The boys go barking...
 At
the end of 2010 the Kennel Club events office was contacted by the production team from Ant &
Dec's Push the Button TV Show, saying that they wanted to feature an Agility competition on the programme,
filmed at Crufts. For those who do not know, Push the Button is a
popular primetime ITV Saturday evening show with 7 – 8 million viewers. Would this be good news
for Agility, Crufts and for dogs in general or would they be the laughing stock? Dave Ray explains what happened when Ant & Dec briefly stole the limelight from the dogs on the first day of dfs
Crufts 2011. This report will appear in the
Kennel Gazette later this year.
Whilst
running the finals of the Kennel Club Agility Stakes at the Olympia Christmas Show, Vanessa McAlpine, Show Director of Crufts,
asked me to attend a meeting between herself and the
producer of Push the Button, a popular TV programme which has been running on a Saturday
evening on ITV1 where two families compete against each other for money. There is usually one
competition on the show each week in which a member of each family competes in a challenge that
they have to train for. Previously they've had dancing on ice, kicking penalties on the Wembley
pitch, horse racing at Newbury. This one was to be completing a dog agility course at Crufts!
 Training
in secret...
Although I arranged all the organisation of the competition, my wife Mary Ray took charge of all
the training, Mary had one day to turn the competing member of each family into a Crufts
Agility Superstars. The training was to take place on the day before Crufts started. The
competition was to take place in the Main Area the very next day!
On
the Wednesday before Crufts, we had the full film crew at the Rugby DTC dog barn
along with Ant and Dec who spent most of the day there too. I did keep it a bit of a secret as
we didn't want spectators there because it was a deadly serious operation.
In the blue corner we had Dillion competing for the Simpson family while, in the red corner, it
was Lee representing the Cassidy family.
 Our
first job in
the morning was to decide which dogs they were going to borrow. The selection would be made
between dogs belonging to Mary, Jan Morse, Julie Skipp and Yvonne Croxford. There are lots of
great agility dogs around but our choice was severely limited as the dogs have to be happy
to work for a stranger.
Each competitor tried out
two dogs, and the producers decided to leave the choice to them. Lee picked our Levi and
Dillion chose Jan's Kia. They spent the rest of the day training individually with Mary.
Anyone
who is under the impression that these things are fixed couldn't be further away from the
truth. We couldn't tell one how the other had got on, what they had been doing or how
successful they were. They were kept apart the whole time when they were under instruction. In
fact, the only time they came together was when they were needed for joint filming, and we were
not allowed to tell one what had happened with the other one then.
Due
to the pressure involved in this event, at an early stage I had
suggested that
we ask a completely different person to judge, not one with commitments at Crufts already.
The person I had in mind was Arthur Rodgers.
Arthur
supplied our first training course. It was a fairly straight forward 16 obstacles lay out. Both
handlers mastered that course quite well. For
the afternoon training session, however, the level of difficulty was ramped up with Mary and Arthur
planning the courses between them. I have to say considering that Lee had not owned a dog for the
last five years and Dillion who had never owned a dog at all - and was very apprehensive about dogs in
general - they both did extremely well. In fact, it was quite amazing how they responded to the
training.
 Whist
the training was taking place, Ant and Dec could not resist offering their advice! A lot of
people have asked me if the two most popular 'nice guys' on television today are really that
nice, well... I will tell you further on!
At the
end of the training day, Lee and Dillion were whisked away. They would not to see the dogs nor a single
piece of equipment again until one hour before the competition in the Main Arena the next day
 Pre-filming
Throughout the morning the fact that Ant & Dec's Push the Button was
being filmed at Crufts at 1:40pm was widely publicised around the NEC so it was not surprising
that before 1pm
there wasn't a seat to be had in the Main Arena. There were nearly 9000 people seated
waiting for the competition to start!
Lee
and Dillion met the dogs again in the collecting ring about an hour before the competition
started. Once again the secret service stepped in and the competitors weren't allowed to watch each
other. They had 30 minutes each to bond with their dog. They had a hurdle which they could
use to put the dog over to warm up. Neither was they allowed to see the course in the Arena
when it was built.
 Before
the event,
I had suggested that the best way of scoring on this occasion would be to add five seconds to
the handler's time instead of using our usual five faults for every mistake on the course. This
would ensure that both handlers would finish the course. Any eliminations incurred would add 20
seconds to the handler's time. As the result was not going to be announced until the Saturday night
programme, the number of faults and eliminations could be kept secret and unveiled on the
Saturday night.
The competition
I
think the look on Ant and Dec's faces when they walked into the arena said it all. Dec simply said 'Ooh dear, it is really big!' Both competitors
looked horrified. With so many people watching, it must have been really daunting
for the two inexperienced handlers especially as the number of obstacles had increased to 20
and the level of difficulty had been jacked up as well. You must bear in mind, however, that
the producers did not want it to be an easy run for the competitors as there was £20,000 at
stake in this competition.
 Mary
was allowed five minutes to walk each competitor around the course. I have to say
that she did her best but it was apparent that she needed at least ten minutes, and I'm sure that
she would have liked 15 minutes! The pressure on Lee and Dillion was enormous. They really did
well once the competition started especially with a live audience of 9000 cheering people. To compete in
those circumstances after only three hours of training was astounding. They really did
brilliantly! Shame both could not win. It was a tremendous achievement even though they both
had eliminations.
It was
difficult to second guess the result so everyone waited with baited breath for Saturday night's
programme. Miraculously, all the filming at Crufts - including the final and a whole day's
filming in our barn at Rugby - was condensed into less than ten minutes on the programme. It
was a really, really good piece of television and very well edited. I know we can be accused of
being biased but we believe it has been one of the best challenges they've had on Push the
Button. If you want to look at the clip from the website:
http://www.itv.com/entertainment/pushthebutton/videos/crufts/
 Now,
I will revisit what I mentioned about what are celebrities really like. Ant and Dec have a
reputation for being ordinary guys and I can tell you they are. They are two of the most well
known entertainers in the UK but you couldn't wish to meet two nicer people. They were only too
pleased to oblige if anyone wanted a photograph or an autograph, and they were always there
with their light-hearted remarks.
It was very apparent they are popular with everyone
they work with, too. In fact, at the Rugby barn, it was the producer who was getting annoyed as he
tried to get them away from having their photographs taken with yet another fan. Yes, we are all
now members of the Ant & Dec fan club especially Mary Ray.
If you
want to see Mary's latest Crufts Heelwork to Music routine that More4 did not show click on the
link to You-tube below. It's Slumdog Millionaire this year.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eXF4dz7E0vE
 About the author...
Dave Ray joined Rugby DTC with his wife Mary in 1978 and, although not a dedicated dog
handler, his business skills were soon put to good use. After election to the Committee, he
held various positions including for many years the Club Treasurer and Show Manager. He has now
been a RDTC member for 33 years and is currently the Vice President and Show Manager.
Dave is also Chairman and trustee of a Rugby-based charity called Avon Valley
Canine Trust.
He took over running the Olympia Agility events in the early 90s and became the
agility organiser for the sponsors Pedigree. He remained in this position until their
withdrawal in 2009. He then continued organising this event for the Kennel Club.
Dave was elected as Midlands representative on the KC Agility Liaison Council about 12 years
ago and later elected as Chairman of the Agility Council. He is a member of the Activities
Sub-Committee, the International Agility Working Party, the Heelwork to Music Working Party and the Agility Festival Working Party.
He is also quite involved with Crufts Dog Show and is renown for the his
expert agility, HTM, Flyball and Obedience commentaries.
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