Last lesson; Walter's startline stay

Today was Walter's last lesson for a while, probably a very long while as my spending has to be reigned in for the foreseeable future. I think his alltime favourite motivators in agility are his squeaky toys. I can fit one of them in my pocket and make it squeak out of sight while walking to the starting point which really gets him into excited/happy mode. The squeaky toys made him happy enough to successfully complete the 6-weaves several times today even in the tight quarters of the facility.

Note for my records re his SLS: In all of this session and last fall's session of lessons I've been leading out on Walter for all exercises that called for it. Every single time he barked, fussed, barked, scooted, and oh yeah did I mention he barked, but 90% of the time he didn't take the first obstacle until released. 10% of the time he broke it right away and got reset. I think I'll try leading out on him at some fun matches this year just for the fun of it. As much as I don't mind running off the start with him in trials, it would be nice to be able to lead out once in a while when it provides a significant benefit on the course at hand.

Lesson: Distance Challenge

As on Lucy's lesson on Thursday, we worked on the first several exercises of the Distance Challenge in the Jan 2008 Clean Run, using the easier blue line. Like Lucy, the exercise in Figure 2 wasn't a problem. And, like with Lucy, in Figure 3 again I had trouble with the flip/rear cross from 2 to 3, and AGAIN desperately threw up both hands to send him to the tunnel. When in doubt, why use only one arm when two are available? :^) We skipped the Figure 4 exercise; darn, I had been looking forward to comparing his out from 3 to 4 with Lucy's, oh well. The Figure 5 exercise went much more smoothly than with Lucy -- specifically the flip/rear cross from 3 to 4. Next was the Figure 6 exercise in which Walter kept going to the tunnel instead of the #3 jump since I couldn't get my arms figured out. Last we did a modified Figure 6, which was jump #5, #2, #3, then the tunnel and the tunnel straight out from the jump. He did pretty well at this one and I was able to layer the last jump from the far side of the #5 jump which I'm quite sure I wouldn't be able to do with Lucy at this point.

It was a fun lesson!

Lesson; Walter in good mood

Took Walter for a 30-minute walk at the dog park before today's lesson and he was much more attentive at today's lesson than at the previous one where he had had no exercise beforehand.

Today we worked on serpentine and threadle stuff and he was happy to play today, even caught me off guard a few times by paying attention to me where I wasn't expecting him to. We seem to be getting the hang of running serps with the one arm waving in and out method.

Homework: work on the "finish right" exercise (see Lucy's blog entry from Thursday) working up to about 5 feet distance and the dog driving around.

Lesson

Walter and I both were suffering from "Christmas brain" at today's class where we worked on a tunnel/jump/weave sequence. He just didn't seem into it today. He kept popping the weaves around pole 9 and the instructor noticed that he was breaking his footwork, so going back for a refresher in the wams will be a good idea. I need to do some work in teaching him to collect over jumps because he's a long jumper. Also we worked on shaping lines to weave entrances.

Morning Star trial

Today I learned that I'm not one of those people (if there are such people) who love to flit back and forth between rings and dogs, trying not to miss walkthroughs and runs. Our morning was fine, but in the afternoon it got pretty hairy and for one of the courses I only had time to walkthrough - make that run through - once before having to run and grab a dog for another class. Also it was a long day that started too early and ended too late. Agility is not as fun when one is pooped out.

Advanced Team
Walter and his nice little JRT partner ran clean to clinch Walter's Advanced Games title! Also, it means that Walter Q'd in every Advanced Games course he ran. How, then, is it that it took us nine tries before he got his first Advanced Standard Q. :-)

Advanced Standard #1
The good news is he didn't fall for two potential contact traps that I was a bit apprehensive about. But, he got distracted for a moment and missed an easy tunnel entrance. Also, he hopped off the table before lying down.

Masters Snooker
This was his first event in the other ring so this is where it started to get hairy running in the different rings. I had designed a terribly nonflowing course for him which neither of us appreciated. It wasn't very fun and we got whistled off after the fourth red when he took another red. Frankly I was happy to be done with it and get back to the other ring so as not to miss his other run, Advanced Standard #2.

Advanced Standard #2
This is the course I had only had time to run through once. Strangely enough we ran it clean for a Q! It was a decent run unlike his first Advanced Standard Q which he got due to a fluke. So it took him nine tries to get his first Advanced Standard Q and four tries to get his second. It would be nice if this downward trend were to continue, but I won't be holding my breath. :-)

Steeplechase
Completely spur of the moment, I led out on him for the first time ever in a trial to help him get a tunnel/frame discrimination. Lo and behold, he held his sit-stay! Barked his high-pitched girly bark like the dickens, but held his stay. The run was slow overall and distracted at one point. It was a really technical Steeplechase and getting late in the day so we were both getting tired I think. He did get some nice lines though including a challenging weave entry.

Masters Jumpers
Last class of the day so I was feeling a bit energized. Walter was attentive and responsive and would have been clean except for succumbing to a chute trap.

In summary, it wasn't his Qyist trial, but he was 100% for all weaves and held 2o2o on all teeters and dogwalks.

Stats
Classes entered: 6 (Advanced Team, Advanced Standard 1 and 2, Masters Snooker, Steeplechase, Masters Jumpers)
Qs: 2 (Team and Standard)
Time/SCT: 57.73/71 (Adv Standard #2)
YPS: 3.0 (Adv Standard #2)
Title earned: Special Advanced Games Dog of Canada (SAGDC)

Home practice: weave entries and "out"

Wrap entries
Now that Lucy has learned the wrap entry I'm motivated to get back to Walter's entries, starting with the wrap. He did well today on the 3-weaves at a gentle 6 o'clock entry. I have to keep his weave practices really short because unlike Lucy his enthusiasm for the weaves fades quickly with repetitions.

"Out"
Taking advantage of having a couple of jumps in the house for a week. Put one jump out and patterned him into taking it while I stood off to the side. Then put a second jump next to the first and continued to ask for the out jump. Also asked him to take the closer jump a few times and he didn't seem to have any problems with any of this today.

Walter's agility goals

I'm not one for New Years resolutions, but I do like to review goals and set new ones, so here goes.

These are the goals I had set for Walter's 2007 agility year, along with a progress report:

Improved drive on the a-frame
I think I forgot about this one, especially after seeing on video the impact of 2o2o on his front end. Will be taking time off of trialing this summer to try to train an actual running contact.

Work through start line stay issues
Done, sort of. At the time I thought it was essential to have a SLS before starting to trial. While a SLS is undeniably a great tool in the toolbox, it's not necessary if you can run and keep up with your non-super-speedy dog. Haven't yet tried to lead out on him in a trial, but running off the line with him hasn't been a problem for the most part. Plus it has the added benefit of making me get more of a cardio workout. :-D

Improved distance work with all obstacles
Not sure what to report with this one since I can't remember specifically training for this lately.

Faster down on the table
Once I found out that the table becomes essentially extinct once you reach Masters, I kind of threw this one out the window :-) That said, I've noticed lately that after he hops onto a new table he likes to take some time to inspect it before lying down.

Proof 2o2o
Stopped requiring 2o2o on the frame early in the fall but still require it on the dogwalk and teeter. He's never missed a contact but occasionally doesn't hold 2o2o. Lots more proofing needed.

Ability to tackle challenging weave entries
Well, Lucy is leaving him in the dust on this one. Haven't done much work on this I'm afraid.

Further develop our agility partnership in general
Well, that's a vague goal if ever there was one.

Compete!
Done! He earned his SADC and SSGDC this year.

Goals for 2008!

- Add tunnel/contact discriminations to skill set
- Add "out" to skill set
- Add hard and soft weave entries to skill set
- Improve distance skills and have a try at Masters Gamblers
- Take time off trialing this summer to train a running frame
- Achieve fully independent contacts
- It'd be awfully nice to get two more Advanced Standard Qs for his SAADC. Took nine tries to get his first one; I wonder how many more tries we'll need to get two more. :-D

Walter's agility year in summary

2007 saw Walter's and my first trial in March. He sailed through Starters and the Advanced Games, but Advanced Standard is definitely keeping us in check and making sure we're good and prepared before letting us get to Masters. ;-) Looking forward to next year's agility adventures and hopefully filling in some of the gaps in our skills set.

Lesson

We worked a very tight and technical sequence, forwards and later on backwards. Poor Walter was getting discouraged (and my clumsy handling was of no help) and started second guessing himself. Weaves-wise, he had no trouble with them running the course forward, but the backward version had the weaves after a tunnel and he kept entering at pole 2 even when I stayed way back and sent him ahead to them.

Also, I asked the instructor how she handles threadles; she does use the false turn for those.

Lesson

Today was a brain-intensive lesson for Walter and for me. Also, something new, Walter was rewarded 90% with a tug toy and loved it. It's so nice to have a dog who naturally loves to tug. We worked on a bunch of things:

Get out
Using a c-shaped tunnel, standing at the bottom and getting him to go past the first entrance to the second. Didn't go too smoothly as he kept wanting to take the first entrance so we had to block it until he was patterned into taking the second.

Serpentine
Walter and I have always done serpentines using the false turn method, but the instructor (new to Walter and me since only a couple of months) had us try something different: using only one arm, held kind of back and low, and moving only slightly in and out. After several tries we started to get the hang of it. It was especially hard for me to get the timing right. Then, she substituted one of the jumps for the tire (all set at 16"). He needed a bit of a chance to get used to the idea of slicing a tire since it's not something we've practiced. Oh, and she noted I tend to drift farther and farther from the jumps as I run down the serp, rather than staying in nice and close. Driving home afterward I started to wonder how threadles are handled using this approach instead of false turns. I'll ask next time.

Left and right
Walter mostly knows (not 100% accurate yet though) left and right but I've only really used it as a trick for a spin in front of me and a bit in skijoring. So it was fun to apply it to agility and see him think through it. Did various jump combinations using left and right.

Go over
Worked a bit on a simple two-jump send. Haven't practiced this much lately so it was helpful for the instructor to throw his toy ahead (my aim was pretty lousy).

Weaves
One of the sequences we worked on used a soft side entry to the 6-weaves with me standing around pole 3. He entered at the second pole every time. He sent ahead to it fine, but if I was standing "too far" ahead, ie in the position required of the sequence, he missed it. Clearly we need to refresh our weaves with me being around the clock.