocker and didn't know what to do with her as a pup. We started puppy school, progressed into obedience and she seemed to really love learning new stuff. We progressed into the trialling obedience classes and she hated it - too boring for my nutso dog (and if I'm honest I had no idea what I was doing so would have made it worse) so we thought we would try agility and it was perfect for us. I can't even begin to tell you how much enjoyment both of us have gotten out of agility. We have been trialling for nearly 2 years now and she just continues to get better and love it more. Here are a couple of videos of her in action to let you see what they can do. (Don't fret about the complexity, these are masters runs, the novice courses are much more basic to start with). Most clubs will usually let you start agility training at age 1 - the dogs aren't allowed to compete until 18 months. If you get your name down a few weeks before you shouldn't have a drama getting in. Most clubs need you to have a basic level of obedience in order to join an agility class though so a good idea to keep you obedience up in the meantime. While I love my agility and know how much cockers can love it, I also know of cockers that thrive on flyball so you should really give both a try and see what she likes the best. ;)

Well done Agility Dogs!!! I seemed to miss your runs last night :D Lomani is sooooo loving her agility at the moment. She ran beautifully last night on 2 tricky masters courses. We got a 3rd place and Q in ADM which was our ADM title!!!!!!!!!!! I had a bet going with one of my instructors that we would try a 4 jump leadout on this one - it was the best option to get the call off the tunnel/jump afterwards so I thought it was worth it. We managed to pull that part off so I was happy with the run (we won't mention where she missed the jump behind the tunnel and then when I put my front cross on the straight line which made her miss another jump). Bring on this afternoon's trial!!!!!! Good luck to everybody competing this weekend

LOL You saw Lomani at her best - there is something about cow poo that seems to make her run unbelievably well. I'm glad to hear that we motivated you though and hope that you are enjoying every minute of your agility time

SD - great runs, well recovered from your fall too! Xena - Thanks, she looooooves to weave!!! Vickie - we barely trained over the break and she isn't reading me as well as she would normally do. There were a couple of close calls where she was out of position but knew what she had to do and got herself there - I have no idea when I got this consistent dog to run with but boy am I happy that it finally happened!

Congrats RS and Vickie!!! Goes to show how much the dogs appreciate their agility when they come back from the break so enthusiastic! We had a nice trial last night, no opens so just 2 runs each. Lomani got an ADM quallie (now only 1 off our ADM title, eeeeeeee!!!!!!!). My OH got a lovely AD quallie and 1st place with Bond and just 1 fault in JD. I think he'll be hitting his stride in a few weeks with a bit of training under his belt And for whoever it was that wanted to see a cocker in action... here you go It felt like a really messy run but doesn't look too bad on video! Hey AD - you got a NQ place with Xena last night too

Does anyone have any information on the outcome of the rule review that happened recently? Any links to the information up yet? Just a little curious... and impatient

I have trained for agility at Jimboomba and I can't speak highly enough of the agility training there. Very knowledgeable instructors and a really friendly club. I haven't done any obedience there though. Enjoy your new puppy and I hope to see you in the agility scene in 18 months or so

WOW That is a brilliant effort! 100% hit rate!! I'm afraid the best we have had was 2/4 My dog is bipolar Do you have any video Wish we had cockers doing agility here ;) Unfortunately we forgot our camera, but our goal for this year is to video our runs frequently so I'm sure I will have some to share soon. I so wish that we had recorded our JDM run from Saturday as it was one of those runs that just felt sooooo good - that's not the one you saw on video was it Smisch :fingerscrossed: . I'm too superstitious though and so far we have never recorded a qualifying run, in fact in most the runs we have videoed we mess up by obstacle 5 Congrats on your great runs with Denver, Smisch... he is running sooo nicely for such a young dog, just imagine how fantastic he will be with a bit more practice under his belt!!!

Wasn't there the small matter of a multiple title? LOL Oh yeah, I forgot, it was our ADO2 title as well... our first multiplier ;)

Congratulations everyone... great start to the year!!!!!!! I have a little brag of my own. After not training much at all over the wet Christmas break I went into yesterday's trial expecting an unfocused cocker that blew her contacts. As usual she had to prove me wrong and came home with 4 Q's from 4 runs :D We've had 3 from 4 before, but never 4 from 4 and certainly not when we were soooo rusty. I even got a couple of stopped 2 on 2 off contacts which is pretty rare in trials. Bring on 2011 I say!!!!!!!

I only have agility titles but have often wondered the same thing, especially within the agility titles. The order seems to consistently be ADM ADO JDM JDO with the games following but the games seem to come in any order. Until recently Lomani's titles finished with GD SPDX SD. But I just got her GDX title paperwork today and now it is SPDX GDX SD so who knows

We are high and safe on the Gold Coast. Please PM me if I can help out in any way including taking in animals, helping MDBA with moving things around, etc as I am on holidays this week and have the time to help.

Just wanted to add that in Qld you are only allowed to register one non-pedigree dog with the CCCQ (Dogs Qld) in your lifetime. The only exclusion to this is if you join and register multiple dogs at the one time. If your dogs are pedigreed then you can register as many as you want.

Wow, I saw this thread up again and wasn't sure exactly where my brain had been at when I wrote this... seems it was pretty spot on. This year Lomani has nailed 2 on - 2 off contacts in training.... since doing that she gives me more consistent contacts in trials but we still haven't managed to put the 2o2o into trials which is something I think I'm just going to have to live with. She got her JDM, ADX, GD, GDX, SPDX, ADO and JDO titles this year so she certainly met those goals. Surprisingly she is also 4 q's into her ADM title so that will definitely be on the list for next year. Bond started trialling in September and has 4 q's to date. He is running beautifully but is still very green and I know that next year will be his year. :D Lets not talk about the whole obedience thing though Congratulations to everybody on reaching their goals!!!!

Fantastic video Luke - I'd kill for those contacts!!!! Barkly looks so happy to be out there and so consistent at the same time (yet another combination that I am envious of!). Well done Congrats to everybody else on their great achievements too. Agility dogs - saw a few of your runs on Saturday and your guys were on fire. Some well earned places in there too against some very tough competition!!!

Congratulations on all the weekend's great results!!! We have a massive brag. For the first time ever, Lomani ran well 2 days in a row. :D :D She has never slept at trials much and as such is really flat on the second day of 2 day trials... but this weekend we went down to Grafton for a 2 day trial, camped at the grounds and she slept!!!!! Got a surprising quallie and first place in a rather challenging ADO run up first on Saturday. Then we had our first ADM run and I stuffed her up for our first fault, then she knocked the second last bar. Doh. Another q in excellent gamblers and that was Saturday done. Then came Sunday when we got 2 more quallies in JDM and JDO. Missed out on a q by 2 sec in our first SPDM run, but had fun nonetheless. I was sooo happy to be going home with 4 q's from 6 runs, not to mention the fact that she finally ran well day 2 for me... then I get bowled over with Most Successful Agility Competitor for the entire weekend!!!!!! What a weekend!!! Looks like we will have to camp at all trials from now on :p It was fun to be trialling with a different bunch of people and we received many positive comments from people asking if she was on speed! LOL Think my agility addiction just went up a notch

I have been doing ANKC for a year now but only just started ADAA recently. Lomani is 410 so is just in the midi category and while she can clear 550, I don't want to risk any injuries so only run her in the Regular schedule (so that she only jumps 400). I have only done 2 ADAA trials, the first was a games trial and I really enjoyed the variety of games that ADAA has. There are a couple of rule differences for snooker and gamblers but not too hard to get your head around. The second trial was agility and jumpers and I really enjoyed the courses, very flowing and good for building up speed. Lomani didn't seem to notice the different spacing with the weavepoles. The dog walk is higher and she seems to pause about 3/4 of the way up and glance at me as if to say, um mum, this is supposed to level off here... but I'm sure she'll be fine once she has done more. They also vary the angle of the A frame depending on the height category that the dogs are in which I think is a good idea. The biggest difficulty I have had at ADAA is that the judges stand a lot closer than in ANKC. Lomani is not used to that and it is something we will probably need to do in training. She got a bit freaked out by having someone other than me running down the other side of the weavepoles and pulled out a couple of times, and wouldn't come down the A frame with someone standing so close. :D

That is great news!!!!!! I have been popping in here many times a day, wanting to see this message and now it is here! Keep up that good healing Jed.

Congratulations, what a successful weekend it has been for the DOL crew! AgilityDogs - Well done!!! I saw quite a few of your runs last night and was once again blown away by your smooth handling and speedy dogs. Luke - Well done!!! I didn't realise you were out of JD already, Yay!!! I used to get those sort of starts from Lomani once she had done a couple of runs for the day. Another cocker spaniel handler gave me the idea of using chicken necks to motivate her as they really are the centre of her universe. I have done it over the last few weeks and in that time have really upped our quallie rate, speed and motivation. I just show her the chicken neck before we go out to run, put it back in the esky and she strains to get to the ring as she knows if she runs fast she'll get it when we get back. We have had a great trialling weekend. We trialled Friday night and came home with a Q and first place in excellent agility. Knocked the second last bar in our JDM run but it was a great, fast and fun run so who cares :D . Went back for day 2 yesterday and in the past Lomani has always been atrocious on the second day in a row trialling. But with the aid of the good ol' chicken necks I got 3 fast runs out of her!!! Came home with a JDO Q, novice gamblers Q (got our title last weekend but I was happy to get another Q as I didn't think she deserved one of the previous ones so now I'm happy that she has 3 Q's she deserved) and just one refusal in JDM caused by my poor positioning.

Good job taking this dog on I think that you will find that there is an amazing amount that you can teach a deaf dog... I do agility with a lady that runs 2 deaf dogs and just this weekend came home with a masters jumpers qualification with one of them Let me know if you would like to have a chat with her and I will pass on your contact details to her as I am sure she would love to help out.