Thousands of people turned out over the weekend as Suffolk hosted a highly successful National Police Dog Trials.

The trials were held from April 16-17 in Trinity Park, Ipswich, and saw around 10,000 people turn up to get a glimpse at the country’s police dog units.

Normally performed just for the police force this is the first year the event has been held primarily for the public.

Sergeant Mick Hart from Suffolk’s dog section said: “The support has been fantastic.

“This used to be more trials for police and not the public but we made the decision that people care about what we do so we made it a public event.

“There have been events open to the public before but this will be the first one to hold a big public stand alone event.”

Suffolk was represented at the trials by PC Nick Self and his dog Lincoln who came first in the eastern region trials and PC Tony Russell who was with his dog Yogi who came fourth in the trials.

Essex police were also represented by PC Paul Arthey with his dog Gunner and PC Mick Pickard with his dog Clyde.

In preparation for the trials Suffolk Constabulary also teamed up with three Suffolk charities to raise money for them which were The Blue Cross’ ‘Complete the Dream’ appeal, The EACH Treehouse Appeal and the Safer Suffolk Foundation.

Sgt Hart said: “Everything over this weekend has been over and above what we expected so we hope the charities will also have some success.”

The 22 competitors at this year’s event had to go through three phases over three days which included tracking, person search, weapon attack, obedience and crowd control.

PC Self and Lincoln came in fourth place out of 22 competitors at the end of the trials.

Sergeant Paul Glennon with his dog Spud from Devon and Cornwall came in first place.