Agility for the pre-school generation

When the alarm clock went off Soraya Porter could hear the rain drumming on the roof. Her heart sank. Channel 5 was supposed to be coming to Colchester to film an short piece on agility for Milkshake, a program for very young children. The theme of this particular segment was to be sport - what you can do with animals. What a day for filming!

Needless to say, the rain had not let up by the time I climbed into my car to drive to the clubs training ground. As we train outside all the year round, there was no indoor option! 

On arrival at the clubhouse, the sky was looking brighter. While we waited for the film crew to arrive, we set up the course. The plan was  to set up a straight up and down course, to include all the equipment - except the floppy tunnel – it was too wet for that - for the three Milkshake presenters to run the dogs round.

Originally they had wanted to run their own dogs, but when their researcher visited the club a few weeks earlier, she quickly realised that this was something that required the dogs to have had some training! Plan B was that each of the presenters would run one of the club member's dogs. The TV company specified they would like three different sized dogs, who all looked different. They did not want the usual  black and white collies, but more like the crossbreeds the viewers might have at home, so that they could catch the children's attention.

Which dogs?
This required a bit of thinking about. The dogs needed to be happy to run with a relative stranger, and they needed to be experienced enough in their training to be able to negotiate the course almost in spite of their handler. Also we did not want to use a dog in the middle of the competition season, who might have their contacts etc. messed up by an inexperienced handler.

So after much thought, three guinea pigs - sorry dogs - were chosen. Representing the club were the following:-

Small dogs - my own hairy monster Ernie Medium dogs - Maureen Goodchild's gentle natured Lulu, a poodle X collie Large dogs - Ros Fairchild's lovely Gelert, a German Shepherd X.

The day before the filming I had had to nip out from work to the fabric shop to buy three pieces of brightly coloured cotton in red, green and blue. This was to make some coloured bandannas for the dogs, and an armband for each of the presenters, to turn them into three teams.

The three female presenters Naomi, Kemi and Beth arrived, dressed in bright waterproof coats. We were all amazed at their Technicolor wellies! They were astounding! You’ll have to look at the photos to see what I mean. All the presenters were all young and confident and made me feel 'ancient, ' especially as I was wearing my jacket, the one with the fashionable coating of mud. Coupled with my ‘wreck of the Hesperus’ hairstyle, I was even more glad that it was only Ernie, not me, who was going to be in front of the cameras!

Finally the rain seemed to break for a cuppa, so filming started in earnest. Lu sported her red bandanna, Gelert his green and Ernie a royal blue.

Before any of the presenters ran, they got our youngest club member, Becky (11) to run with her handsome black and white collie Zac. She was wired for sound with a small microphone to catch her commands to Zac as she ran. They completed the course in textbook fashion, making the whole thing look easy. Becky’s grin was easy to see even from a distance. The pair of them looked like old hands at ‘this television lark.’ Colchester DAC is very proud of them.

The dogs were the stars
First up was Lu. She amazed everyone as she joined in when the presenter virtually danced around her to parade her for the camera. She really rose to the occasion, and brought a lump to the throat with her efforts to get everything right. She and her handler Naomi set off at  determined speed and continued on that way. You would never believe that this was the first time that Naomi had ever run a dog in agility. She was a natural. They shot round the course in fine form - no mistakes and plenty of style.

Next was Kemi with Gelert who was suitably dignified as the gentleman of the proceedings. He took a real liking to Kemi and worked very well for her after a quick check that his mum hadn't completely abandoned him! He looked very dapper in his green bandanna and went round the course with a big doggy grin on his face.

Finally it was Ernie’s turn with Beth. I felt quite sorry for Beth as Ernie had decided it might be a competition, so was in perpetual motion. However, our secret weapon was liver cake. As soon as he realised Beth has wonderful liver cake, his eyes never moved from her hand. The pair of them completed most of the course at a very respectable turn of speed. The only hiccup was right on the last obstacle when Beth tried to point Ernie through the tyre rather than run with him. Ernie wasn't going anywhere  without the liver cake and watched her hand as it flicked towards the tyre and back. However, after a couple of flicks he got the idea and legged it through the tyre, and back through again for good measure!

Lu and Naomi were the victors, and they were presented with a red rosette. Lu took it all very seriously and posed carefully for the camera.

After this, we had a quick break for a cuppa, and then it was back outside in the renewed rain for Ernie to pose while the three girls sang a song. At least that was the idea. Ernie tried to tell them he wasn't into posing. He saw himself more as an Action Man!

Still, as the rain set in, we were finished in record time.

The whole crew from Channel 5 were great. In spite of the rain and wind, we all really enjoyed ourselves, and can’t wait to see the end result. We know that we are only a small part of a longer programme, but hopefully we helped to promote dog agility a little more, and that it is a sport anyone can have a go at and really have fun.

This episode of Milkshake is due to be shown early in the new year.

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