Agility Finkie!

Finkie_Mom

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#23
Woah, been a month since I've updated this!

She's still a bit stressy, but nowhere near where she was. So we've been doing tons of small exercises at home, lots of recall games in fields, and keeping up with crate games.

I finally managed to get my husband to come out to class with me, so he shot some video. There were people standing in his way for one of them, but here is one full course - actually, the first video I have of her running a full course!

This was our last run of the day, and it was HOT in that barn so she was tired. Here ya go!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2e20amyiBpk

I only lose her once and she came back (I think she was distracted by my husband standing there LOL). We also had a bad serpentine in the run before this one that I, of course, went right home and tried with her and she did it perfectly. Grrrr :p
www.youtube.com/watch?v=OnU60bLygfg
 

Finkie_Mom

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#24
GAH. If it's not one thing, it's another. Now she doesn't like the chute (though she never REALLY liked it) and her weave entries are yuck. Of course, when they are practiced, she nails every weave entry all on her own. But here, it's a no-go. And I have nowhere to practice safely off leash, except for the rare fun run I'm able to go to (our second of which is this Friday :eek:).

Anyway, here's that annoying run (the first two jumps are cut off from the beginning, but she nails all the crosses wonderfully!):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V2kxIIEFuso

Here's the run before that, which went just fine except for small errors on my part and her lack of excitement for tunnels:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E5BHPrD6eaE
 

Finkie_Mom

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#25
I haven't updated this thing in FOREVER. But I did want to mention our AWESOME news! (I put this on the Agility Classes thread in the Training section already)

We had our first AKC trial last weekend, and we came away with 2 Qs in jumpers, 2 Qs in standard, and 4 first places!!! We had a perfect weekend!!! I'm still excited about it, days later LOL.

Rather than typing everything out here, I figured I would just link to my blog as I broke down how things went. I also have a video from class last night on there, too! No videos of the actual trial, but next time (beginning of November) I can hopefully get some :)

http://www.loistavakennels.com/1/post/2012/10/our-first-akc-agility-trial.html
 
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#26
You did great at your trial, congratulations. Loved watching all your videos. I am starting my 9 month old Shih Tzu x Maltese in Beginners Agility this coming Saturday, no weaves or jumps and I am looking forward to it. I never got the chance with Remmy, just trained him more or less on my own and he has done well but could probably have been better if he had had the foundation training. The videos sure help as you can look back and see what you have done wrong. I also have Remmy in an Advanced Class as I need more work on my handling even though he is in Masters in almost everything.
 

Finkie_Mom

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#27
Thank you!!! That's the idea behind why I post videos and such. I want to help others to NOT make the same mistakes that I have made LOL. I've never even owned a dog before Kimma, let alone knew what agility was hahaha. So if someone would have told me that I would be competing in anything dog-related 2 years ago, I would have laughed at them LOL.

It's been an interesting process, and what has made it even more so has been the fact that SO many people really and truly think that Finnish Spitz are "untrainable." I'm hoping to show that that is totally not true, not only with Kimma and agility, but also with my other two and what I hope to accomplish with them :)

I definitely missed out on a lot of foundation work, as I had no idea what it was LOL. So I went backwards after starting agility classes to focus more on that (we took a 6 month break from classes just to work specifically on recall and foundation/handling stuff). I wish I knew all of that stuff when Kimma was a puppy, but now I know what I would try differently with other dogs (young and older). I'm glad that you are getting something out of those videos - some of the mistakes I make are PRETTY obvious hahaha. Which is part of the reason I like to get video of myself as often as possible :p
 
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#28
http://youtu.be/T1Mg6LbPZjw

Someone at the trial took this video of Remmy in Masters Gamblers. He tends to make his own course but that is mostly my bad handling. If he had stayed with me after the whistle blew, he would have Q'd as he just missed as the teeter was the last obstacle. He took the jump, teeter and tunnel instead of me directing him to the dog walk after the whistle as that, the tunnel and teeter were the closing obstacles.
 

MandyPug

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#29
Thank you!!! That's the idea behind why I post videos and such. I want to help others to NOT make the same mistakes that I have made LOL. I've never even owned a dog before Kimma, let alone knew what agility was hahaha. So if someone would have told me that I would be competing in anything dog-related 2 years ago, I would have laughed at them LOL.

It's been an interesting process, and what has made it even more so has been the fact that SO many people really and truly think that Finnish Spitz are "untrainable." I'm hoping to show that that is totally not true, not only with Kimma and agility, but also with my other two and what I hope to accomplish with them :)

I definitely missed out on a lot of foundation work, as I had no idea what it was LOL. So I went backwards after starting agility classes to focus more on that (we took a 6 month break from classes just to work specifically on recall and foundation/handling stuff). I wish I knew all of that stuff when Kimma was a puppy, but now I know what I would try differently with other dogs (young and older). I'm glad that you are getting something out of those videos - some of the mistakes I make are PRETTY obvious hahaha. Which is part of the reason I like to get video of myself as often as possible :p
If someone told me I'd be competing in Agility a few years ago I would have laughed at them too! But now I wish I knew i wanted to do it when Izzie was young and there would have been a lot of things different.

At least I have an awesome club and got with them mostly from the start (started out somewhere else that was horrible) and got a good set of foundation work and brought Izzie back from shut down.

I was also told that I could never be successful at agility with a Pug, that she'd be too slow and not athletic enough. But funny thing is that in a year she's in all masters except for one gamble Q needed for advanced and has more Qs than both the dogs that person has and has masters Qs too. So yeah, show them that finkies can do it too!
 

Finkie_Mom

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#30
http://youtu.be/T1Mg6LbPZjw

Someone at the trial took this video of Remmy in Masters Gamblers. He tends to make his own course but that is mostly my bad handling. If he had stayed with me after the whistle blew, he would have Q'd as he just missed as the teeter was the last obstacle. He took the jump, teeter and tunnel instead of me directing him to the dog walk after the whistle as that, the tunnel and teeter were the closing obstacles.
Awww bummer that he got so close!!! It's OK - I learned pretty early on that it's pretty much always our fault if our dog messes up hahaha. I love seeing how things I do while running courses can really affect exactly what Kimma does.

If someone told me I'd be competing in Agility a few years ago I would have laughed at them too! But now I wish I knew i wanted to do it when Izzie was young and there would have been a lot of things different.

At least I have an awesome club and got with them mostly from the start (started out somewhere else that was horrible) and got a good set of foundation work and brought Izzie back from shut down.

I was also told that I could never be successful at agility with a Pug, that she'd be too slow and not athletic enough. But funny thing is that in a year she's in all masters except for one gamble Q needed for advanced and has more Qs than both the dogs that person has and has masters Qs too. So yeah, show them that finkies can do it too!
OMG I totally love my club. I really do. I was so worried when I had to find a new place up here (we were in TX when Kimma and I first started agility), but I just think everyone there is so great and supportive. And fun LOL.

See, I can TOTALLY get doing agility with a Pug!!! It's funny because just getting a CGC on a Finkies is like a HUGE deal! Izzie and Kimma will show all of those naysayers :p

Just for a fun fact, there has NEVER been a Finnish Spitz to get a MACH, only one to get to Utility in Obedience, and one to get an RAE. There is also only one so far to get the new Therapy Dog AKC title. So yeah. I have a lot of lofty goals for all of my dogs :p
 

Finkie_Mom

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#31
Got our NAJ title today! We've had a perfect go at JWW so far - 3 Qs and 3 first places in 3 runs!!! Standard we had an NQ (our first!!!), but we'll try again tomorrow!



But now we are in Open JWW starting tomorrow. I'm scared :p
 

Finkie_Mom

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#34
Thanks, guys!!! A couple of close Qs today, and in both runs, it was my fault we missed them. So I will take it! She was AWESOME and followed me very well. Our next trial isn't for a month, so we have time to fix some things before that :)
 

Finkie_Mom

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#36
Thanks!! Yeah, I'm luckily developing a nice collection of large ribbons! It also helps that Bubbles is usually the only Finkie at conformation shows around here so all of her BOB ribbons tend to be large :p
 

Finkie_Mom

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#37
Well we had a wonderful weekend! Got our NA title on Saturday with a first place, followed by our first Open JWW Q on Sunday with a second place. She did so well. The NQs were totally my fault (with the exception of this weird weave thing we've got going on - will start working on that ASAP), so I'm over the moon with our progress right now.

Here's our Open run from Sunday:
[YOUTUBE]QvXwasyxKoo[/YOUTUBE]

And of course a picture of my girl and her ribbons:
 

Finkie_Mom

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#38
Today we managed to get our OA title with a first place run. We also got our second Open JWW leg with a first place. She was still slower than in class, but the weave entries were there and she was pretty happy! Looking forward to Excellent! ...Sort of... :p

 

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