Agility training

[Shai]

I could probably handle Mira on most courses without a startline stay if I had to, but not without making handling sacrifices I'd much rather not. There are good reasons most of the very top teams have the ability to lead out in some fashion or another. Not that I am counting us among that company!

I like my leadouts when the course calls for them I very very rarely start with her...My starting position tells her where we are going right off the bat and unless the first obstacle is a 180° tunnel, where I am away from her and where I am facing adds value.

But then I turn around and run the same course with Webster on the same day and use little/no leadout lol. Whatever works for the dog at hand.

[Laurelin]

It makes a big difference that my dogs are so little. Mia is fast but she's tiny. Anyways I definitely like having a startline with summer. But not pushing so hard for one works better with Mia. I agree. Different dogs.

[phugiathinh102]

up cho ai quan tam

[SaraB]

Count me in on one of those that very rarely starts with my dog. With Zuma, I'm going to take whatever chance I can to get ahead of her. There has been a course or two in the past where starting with her was the best option, so we adapted to that.

Zinga does a lot of restrained starts right now just because she's a baby dog that is just learning agility. She finds them fun and so do I. However, that doesn't mean I'm not teaching a start line stay either (her's is actually excellent, thanks to Crate Games!!), because I'm sure I'll have to utilize it a lot when she starts to trial.

[Aleron]

Originally Posted by Laurelin

You need to clone me a Savvy. Speaking of, we haven't seen pictures of the ScruffMutt in a while.

Here he is with his blue and Q ribbons from the CPE trial a couple weeks ago:

[Laurelin]

Awww! He's almost looking smooth now!

Congrats on the Qs.

[Aleron]

Originally Posted by Laurelin

Awww! He's almost looking smooth now!

Congrats on the Qs.

His coat changes quite a bit throughout the year. He gets darker, lighter, more scruffy, less scruffy. Never really know what he'll look like in a few months!

Thanks! He's a good boy. Very wild and I have to stop trying to run him like Whim but he sure does have a good time. I'll have to try to get some of his runs up on Youtube.

[Laurelin]

too funny about his coat. He just wants to please everyone. He's too cute.

So last week I was all 'Yeah agility! Yeah trial in June!' What do they say? Two steps forward, one step back? Today was definitely the 'one step back'.

I am actually pretty sure Mia's not feeling well. We're back home and she just trotted in and curled up and went to sleep. Very not like her. She wasn't putting on the guns like usual. Not slow just not... Mia speed. It was subtle because I was the only one that noticed, but I definitely noticed. Very distracted all day.

Of course we had one really obnoxious thing happen. some lady with a white pit bull pulled up. No flipping idea who she was. No one in our group had seen her. She let her dog loose in the off leash field. It's free use for students but it backs up to the agility rings. Most people are smart about the use. A terv was running around in there earlier. But she ran that dog right along the fence line and the dog started fence fighting. Yes, ideally Mia should work through a fence fighting strange pit bull running up and down about 10 feet away from where we were working but it was just too much. And the lady didn't seem to get it either! Very frustrating.

Anyways, Mia improved towards the end of class.

Summer actually did superbly. That dog is getting fearless. She is SO good and wanting to please me.

[Panzerotti]

Yesterday me and 2 friends packed up our dogs and drove 8 hours total to go for 2 hours of shared private lessons. Our indoor training facility is really small and this winter has been really long, so we wanted to have a chance to run our dogs in a big arena. It was soooo much fun!

I have to start traveling more often because handling at speed is completely different, lol! I feel like we have more untapped speed as well which will come out once we get our communication down pat and she's confident about where I'm sending her. Also, in this vid, the sequences where she's a bit slower is because she got obsessed with the ceiling for some reason, the weirdo.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GqUMlCgZl2k

[Laurelin]

So I'm having some concerns with Summer. She was panting heavily today. It was hot but not that hot (around 80 F but bright sunny and humid). So it's going to get much hotter outside in the upcoming months. All of our practice is outdoors. She is a very loud panter but I don't really recall that being a problem until these last couple years.

She ran engaged but slow. I could not get her to take water at all. And she barked the entire class, so I am sure that doesn't help that she was essentially going for the entire hour and a half in the heat. The other dogs would lie down between turns and would take water. Some of the other dogs had slowed down a bit by the end of class too. I'm just worried about the panting. Summer was running really nicely at first.

Any advice? I think I am going to take her to the vet to get checked out just in case. And get a crate fan. And then work with her outside to try to settle in the crate. I wish we had an indoor practice facility but if I need to just skip the hotter days, I will. It's kind of baffling though because I don't remember that being a problem before.

ETA: It was also 27 F on Monday so I am wondering if it could be partially the sudden temperature change and she's just not used to it yet?