How did you train the weave poles?

How did you train the weave poles?

I may be getting a young Vizsla b*tch soon. I am debating the best method to use to train her to weave. I am definitely leaning towards WOM. I like that it encourages speed, but teaches the footwork of weaving early on, before the weaves are actually totally upright.

How did you train? What was good about the way you trained? Did you have any problems with that method?

What is WOM? I just now noticed the poll. What are those other methods? What do they mean?

I used treat lures and got the accuracy first. Then minimized the hand signal, (which naturally developed by luring) making it more subtle gradually. Then got him excited and increased speed, while tightening up the bend in his body.

WOM, or weave-o-matics, is a weave pole training method in which the poles are slanted into V's. They are similar to this: http://www.trainagility.com/Weaves.html You can either start the poles directly on the ground, or at a small angle from the ground. The dog then runs straight through the Ved poles. As the dog becomes more comfortable with the footwork of the weaving and still maintaining speed, you raise the poles into a smaller V until they are eventually upright, or vertical.

If you simply google "Channel Weaves" you will find tons of information. It is the new fad in weave pole training. It is very effective and dogs tend to do very well with it.

Oh yes....now I recognize that. I just didn't connect the terms. Well, yes...that does look like a good way. I just didn't do it that way because the trainer/class I went to didn't have that kind. Now, he's quite the speedy gonzalles going through the weaves. That's his 2nd favorite thing to do, after the tunnel....oh...and maybe the jumps. He does love to jump and goes over the jumps with gusto. LOL. He's gotten quite good at the weaves.

Good luck to you! It is a very fun sport, to be sure.

Sure is! It only took a very short while to get me addicted! I have now been training and trialing for seven years!

I used the WOM/Lure for Ripley, only took him a few days to get the idea of what he was supposed to do with them. Just grabbed a treat or toy, dangled it in front of him and lured him through. He caught on very quickly.
With my Border Collie I will use target training (he'll target my fist fairly well now.) to lure him through because when he's focused on a toy or treat he'll smash all that gets in his way.. He wouldn't even notice the weaves.

I didn't have any problems with the WOM. In fact the only problem we encountered with the weaves was due to a handler error, I didn't emphasize the importance of a correct entrance and we're still working on correcting that, since he tends to enter on either side when he's in a hurry.