The Kennel Club & Pedigree Agility events

The most sought after agility finals to compete in are without a doubt the Kennel Club Agility Finals at the Olympia Christmas Horse show, equalled only by Crufts itself in the agility world. At Olympia, there have different classes of agility finals on each of the five days of the show. It is an extremely busy agility event for the organisers and the judge with four Semi finals for the Kennel Club Olympia Agility Stakes at Christmas, the YKC Agility Dog of the Year which qualifies for Crufts and the Pedigree Team and Pairs Relay finals.  So it was agility all day for each of the three days of the show. Dave Ray, event organiser, reports.

The City of Birmingham Show really is a superb venue for agility with great facilities, and we were really made to feel at home. This year we had the benefit of a newly reseeded arena which made it even better. Day 1 Friday One of the biggest events at the City of Birmingham Show is the Novice Semi-final. Although there was engraved crystal and rosettes etc for the top dogs, the main aim for the handlers was to be placed in the top 35 as that is the number that would be invited from this event to compete in the Olympia Semi-final to be held on Sunday, 21 December 2008 Just to get to the Semi final, handlers had to be in the top three in one of the heats from maybe up to 500 dogs competing so just to qualify for this semi-final was an achievement itself. This year 59 handlers had qualified. As with all of the classes at the C of B, our judge Bill Glover had designed courses that were achievable and fast but not easy and certainly needed a high degree of handling skill.  Running third, Matthew Goodliffe went into the lead in what we thought was an unbeatable time of 28.64 seconds, and he held that until Will Rolfe running 20th did an unbelievable round in 28.37 to snatch the lead. We didn't think that that could be beaten, but we were proved wrong when young Tracey Flower with her Border Collie Dellekko Madame Barbie, running 32nd, floored us all by taking the lead in a time of 26.38. That was the position that she would hold until the end even though Joanne Tristram with her crossbreed was close to taking the lead in a time of 27.13 seconds she couldn't quite take the lead.  Also worthy of mentioning were Fiona Vaughan with her WSD finishing in 3rd place and Sarah Young with her BC finishing in 4th place, the last two only being separated by 100ths of a second. It certainly was what I would call an exciting competition with some of the favourites going out and some of the younger handlers coming in.

Judges Report from Bill Glover With three full days of judging (14 classes) this is certainly one of the busier appointments to be offered, and a fair amount of midnight oil was expended on designing the courses. I was pleased with the way that they ran, and hope people enjoyed them as much as possible under the circumstances! All the agility at City of Birmingham takes place in a single dedicated ring with a mixed audience of agility enthusiasts and breed handlers. We were lucky with the weather which, although overcast, remained warm and dry for most of the time. This meant that the ring remained in good condition, and even more importantly we were able to enjoy our evening meals - courtesy of top chef Dave Ray - in the open air! Unfortunately with so many events it isn't feasible to give a 'blow by blow' account of each one, but the full results are included with this report. There were some simply stunning rounds, and my congratulations go to those who finished up in qualifying places for Olympia or Crufts. Of course, there were an equal number of 'if onlys' and hard luck stories. My commiserations to those who didn't qualify, but well done for reaching the Semis in the first place - no mean feat in itself! Finally I would like to thank Dave Ray and his crew for their help and hospitality. In particular Shaun Young and Rob Hunter who did an excellent job of putting up all my courses. And also my wife Pia who, despite looking after two small children, a baby, and five dogs, also worked as the caller each day and ran her Maisie as a 'white dog' before the various finals. My thanks to you all. It was a privilege to judge the various agility finals and semi-finals at the 2008 City of Birmingham Championship show, and I'd like to start by thanking the Kennel Club and Pedigree for continuing to support these events and all the qualifying heats throughout the year.

Results
KC OLympia Novice Agiity Stakes Semi Final

The Kennel Club Olympia Agility Stakes supported by Pedigree is the original Olympia agility final.  It used to be open to all Large grades of dogs but, due to the sheer numbers in agility and the advent of other finals for them, it is now limited to Grade 6 & 7 dogs which are the top grades in the UK. 

This was the penultimate semi-final for 2008 and with 20 dogs competing the top five dogs go through to an Olympia semi-final on Saturday 20^th December in London where they will join the other 30 dogs who have qualified. Bill Glover had put up a fairly testing course for this competition and the handlers worked it hard and skilfully so only five were eliminated and, quite remarkably, only two dogs had faults so there were 13 clear rounds.  So time would be the deciding factor. As it turns out the maximum course time allowed of 42 second would be academic.

Commiserations of the day went to Mark Laker who went into the lead when he ran second and then had to stand and watch himself drop through the places to end up in 6^th place. There were some stunning runs in this competition and the first handler to compete the course clear in under 30 seconds was the very skilled YKC handler Anthony Clarke in 29.879 seconds. Once more we didn't think that anyone could beat it that was until, running 18^th, a young lady who we are not too familiar with in the southern part of the country, Doreen Charnock, snatched first place in a time of 29.56 seconds with her WSD Big Mac.  So there were at least five happy people and lots of 'if onlys' on this the first day of the City of Birmingham show and the sun was still shining.

Results
KC Olympia Large Dog Agility Semi Final 6

Day 2 Saturday
In the morning of the second day, we ran the Junior classes for the Young Kennel Club (YKC). They were competing for the City of Birmingham Dog of the Year trophy and qualification for Crufts which has been reported on separately. This was skilfully judged by Bill Glover and Lucy Smith the YKC manager was on hand to look after all the administration.

In the afternoon, we had two events qualifying for the Kennel Club Agility Stakes Finals at the Olympia Christmas Show -both were supported by Pedigree.

The first event of the afternoon was the final Semi-final for the Large dogs. As in the previous days, this is restricted to top grades of handlers and dogs only. As it was the last Semi-final, competition was going to be fierce.

There were only two eliminations in this round and eight clear rounds but I have to say, I felt really sorry for Mike Richardson. He had an elimination on the Friday and slept over in his van on the Friday night and had an absolutely wonderful run in the warm up event taking first place, Then he just made one small mistake in the Semi-final which turned into an elimination. He was going too fast. Otherwise, I'm sure he would have won it.

The first clear round we had was Tracey Stiff, running 4^th, in a time of 31.87 but she didn't stay there long as Lynne Ward, running next, clipped half a second off her time to take the lead. Lynne didn't stay there long because running next was Alan Bray who clipped another half second off her time and took the lead in 30.89.  One of my favourites ran at 11^th. Well, I should say one of my favourite dogs. Kathrin Tasker's Winsome Winnie, the Lurcher, went into third place with a clear in 31.38, but she was soon pushed down to 4th place when Lynne Ward ran her second dog at 14^th and went into second place in 31.07. So now Lynne had two dogs in the top five.

Running 16^th, Jo Tristram assured herself of another place at Olympia with her borrowed crossbreed Cascades Heavenly Promises.  It was a remarkable achievement for Jo as she had already qualified dogs for the Medium and Novice finals at Olympia this year. Lynne Ward was in the fortunate position of qualifying two dogs in the top five but. as handlers are only allowed to compete with one dog in each final, it meant that her highest placed dog would qualify. That was her young dog Waggerland Rookie. The very fortunate 6^th placed handler was Tracey Stiff who will be running at Olympia with her WSD Mr Scrumpy.

Results
KC Olympia Large Dog Agility Semi Final 7

No sooner than the dust had settled from the Large dog Semi final that we moved on to the Small dog Semi final. Once more handlers were desperate to qualify for Olympia. To do so, they had to go to the very stressful and expensive procedure of travelling to as many of the 11 heats as they could the aim being to be in the 1st or 2nd place to qualify for the Semi final. We had 22 competitors vying for one of the top ten places to qualify through to Olympia.

First to go was another one of my favourite dogs, Dawn Weaver's Papillon Tonring Just a Puzzle. Unfortunately he had 10 faults and would ultimately finish in 19^th place. Mandi-Sue Sarti running second went clear in 34.76 and went into the lead and would remain there until Zoe Councell and her cocker took the lead off her in 34.24.  Rrunning 8th with her Ag. Ch. poodle, Dawn put in a stunning round to take the lead in 32.27 not that she stayed there long because, running 12th, Wendy Clay and her collie X terrier Racing-redd Brussel Scout did a superb round in 31.719 to take the lead.

Bernadette Bay did her best to catch her running eighteenth with her Sheltie Ag.Ch. Obay Truly Wicked but would ultimately finish in 3^rd place on 32.66 seconds. Miranda Frankham cleverly handled both her Shelties to top ten places but, as always, the highest placed dog qualifies so that honour went to Chandling Black Chaser. This meant that the 11^th placed dog goes to Olympia and that was Amy Lawson's Sheltie Millie on to One.

The biggest disappointment of the Semi final was for Nicola Garrett. She suffered an elimination with her Sheltie Ag.Ch. Obay Truly Driven which is a great shame because, on past performance, she deserves to be in the final at Olympia as the dog has been so successful. But that is the way it goes in a semi final, and she won't be there this year in the Smalls. Well done to everyone who has qualified for Olympia this year.

Results
KC Olympia Small Dog Agility Semi Final

Day 3 Sunday
The final day at the City of Birmingham is always a little more relaxing having just two finals, but unfortunately this year it had the worst weather. The previous two days we'd had good weather and, quite unusually for us this year, we'd had two very nice warm evenings but the final day was to start foggy and damp and just get worse. As usual with all our finals and semi-finals, we had warm up events before each of the finals just to get everybody in to a competitive mood.

The first event of the day was the Pedigree Team Relay final. Eight teams competing with four dogs per team and as the name suggests there was a baton change between each dog culminating in a total faults and time for each team of four. The first team to go were the Cats Whiskers which was the team from Crayford Agility Training Society (CATS) and this consisted of the two Wards and the two Stiffs - or  perhaps I should say Lynne and John Ward and Tracey and Alan Stiff. Perhaps calling them the Stiffs doesn't sound too good! And it wasn't too good for them on the day with Tracey being eliminated and the others having faults as well which gave them a finishing result of 120 faults.

Second team up to the line were called 'Owt You Like' from the north of England. They had four steady rounds with a total of 10 faults but very slowly and although they took the lead they had 16.19 time faults. Third team in were from Scunthorpe OATC who would ultimately finish in second place. They took the lead with just 5 faults on the dog walk for Marilyn Murphy but a good time of 156.53. It was good to see Trevor Candy still running a GSD.

The fourth team in was the Worcester Warriors who would be out of the high places after Pam Cashmore suffered an elimination. Fifth team in were the usual suspects from Thames but all was not to go well with this team either, a good time of 127.78 but 10 faults for Dave Jolly and 5 faults for Jeff Holloway but good enough to ultimately take 3^rd place.

Running sixth were the Upanova up from Hampshire. Mark and Karen 'Jugs' Laker did two good clear rounds and Sue Rolfe had 5 faults but quite unusually Will Rolfe got himself eliminated so that put them out of the top places. Running seventh were the Phoenix Red team from Avon/Somerset area. A long journey for a disaster for them as two of their team suffered eliminations.

After the last team to run, we only had three teams without eliminations. Now it was the turn of the Blonde and Bold Wannabees up from the Oxford/Berks area. I don't know if they were blonde but they were certainly bold with three clear rounds and 5 faults from Natasha Wise, one of the most experienced members of the team in a brilliant time of 123.57 seconds. They snatched the lead off Scunthorpe. If you can snatch it by going 30 seconds faster!

Results
Pedigree Team Relay Final

Sunday afternoon was to see the final event at this year's City of Birmingham show – The Pedigree Pairs Relay final.  It was also to see the worst of the weather as it rained off and on all afternoon but well done to all the competitors who carried on running raining or not. As usual for the Pairs Relay final, it was a really good humoured event as well as being serious of course but it does lend itself to me to give more light hearted commentary.

With 24 pairs qualified from the 12 heats held throughout the country and some of top handlers involved it was always going to be a hard fought competition for the winning pair. As usual I am sure causes a little marital discord on the way home when one half of the pair gets faults and the other half goes clear!

The unlucky handlers to be drawn first were Helen and Andy Brown. They put in a cracking round to both go clear in a time of 56.43 - Helen working her WSD and Andy his usual BSD. They obviously went into first place, a position that they would hold until about halfway through the competition. Janet Thompson and Pat Brown came close running fifth with a time of 57.22 which put them into second place at that moment. Jackie Gardner and Marc Wingate-Wynn running eleventh had 5 faults in 57.51 and went into third place at that moment and then running twelfth Tom Hadaway with his WSD and Mark Douglas with his Ag.Ch. Kelpie knocked off almost 3 seconds off the current leaders time and went into the lead with a double clear in 53.25.

We would have to wait until the 19th runners to find anyone in contention and that was Dave Alderson and Clare Murray with their double clear round in 54.48 which put them into second place but not for long because, 20th was Nigel Staines with his young Kelpie and Ian Dobison with his Ag.Ch. WSD put in a double clear of 53.33 which was only 0.08 seconds behind the leader. It put them into second place and that is where they would stay at the end of the competition.

It was a great final and most importantly extremely good humoured and a fitting end to a very successful City of Birmingham show.

Results
Pedigree Pairs Relay Final

Thank you
Firstly, I would like to thank the Chairman and Committee of the City of Birmingham Canine Association on behalf of the Kennel Club, Pedigree and the agility competitors for allowing us to hold these very important agility events at their annual Championship show. I would also like to take this opportunity to thank our judge Bill Glover for all his hard work over the three days of the show and, of course, my ring party and stewards without which nothing would happen at all Thank your to Roger and Pauline Churchill, Pauline Barr, Rob Hunter, Elaine, Pia Glover, Pauline Fletcher and Shaun Young.

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