Just got my obedience passes and they've put Ellie in Beginners and A!! I entered Beginners and Novice, at least I certainly meant to! I've emailed the secretary, but will I be able to move down to Novice if I go and explain when I arrive? I would love to do A because she can just about do scent and I'd love to see her have a go, but I know from experience that she doesn't do out of sight stays in a strange place, and there's no way she will do a 3 minute out of sight stay. Help!!

I've now had the reply back that I did accidentally enter A not Novice and I am not allowed to transfer. So now the question is, I thought you were supposed to enter the lowest 2 classes, so will it be ok that I have skipped a class? And also, I think in A you must not give extra commands or signals during heelwork, is that right??

KC obedience regs Annex A
3. A dog not qualified to enter Championship Class C must be entered in the
lowest Scheduled class for which it is eligible and may also be entered in another
standard class if desired plus one additional special class if scheduled.

Class A.
a. For dogs which have not won 3 First Prizes in Class A,
B and Open Class C in total.
b. Simultaneous command and signal will be permitted.
Extra commands or signals must be penalised.
c. The detailed tests will be:
(1) Heel free
(2) Recall from Sit or Down position at handler's
choice. Dog to be recalled to heel by handler,
on command of Judge or Steward, whilst handler
is walking away from dog, both to continue
forward until ordered to halt. The recall and halt
points to be the same for each dog and handler.
Test commences following handler's last
command to dog
(3) Retrieve a dumb-bell, handlers may use their
own dumb-bell
(4) Sit 2 minutes, handler in sight
(5) Down 3 minutes, handler out of sight
(6) Scent discrimination. The handler's scent on a
marked cloth supplied by the Judge. There must
be a total of 6 scent cloths, this total must not
include any decoys, but must include the cloth
provided by the judge. These 6 cloths must be set
out in a straight line, which may be in any
direction.

HTH :D

Thanks! So I've done it 'correctly' if not as intended, as I've entered Beginners which is the lowest class I am eligible for, and A. OK, we can do heel free though I expect I'll get some extra command penalisations as she isn't used to working without any extra. In rally they penalise extra commands but you can praise, so I can walk round saying 'good girl' every so often to keep her focussed, but I guess that would count as an extra command. A recall is ok though again we'll probably get penalised as she tends to arrive very fast with an excited bounce. Retrieve is ok bar losing marks for pouncing on the dumbbell, 2 minute sit should be ok, we usually just do 1 minute but can practice a couple of 2 minute ones. She may well be able to do 6 scent cloths, she's certianly done 4 or 5 correctly, hopefully they will let us practice that at club on Thursday as she hasn't done it for months, but was perfect then.... It's that out of sight stay - I can practice at home, but it's out in a strange place with strange dogs that she breaks as soon as I disappear. Oh well!

Hi

If it were me I would only do as much as my dog is confident in. 

You appear to have the basic skills but your dog sounds as though it is still at a stage where extra encouragement is required.

Much better to lose marks for praise or extra commands than to de-motivate your dog.

As for the out of sight stays, if you are not confident that she is ready you can simply not do them, I would advise the stay ring steward, or you should be able to scratch on the booking in sheet.

Hopefully you and your dog will have a long career ahead of you both and it is not worth risking for the sake of one class entered in error.

Enjoy

h

Well we only dabble, yes I agree I'd rather lose marks than have her not enjoy herself. I will tell the steward we haven't done out of sight stays much and ask to put her somewhere where she won't disturb other dogs if (when!) she doesn't stay. But I don't want to scratch - she won't care if we come last and it will be fun to try it!

You could always just train A.  Just ask the judge if that is OK.  Then you can take a toy in the ring and have some fun, as well as having a go at the exercises in class A.  Maybe even do a little bit of heelwork (I mean just a few paces) with no commands, then have a game, and then do a few more paces. 
Don't forget it's no extra commands in the retrieve as well, so just one command (command and hand signal allowed) to send your dog and then one command for the finish.  That means you have to decide to either look at your dog getting the article or looking at your dog in the present position, because you can't move your head!  The same with the 'A' recall, you can't look at your dog when you call it.

For stays, ask to do training stays.  You don't want her to fail them.  Just leave her at the edge of the ring, and maybe just go out of sight for 30 seconds.

Nah, training's fun in class, but no fun at a competition - we'll just say we've not done it before (might even own up to not having intended to enter it!) and take our lost marks with good spirit. She isn't into toys anyway. I don't usually look at her when I call her for A recall, but I will try hard to keep my head still as she arrives. Once I've sent her for the retrieve, I assume I can move hands and feet from heel position into present position? And is a 'wait' allowed before I throw the dumbell? Last time we tried out of sight at a show she did about 8 seconds, haha! I think we'll just do it as a bit of fun, so long as we don't disturb other dogs. Who knows, she might stay put!

In the retrieve you can move into a present position, while the dog is going to the article.  But you have to keep your hands and head still when she is returning to you.  Yep a wait command, send your dog and finish command (I think!)

I should say I'm not an expert!  I'm still at the bottom in pre-beginners, but I have watched others and learnt all about the other exercises.  If I start a round and it all goes horribly wrong I always change it to a training round.  Otherwise my dog just gets bored, and learns to do things wrong.  She is capable of winning, but I'm not lol

I don't think either of us is capable of working really high levels, we're both a bit slapdash and happy-go-lucky. Rally suits us much better! So she won't mind or learn the 'wrong way' or anything if we don't do it quite right, she won't be bothered at all. :-)

Good luck and have fun, remember to let us know how it goes :-D

Oh I will, you'll probably get a blow by blow account of the hilarious chaos that will be our round! :-p

Oh I could tell you plenty chaos stories :-D The boy I work now has taken a while to have the confidence to do stays but has been doing well since he settled. I can only do Novice and A at limited shows so I put him in A at the last show I went to, he won because he was the only one to get the scent exercise!!!

Don't raise my hopes!! I'm banking on there not being many toy dogs that work A and getting 5th of 5 or something like that. By the way, I'm not usually worried about which round I work first as Pre-B / Beg / Novice are so similar, but as I'm in Beginners and A, will it make any difference to my chances which one I do first? I would say Ellie is fairly bouncy and keen for the first round, then settles, then becomes a bit bored and starts lagging. I'd be inclined to try A first because if she starts lagging in Beginners at least I can try to gee her up a bit!

I always work the higher class first but it would depend on your dog

I think I'll try that as long as we aren't in the running order. :-)

> I think I'll try that as long as we aren't in the running order. :-)

Do they have a running order at UK Toy? I've never been before but I know limited shows don't always, and I assumed it didn't or it would've been in with the passes? (if drawn of course - but I have two dogs in four classes so would be lucky not to get a RO at all!)

I was wondering about that anyway, as I'm trying to work out how best to plan my day (breed class as well - and at the opposite end of the building!) - my plan was to work the first dog in the first class first thing, but if there is a RO that's not going to work :)

I was going to suggest training A also, but I have the same problem with my older boy - I cannot train in the ring because he won't go for toys in that kind of envionment. Sounds like you've got it sorted now though, so good luck!

Yes I'm pretty sure they have a running order and I didn't see any mention of me being in it on my pass, so I will just get in after the RO dogs. She did an out of stay at club last night and we've only been going there 2 weeks, so I can always hope! I'm just going to lose bags of marks on heelwork because it'll be a choice between extra commands / encouragement and her not keeping a very good position. Also after I've taken the dumbbell she anticipates the finish, I'll practise a couple without finishes this morning but chances are we'll be losing marks there too. Never mind! Good luck and come say hi - I'll be the one with the bouncy Cavalier! :-)

Well the girls did me proud today! Hetty passed her bronze with no trouble at all! And Ellie who as you know I had accidentally entered in A instead of Novice, excelled herself. She did a pretty good round except I had to give extra commands to sit after the heelwork and the recall, and they probably caught several semi-unintended signals on turns etc. But her retrieve was great, she didn't anticipate the finish, and although overall we were 5th of 5 going into stays, she'd done the retrieve better than some of the others, and worked as well as could be expected at her level. I was thrilled and so proud of her when she did the 2 minute sit and 3 minute OUT OF SIGHT down flawlessly, after all she really doesn't like me doing out of sight stays and nearly already breaks them! One of the other dogs broke both stays and that put us ahead of them!! She had an epic fail on scent which after all she hasn't done since last year and brought me the wrong cloth back, but 2 others failed completely and 1 needed a lot of help and encouragement, so possibly the floor or general area was making things harder than expected. So we came 4th of 5 which considering we hadn't meant to enter at all, was pretty impressive. And she also did Beginners, put in another pretty good round and clear stays, and came 4th of 8. So a successful day over all. It was also nice to meet a couple of the people who have helped with advice on here! Looking forward to tomorrow when we have a rally trial!!

Well done Lucy!!!!

Well done!! Look forward to hearing about the Rally Trial :D

Rally trial was very good thanks - Hetty was rather bouncy but still got 191 in Pink (the novice and puppy level) and 194 in Bronze of a possible 210. Ellie was very good in Bronze getting 206, and pretty good in Silver, which is offlead - she went off course twice trying to add in an extra go over the little jump, so she got 196, but I can't be cross that she lost marks for enjoying herself! Next weekend is a rare non-doggy one, then another trial the weekend after, at which Ellie will hopefully gain her Level 1 'title' and be halfway towards her Level 1 Championship.

Sounds like a good day. I'm hoping to get to a rally trial at Blackpool in July

Excellent - an APDT one presumably? So far all of theirs have been too far for me, so I'm doing Talking Dogs rally and Pet Dog rally obedience. :-)

great news well done xx

That's fantastic - well done :)