Laura Simonelli has been active in the sport of agility since 1998, initially competing with her 16” sheltie, Murray. Today, Laura competes with a papillon and a border collie mix. She has earned 16 MACHs, 2 PACHs and 3 C-ATCHs, and her Papillon, Astro, is the #10 MACH Papillon in the history of AKC.
She has competed in two AKC Nationals and two CPE Nationals, and has a notable array of accomplishments including:

*Joule went from Novice to MACH in 6 months
*Blast is consistently on Bad Dog Agility’s Power 60 list (a independent list of the fastest dogs in AKC agility)
*AKC Nationals in 2014: Blast won the challenger’s round and placed 5th overall
*CPE Nationals 2012: Astro was High in Standard and Blast was 3rd in Games
*CPE Nationals 2009: Joule was High in Standard and High in Games
*AKC Nationals in 2007: Astro made it to the Challenger’s round
*2008 #3 and #7 Papillons in AKC
*2008 #22 Dog out of all the breeds in AKC
*2007 #2 Papillon in AKC
*2007 #10 Dog out of all the breeds in AKC

Laura’s full time job is as a high school teacher, which allows her to explain techniques very clearly and in many different ways. She has trained dogs as small as a 4lb papillon to as large as a 120lb Mastiff. Laura has been training with Diane Bauman since 2011 and has learned invaluable dog training advice from her. Most recently she traveled to Finland to train with the One Mind dog trainers for an entire week and continues to work with OMD coaches.