Dogsey

On 18th June 2006, we had what I believe to be the very first Disc Dog Event in the UK. The whole idea of the event was to promote disc dogs in the UK, after all it has been in the States for over 30 years(?) and in mainland Europe for over 10(?); the event was also put on to raise money for Lurcher Link.

My wife, Di and I (Paul) arrived at Poolsbrook Country Park near Chesterfield at 8am, with the event scheduled to start at 9.30 we thought we would have enough time to put everything up and get everything sorted. We were wrong as in the end we were running about 20 minutes behind, which as it happened didn’t matter too much as one of the competitors, Tracey and her dog Mylo were late, and I hasten to say this was due to me writing the directions down wrong!

We finally got under way at 10.30 with a 10-minute demonstration with our dogs, Neelix; Chakotay; and Tuvok; as well as my parents dog Millie. They all performed impeccably; although Neelix wouldn’t perform properly until he knew I had some treats in my pocket. Neelix is a hairy crossbreed who I adopted from Sheffield Dog Rescue when he was a year old, he’s now 4 ½ and has done Agility and Flyball, but prefers this. Chakotay, as is usual these days was the star, giving 100% enthusiasm and effort for each throw. Chakotay is a 2 ½ year old small built Lurcher who we adopted from Thornberry Animal Sanctuary when he was 10 months old having been there since four months old. It took another 10 months to get him to catch a disc. I have never known Tuvok catch as well as he did do on this occasion, considering we’ve only had him about 9 weeks. Tuvok is a medium built Lurcher whom we rescued from Carlton Forest Kennels and Rescue Centre on Good Friday of this year, he’s believed to be around 18 months old. For an overweight Labrador who’s pushing 10 years old, Millie was fantastic too. She proved to be as fit as the others in some ways and just kept going bringing the disc back without question. The down side to her age is her lack of ability to jump to catch the disc, which means she doesn’t quite have the “wow” factor as the others.

It was about 10.40 am when I started the training. This meant I had all the dogs in the ring (which was actually a triangle), one at a time to try to give them the benefit of my knowledge as a dog trainer and disc dog enthusiast. Each dog was in the ring for around 4 to 4 ½ minutes and the training was completed for 11.45. We decided to take an early Lunch, which gave us time for a fun event at 12.30; the fastest recall.

Each dog, of which there were 16 for this event, had three runs down the arena, which worked out about 75 feet each time, the fastest of the three was the time that sorted out their final positions. Seven of the 16 were Lurchers or other Sighthounds and our Chakotay won this with 2.55 second; second being Max with 2.83, a good performance considering he and his owner Kelli had travelled for two hours from Hertfordshire that morning; and third was Conner with 3.14. The non-Lurchers finished like this; Jess with 2.91; Zak with 3.02 and Joe with 3.20, in fact Border Collies took the top five places in this class, and all owned by Carolyn and Dennis who had come to see us from Huddersfield. Out of the 48 recalls, only 5 were under 3 seconds, and Chakotay could put his name to 3 of these. There was only 1.53 seconds that separating the quickest dog and the slowest; not bad considering the quickest was a 2 ½ y/o fit Lurcher and last was a 9 ½ y/o overweight Labrador!

Another slight break while a man from Stavely Lurcher Club came over to have a chat and to put a donation in the moneybox; then we were training again.

The second round of training commenced shortly afterwards and I was amazed to see what work the handlers had put in and I saw an improvement in most dogs, but now it was time to rest them for the big fun competition.

This gave Di and me time to put on another demonstration (after we’d had a cuppa), this time they all performed even better than before, I was well chuffed.

The competition was to start about 3.30pm, but before hand we had to show our respects for SAM a crossbreed who ran off from the area we were using, just a few days before and ended up on the road ½ a mile away, he died shortly afterwards at the vets. After our minutes silence, for which ALL the dogs were completely quiet and still, each dog had 2 minutes to catch or retrieve as many discs thrown by their handler, as possible. Points were scored for where the disc was caught or retrieved from, with maximum points being gained by dogs bringing a disc back from the 60 feet zone and minimum for discs returned from the 20 feet zone. There were also more points available for dogs catching the disc rather than just retrieving it, again more points if it was caught in the 60 feet zone.

We felt it unfair to run our dogs that had a lot of practice in this so left it to the other 10 which finished in this order. The winner was Dawn with Maddy, a 2 ½ year old Lurcher on 55 points. Second, after a tiebreaker was Kelli with Max, a 21 month old Saluki cross Greyhound on 37 points. Also on 37 points but finishing third after the tiebreak was Carolyn and Zak, a 3 year old Border Collie. Only three points behind in fourth with 34 points was Carolyn’s other half Dennis with Ellie an 18 month Border Collie. Fifth and last of the places for prizes was Tracey and Mylo a 2 ¾ year old Saluki on 28 points.

As we were overwhelmed by the generosity of our sponsors, we had enough prizes for us to give some special ones out and these were; Most Points Scored in the 20 feet zone, which went to Meg, another Border Collie, handled by Carolyn. Most Improved, which went to Kelli and Max. And we just had to give the Most Spectacular to Connor, a 2 ½ year old Lurcher handled by Antony after leaving the arena via the fencing at the far end of the triangle, which just happened to be where his mum was taking pictures!
For Tilly, a 5 ½ year old Border Collie cross handled by Andrea and for Buster a 21 month old Boxer handled by Sarah and Paul, they did get a consolation prize, mainly consisting of discs – honestly I’m not saying they need more practice!

Not only had it been a good day for Lurcher Link, with us raising £163, it was also a good day for disc-dogs-uk as a few people had said it really interested them and they would love to do it again and plans are already underway for more fun events. It was also a good day weather wise, the sun wasn’t out making it perfect for the dogs and it wasn’t too windy making it perfect for throwing, and although we had a few spots of rain, they were so little it didn’t matter anyway.

It wouldn’t be right if I didn’t finish by thanking all our sponsors for their generosity; Nurtience; Burns; Gilpa; Pascoes; Wagg; Chudley’s; Kingstand Lodge Kennels (Budby Notts) and of course myself; Paul’s Problem Pooches (Chesterfield).

To sum things up the day was absolutely effing fantastic, as you will see if you view the pics at the links below, EVERYONE was smiling, and the dogs looked happy.

The photos, sum up the day exactly, there’s action shots of dogs chasing discs, there’s some of them catching discs, even some of dogs escaping the arena, also a few candid shots taken of people and dogs when they weren’t looking as well as quite a few taken during lunch when the dogs were running around together enjoying themselves.

Slideshow 1

Slideshow 2

To wet your appetite here's our dogs in action...

Millie



Neelix



Chakotay



Tuvok