Hannah Houldsworth



I started agility at Scunthorpe in September 2001 with Josh, a very fast and enthusiastic working sheepdog. Having never learnt the necessary handling skills, I spent the first season mainly running frantically behind him in the vain hope that he would listen to my erratic directions trying to steer him around the correct course.

After 2 seasons of “the fastest round but……” I decided to take advice from Greg and Laura Derrett. They taught me how to retrain Josh's jumping style to try to help him keep more poles up.

In the meantime I acquired my second working sheepdog Maddy. After the mistakes I had made with Josh, I was adamant that my next dog would have a good jump style and solid contacts and that I was going to handle in a controlled and consistent manner.

Maddy's initial training coincided with the time Bob started training with Greg. Maddy was trained in Greg's methods from the offset, proving his consistent methods really do work as she went from elementary to advanced in 18 months; Josh has also just achieved grade 6 status too. My latest agility dog is my parent's border terrier Poppy (Keepersdream Rambling Rose) who has just started her agility training.