AgilityCategory Archives

Jet’s Heeling is Improving

So last Saturday I took Jet to a sanctioned Match for some obedience practice. Well, I wasn’t happy with how he did. Actually his heeling hasn’t been very good in the ring since we started going into the ring. In training, he’s great. But I think I have a plan to get him better. This was the Novice run through at the Match. He’s not even hardly really heeling:

So I figured I needed to do something, because Jet was entered in an obedience trial the next week (which was yesterday). And I think we just train in places that are too quiet. Because Jet is deaf in his left ear, he has sound issues. And you can see in the above video that the ring was set up right next to the bathrooms (I guess most people don’t even think about doing that?) and the flushing of the toilets really bothered him.

So it inspired me to start taking Jet to a place that had many more distractions. Mostly I train in very quiet parks where Jet does a great job. But most obedience rings are not so quiet. And so I took him to Sugarhouse Park every day last week. We did heeling with minimal treats. I figure, when in the ring, it’s just me and him, and we need to build a relationship without treats, too. However, I went to some pretty hard places at the park and when he showed signs of nervousness, I gave him treats anyway. And so yesterday this is what I got in the ring:

I think it’s much improved! So this is my goal then… to take Jet to difficult places and do heeling and training. At least once a week. My work schedule is changing and they are making me work 5 days a week (YUCK!) starting in October. I know I know, I’m spoiled, I haven’t worked 5 days a week in over 10 years. I usually work 4 10 hour days, which I much prefer. But now… well, I don’t want to talk about it. Anyway, I’ll have to work training into a new schedule. I think it will help. We don’t have another obedience trial until maybe March. So I’ll see how it works out. Though in the winter it will be hard to go out and find places when it gets cold. Hrmph.

The rest of this weekend we are doing agility. Jet did good today, but didn’t Q. One mistake in JWW and one in Standard. He did Q in the new Time 2 Beat class, which was fun. Hopefully tomorrow will be better. I need to snuggle into some nice cozy sferra sheets tonight for bed. I’m tired, and sore, and I need to get some rest. But alas, I do think his heeling has gotten a bit better.

Cynthia

September 16, 2011

Agility, Jet, Obedience

4 comments

Agility, Jet, Obedience

Jet’s AX

Well, on Saturday Jet got both his JWW and Standard Qs too, which gave him his AX title. Woo! I’m excited. We had a great weekend. I’m not sure why Blackfoot, Idaho, went so very wrong. LOL. But we made up for it this weekend. I’m thinking in Blackfoot it was a combination of stress, harder courses, and cooler weather making Jet run faster, which I’m not good at handling.

So now he’s officially Stolta Ebbas Einride of Sweden AX AXJ. Wooo! Below is the playlist of all the videos from the weekend. If you want you can scroll through them and watch. Tatum’s are in there, too.

Jet is such an amazing little Danish-Swedish Farmdog doing agility. He is so absolutely perfect for me.. But then, he’s perfect, Qs or no Qs. I just adore him, and I am having fun doing agility with him! And with all the running around I did last weekend, I don’t have to look for Diet pills that work fast, because I’m running fast!
xx

Cynthia

July 11, 2011

Agility, Jet, Tatum

15 comments

Agility, Jet, Tatum

Jet got his AXJ!

Well we seem to have recovered from our unfortunate fiasco running agility in Blackfoot Idaho, where we only got 1 Q out of 8 in Jumpers and Standard. Today Jet and I were in a local AKC agility trial and he Q’d in both his runs! That’s his second Excellent A Standard leg, and his third Excellent A Jumpers with Weaves leg for his AXJ, woo hoo!

I’m so excited we got his AXJ today. I was getting a bit down in Blackfoot when we didn’t have a good Q rate at all. So now I’m glad that it’s picked up again. We have two more days of agility and hopefully we’ll get some more Qs. I’d love to get his AX this weekend too!

It was pretty hot today though we were indoors so that was nice. I didn’t need my Ray Bans even unless we went out to walk and potty. The indoor building was rather warm but they had the Swamp Coolers going and the big fans so it wasn’t really too bad. Though I was still sweating when our runs were done.

Tatum did really well too though she didn’t Q. I forgot that in Open each second over course time is actually 2 faults, not one. So she was 12 seconds over course time in Jumpers but she got 24 faults so no Q. I’m really gunna have to see if I can speed her up. But we do have some years yet and she likes it so we are just having fun. Here is her run, I didn’t get her JWW on video, but she moved even better in JWW:

Cynthia

July 8, 2011

Agility, Jet, Tatum

9 comments

Agility, Jet, Tatum

Weave Challenge

Okay since we had some weave issues at the last AKC agility trial I really wanted to participate in Kathy’s Weave Poll Challenge! So here it is!

First I did Jet… he did really well, it’ll be interesting as the time goes by and we move the jump around to see how his entries are.

Then I thought what the heck, why not to Tatum too? She doesn’t really send to anything.. she has no interest in toys, and I haven’t worked a toss/treat bag but I really should. So anyway I did it with her too and she did better than I expected, especially on the call through and the send!

This will be fun. I might be doing it more than once a week to catch up since I’m kinda behind, everyone else started 10 days ago!

Cynthia

June 21, 2011

Agility, Jet, Tatum

4 comments

Agility, Jet, Tatum

Troubles in Blackfoot

I learned a lot about running Jet in Excellent A Agility last weekend in Blackfoot, Idaho. We cruised through Novice and Open so fast that I forgot how extremely difficult it is to run clean in Excellent. We only got 1 Q out of 8 runs in Excellent A. (He got his Novice FAST title and a leg in Open FAST but since my goal with Jet is a MACH, I’m not really counting FAST runs in my calculations.)

The good news is that Jet is running extremely nicely. He’s having good forward focus. He’s spotting and taking obstacles. He’s moving quickly and consistently. His contacts are holding a nice 2o2o and he didn’t blow one all weekend. He’s jumping smoothly. He’s weaving nicely for the most part, though I need to drive him a bit more. And, most important of all, he’s having a really good time.

I have a goal for Excellent Agility, and it might be a really lofty one, but after 8 years of struggling with my first two dogs, I think Jet and I can achieve my goal. I want at least a 50% Q rate in Excellent. And if we are not getting it, then it’s time to analyze and train.

I watched the videos from the weekend and I made a list of the things we are having problems with. Here is my list.

Weaves:
- Two Missed Entires.
- One skitter where he missed a couple poles.

Front Crosses:
- Once I rotated too much and sent him to the wrong obstacle.
- Once I rotated too little and sent him to the wrong obstacle.

Rear Crosses:
- In two runs I opted to NOT do rear crosses because I don’t think Jet has strong enough rear crosses, and either missed an obstacle or got an off course obstacle. (Not once did a rear cross cause us an NQ… but I do avoid them when I can.)

Wrong End of Tunnel:
- This only happened once for an off course. However, I know I have to train discriminations better and this is a weakness we have.

270:
- Jet missed the second jump of a 270 once. I also know this is a weakness in our training as I haven’t trained 270s with him much… or, okay, at all.

Out of 8 runs, that about sums up our errors. I think I can fix these things. They are training issues. And I do need to see improvements so I’ll be videoing our training sessions and will attack these problems. Jet doesn’t understand. Once he does, he’ll do what I ask him to do.

I also know that I have a lean-over problem… and I want Jet to understand that when I call him verbally, that will out-weight the body signals I may give him incorrectly. One run I didn’t rear cross him and he took an off course tunnel. I yelled at him to come HARD but he still got into the tunnel before he turned around back to me. I’ll need to reward him for coming to me off tunnels, and other obstacles, even if I’m bending over. After 8 years of agility I think I’m never going to stop bending over, and so I just need to train my dog to respond to me better. Since he’s much easier to train that I am. LOL

Here’s our one Q run:

So now back to work, programming, not doing electrosurgery, though maybe that’d be more fun. I have a couple weeks before our next trial. I hope to get a few of these things worked out before our next trial, so I can increase our Q rate!

Between Agility Trials

Well I just haven’t had the gumption to come update my blog with last week’s trial results. I’m not sure why, because Jet did really well! I messed up a couple of times, so out of 4 runs he only got 2 Qs. But we are in Excellent A now, and so we have to run clean. No more mistakes allowed. So it’s a bit harder.

Jet Qualified in Exc A JWW on Saturday, and Exc A Standard on Sunday. The Sunday’s JWW run he took the wrong end of the tunnel.. so that’s tripped us up twice now. Once in open, and now once in Excellent A. But I haven’t had time to get out and work it… and we have a 4 day trial this weekend. So I’ll just have to see how it goes. I’ve been feeling a bit sick this week too so haven’t really had the gumption to go out and train agility like I should.

Those are his two Sunday runs. The STD Q and the JWW NQ. I am happy with our runs anyway. For him to be doing so well and it’s only his 4th AKC trial… I cannot complain.

We have a chance to get into Excellent B this weekend, and I’m trying not to stress about it. LOL. If Jet gets into Excellent B and earns a speed point, that’ll be my very first AKC Speed point ever. After 8 years of agility, to finally get my firs speed point… I’ll have to frame the darn thing in gold. LOL It either means I’m a dunce to keep trying for so long, or I’m just good and persistent. I’ll interpret it that second way.

Gotta go to Blackfoot Idaho this weekend for four days of AKC agility. Maybe I’ll look at which motorcycle gps would be best, but then I have one for my car, which seems to work just fine. But that reminds me I want to print some maps so I know where I’m going!

Agility Trial June

Jet Weave Polls

So in June 2011 I have six full days of agility. That’s almost a full week. I’d much rather spend a week of agility than a week of work anyday! In July I also have 6 days of agility. So in June and July I have 12 days of agility, but then I’m sure you can add. LOL. I just think it’s fun to see how many days of agility I have so far!

After July, I won’t have anything until September. I’m bummed! Well, I can’t say I don’t have anything. In August I’m gong to a Chris Zinc seminar in Grand Junction, Colorado. That’ll be fun. Then the end of August I’m going to Camp Winnaribbun. In September I am going to DOCNA Championships, too. Mid-sept I have another AKC trial. It’ll be okay to take a break… I guess. I’m just having so much fun trialing with Jet, that I don’t want to take a break!

Anyway back to the present… LOL. This weekend is a 2 day AKC Agility trial. Jet is now fully in Excellent A in both Standard and JWW. And Tatum is in Open in both. I sure hope Tatum can do all 12 weave polls okay! And with Jet, no more mistakes allowed, we have to run clean to Q! I hope we’ll get into Excellent B before these 12 trialing days pass. If not, then I need to seriously reassess our training!

Jet is also in obedience this weekend. I haven’t been thinking about it that much because it’s making me nervous. I don’t really know if he’s ready. His heeling still needs work and so do his stays. But we’ll see. I hope to get video of both agility and obedience.

And we will stay safe, so we won’t need any Bronx Medical Malpractice Attorney, though that doesn’t really apply to agility at this time! LOL.

Cynthia

June 9, 2011

Agility, Jet, Tatum

1 comment

Agility, Jet, Tatum

The Tatum Fan Club

Tatum has been doing so well at agility lately that I’m just stunned. In Logan, Utah, a couple of weeks ago, she managed to get a 50% Q rate in Novice and pulled off both her NAP and NJP titles! I was thrilled. I am always so thrilled with how well my silly girl is doing. She came from such a rotten start, lost in a hoarder’s yard with 70 other collies, bad people experiences, and so afraid when she left our house. Well, look at her now. She ran so fast out of the start line she completely took me off guard and I had to run to catch up!

She always had a really fast recovery and so I just though she probably had it in her. And now she loves agility. She’s nailing her weave polls every single time. She’s hardly going around any jumps anymore. And she just loves the contacts. This video is from our DOCNA trial last weekend. I don’t think she’ll every be fast enough to qualify in DOCNA, but we had fun anyway. And maybe if I actually learn how to handle her in changes of direction and crosses, then maybe we could speed up a bit!

A friend of mine was saying, at the DOCNA trial, that at first people didn’t really think she’d be able to do agility, and thought I was a bit crazy. But now I got a lot of comments on how well she’s doing, and how people love to watch her run. And so my friend said now there’s like this little Tatum Fan Club that is rooting for her. She’s my baby girl, with her own fan club. LOL.

At home she rules the house, pushing the other dogs around. She will always have issues, fortunately she’s completely house trained so we don’t need any carpet cleaners raleigh nc. And she does spook more easily than other dogs, and she doesn’t much like people… though she will go up to you now and see if you have any treats. And it seems I’ve had so many people give her treats, that she thinks most everyone does now.

I’m so proud of Tatum. I’m moving her to open for her next AKC agility trial. She can do 12 weaves, and I know she can do the courses. So it’ll be fun to see how she does!