Crufts, here we go!

After battling with an injury for the past 5 months, today is a special day. We have been given the go ahead from Manouk’s orthopaedist, Scott Rigg from Bridge Vets in Aberdeen, to compete in the agility championship at Crufts on Sunday!

This has been a long but interesting journey and I have learnt a lot, especially in how patient we have to be to rehabilitate an injured sport dog. The rehabilitation included a cross discipline program, with lead walks, canine massage therapy, core stability exercises, physiotherapy and hydrotherapy, with Scott regularly assessing the progress. In fact we have done barely any agility.

So that’s it then, I now have 4 days to remind myself how to run an agility course. This is definitely a scary thought! And unless something unexpected happens, in 5 days we should be heading to the arena. A dream come true, an even more special dream after having to fight so many odds this past few months.

Scott, thank you for your patience and support in getting Manouk back on track, I realise the journey with Manouk’s rehabilitation is not over but we would not have been where we are today without you. I really appreciate how available you have been for us (in addition to your expertise of course!) despite the busy schedule of your clinic.

Finally, good luck to all my friends participating to Crufts, especially my Scottish fellow competitors. Even if I have a weird accent, I am a Scottish agilitist after all and proud to be!

 

PS: Some of you asked if it was possible to watch Crufts online. There is an official YouTube Crufts channel and in the past year there have been a good coverage of the main arena. If you have time, I would advise you to watch the international agility which is held on the Saturday and support our Scottish Agility Dog of the year (2014) team Alan Short & Bruce. There will be 3 rounds, 2 qualifying rounds and one final round, running respectively at: 11:30: qualifying jumping round; 14:00: qualifying agility round; 17:10: final

The championship agility is held on the Sunday: 09:00: qualifying jumping round; 11:00: qualifying agility round; 16:55: final