Lilly

Our Journey to Crufts!

Lilly is my youngest English shepherd. From the moment I brought her into my home, she has been an absolute angel. She has the sweetest temperament and is a complete joy to own.

However…

In terms of a sport dog, she has been a challenge. Initially she had no interest in retrieving, or toys in general, (unless one of her siblings wanted it). Having worked on this for a couple of years she is finally happy to retrieve a food containing toy and return it to me to seek her reward.

I have spent the last 3 years gently training her for the world of agility. A dog sport that involves the dogs taking obstacles such as jumps, tunnels, and large pieces of equipment requiring the dog to move along it, making contact with certain areas to ensure that no penalties are incurred. The competition is timed and faults allocated for certain mistakes. I could spend all day explaining the rules, but I won’t. Instead I will explain things as I go along. Lilly is a sensitive soul, and so requires really careful handling, and taking things slowly so that she never fails.

I feel that her training now is at the stage where she can start to compete competitively, I have entered her into the Crufts Novice ABC stakes, this is a class at a show, which if she gets placed, will push her into a semi final. This semi final will ultimately lead to her competing on the green carpet at Crufts next year if she does well. For those that do not know Crufts is a competition, that takes place in Birmingham at the NEC. It is the largest competition and dog show in the UK.

Therefore I thought that I would Blog our preparations from here, with the hope that we make it all the way. I hope that you will join us for the ride…