Oh Funky Monkey!!

Although Caoilte had been a bit more boisterous at show and made occasional contact with my hand at the past couple of shows it was due to me using the wrong hand or being out of position. I thought we would work through it as in training she continued to be good. Nothing prepared me for the performance at Weardale show at the weekend. On the Saturday I was a bit tired and the show started later so walking dogs rings and doing runs was a bit hectic. I still made sure she got extra exercise before going into the ring. She started of with a jumping round, doing a lovely wait then every turn the old Monkey was back barking at me, jumping in front of me and looking at me but worst of all despite keeping my hand up and giving clear hand / arm signal reinforced with GO her mission seemed to be to get my hand. The higher I took my arm out of her reach the higher she jumped to grab me. I put her in a down calmed her down calmly and quietly tried to run again. Her behaviour continued. In hind site I should have put her in a down thanked the judge and calmly left the ring. However when in that situation it is very difficult to know what to do, especially when I was shocked at the old Monkey's return. I tried to be as helpful and consistent with her as possible. To no avail. I made sure we had one to one time tried to get rid of excess energy on the Saturday and Sunday morning. I put it down to being tired and was so looking forward to friends seeing the vast improvement in my wee lass. I could not have been more relaxed on the Sunday, prior to her first run we were sitting chatting at the champ ring she was curled up on my knee almost asleep. We stood in the queue I had her lead on one finger and expected nothing from her only hoped she would work with me. Again did a recall over the first jump, she took the lead over the long jump into the cloth tunnel, I command her to turn left then the demon appeared she jumped in front of me, then leaped jumping at my face whilst I froze. I had no idea what she wanted me to tell her I gave her as much help as my now shaking knees would allow, I had to try and keep my hands out of her reach. The judge was standing at the weave and I gave her her command she gave the judge a funny look and backed away a wee bit, I just repeated the command she did a nice 12 pole weave and tyre to finish came out the ring appeared to be the wee Monkey I love to bits. All the hard work I have put in over the last year was gone, we were back to square one. I was really upset and at a loss of what to do. She does not do it in training. The only thing I can think of is in training the jumps are wider apart than at shows and she has more space, when at shows my position could be wrong as I am used to the wider course and am not positioned where I would be If the jumps and distance between obstacles was the same as at a show. Her graded and combined classes are not straight up and down and there is an element of close work round the jumps needed, or directional change which she can do on a wider course cause I can not run very fast. On a standard course I my position is different perhaps she is confused. I am racking my brains to try and find the solution and can only hope we understand each other one day. As a dog trainer I have always been able to help solve others problems and don't have a problem within my own pack they all know and respect me as leader. But oh ma Monkey is testing me in the ring. I have a knowledge of psychology and using techniques are often useful and solve many a problem but this one has got me beat so far. But she is a joy to have and to run when we get it right so our learning curve continues. So will just have to stock up on the Kleenex again LOl