The European Championships is always an exciting and exhilarating event in the agility calendar, whether you’re there to compete or spectate, its atmosphere is electric.
This year hundreds of top agility handlers and their dogs from all over Europe came together on 28th-31st July, after 2 years of cancelled competition to compete for the title of European Champions!
The build up to the competition this year was challenging, as James and his partner Lizzie welcomed their new baby boy on the 24th July … so it was touch and go if James and Willow would even make it out to Belgium in time! But luckily, with the help of their fellow team mates organising, and re-organising travel for them, they made it!
The pair took part in both the team and individual events this year. Unfortunately, making a few silly mistakes meaning they didn’t qualify for the individual final – however they did qualify as a team in overall 3rd place, putting them in the team final.
All the finals are run on the Sunday, and the build up is intense as all handlers and dogs have been training all year round for this opportunity.
Amazingly James’s team all performed perfectly, all four of them putting in foot/paw-perfect clear rounds (meaning not a single mistake from any of them!) Placing them in 2nd place overall.
Team GB have never won a medal with medium dogs, so this is an incredible achievement for everyone involved: James and Willow, his team mates and for Team GB.
As you can imagine, we’re all still on a high and celebrating their success! However, we’re now already on the count down to the World Championships in less than 5 weeks (September 2022) where again, Willow and James have been selected to run as part of the Team GB medium squad, and more impressively have been selected as one of only two medium partnerships to run in the individual event … no pressure James and Willow!
We’d like to thank @cotswoldRaw for their continued support. Willow’s health and diet plays a massive part of how well she performs at these events – she wouldn’t be there without you!
Fingers crossed for a successful few months ahead,
James, Willow and their ever growing family