What's The Earliest You've Ever Had To Get Up For A Show?

Just sat here working out what time I'm going to need to set off on Sunday. Rossi will be in YD, so will probably have to get there just before 9am to be safe. 3 hours travel means I'll probably have to be up at about 4.30/5.00am! Must be mad!!

I think the the earliest I've ever had to get up was about 3am to get down to South Wales in time for JD Spinone judging! So what's your earliest time?

Crufts think we get up for 4am to get there in plenty of time!

I try and stick with the 2.5hr rule for champ shows and 1hr for opens ! but the breed ch shows are about 3 hrs away and we usually leave at 5.30am because the jnr handling is in first at 9.30am! so don't want a panic when we get there!

Getting up - 2/3 am.....leaving 3/4 to be there for 8.

Home again in the evening

I love my dogs really!

Well we're going back 20-odd years when I used to show cats. I lived in London, and as I don't drive, I usually had to get to a mainline railway station before the buses were running. It was always dark. The radio would be on and in those days LBC would broadcast classical music at weekends until 6am. It got so that I always felt we would have a good day IF a certain classical piece was played!

I remember the night before the National show - held at Olympia. I think it was my first National so I wasn't able to sleep, in fact I was still awake at 3am. To my astonishment I heard hoofbeats on the road outside - bear in mind this is Hackney! - and saw a palomino Welsh Mountain cantering up & down the road.

I went out in bare feet and carefully enticed the pony towards me. I was within seconds of grabbing his forelock then a car went past and he was off again! So I went to hammer on the door of the people who owned it, only to be told they had sold him to someone else a fortnight before....

People did still keep horses in the inner city then - the paddock is now a Tesco superstore.

Anyway they called the owners and it was recaptured eventually, but safe to say I didn't sleep AT ALL that night! Does that count??? By the way, my cat won Best of Breed - one of three BOBs he got at the National in his show career

I don't do 4-5 hour drives anymore, that was more than ridiculous tbh. 8-9 hours driving in one day is just too much for me. I'm even worse when it comes to open shows though, I won't travel more than 30-45 minutes to an open!

It's nice having male dogs as you're in early and then can get away. What used to drive me mad was getting there early, showing the male Spin and then having to wait all day to take Isla in the ring. Drove up to SKC one year, the Spin was done and dusted by 9.30, Isla didn't go in the ring til 3pm!!!!

I love me bed more!

Its funny you should say that!!

Trouble is - being down here, if you wanna do freestyle - you have to travel -I do about 4 shows a year - possibly 5, but one is local - the next nearest one is 4.5 hours.

No it is much easier to put time limits on travelling when you live centrally. Living up here has much the same effect, I tend to stick to the North East and North West when it comes to shows now.

what you mean you lot sleep actually sleep the night before a show ??

- when you are on a 5 hour drive full day of show and another 5 hour drive....tis a good idea to get a couple of hours in!

Where are you going Rips? Id never travel more than 2/2.5hrs for a show.