Double Trials and Training Musings

Yesterday Gosnells Dog Club ran a double header – full trial in the morning and full trial in the afternoon. I had 18 runs all up 16 with my two and 2 with Dexter my borrowed red and white BC. Dexter did really well yesterday – he did absolutely everything I asked of him and kept his bars up except for the last one in the morning run due to his mum Janice vocally celebrating a touch too early! He picked up his fourth pass in JDX and now has one to go.
My two didn’t do too badly – Cypher didn’t have a great morning, due in part to me over handling him in Masters Agility and causing him to lose his momentum over the spread jump and thus crashing it. Mental note to self: Must train more static obstacles (like contacts) straight onto spread jump using minimum distances. We don’t see that much in training – a contact onto a spread jump (double bar staggered). For the majority of dogs that don’t go at super speed this can be an issue. He also knocked a bar in Open Jumping which was unusual – I withdrew because I had lots of runs to do and the fact that the ring was miles away from the car/dog crates. In Open Agility he had a GSD come running at him from the Novice ring just as he was finishing off the weavers I just grabbed him and picked him up which really gave him an ego boost – he was very vocal that he could have that GSD if only I would just let him down from my very safe shoulders! Judge offered a rerun and asked if I’d like to come back and I asked can I just go again straight away. Cy was fired up and ready to go. So we went! Heehee he did a lovely course – never seen him weave so fast in a trial before! Unfortunately it was a tricky distance challenge out of the blind chute tunnel straight onto the a frame however a very appealing jump closer to the handler on the inside got most dogs as they curved in to their handlers. Cy did have a wobble there as he got a little slowed down by the chute and as much as I tried to show him the aframe he just wasn’t going to see it. Never mind it was a great run apart from that. We then went in Masters Jumping and he did absolutely everything I asked of him, not a paw wrong, he ended up with a third place so that was good. I had actually added about 5 or 6 meters extra to his path by completely forgetting a front cross and doing a post turn instead, he adapted well to my glitch though *g*. Raven had Masters Agility first up and simply proved that she is way smarter than me. I could tell at the start line she was not going to stay for love nor money nor the promise of chicken jackpot! So instead of being a strong, consistent handler who insisted that she wait I decided to risk a run off the start line over jump 1 and then into a flexi tunnel under a very prominent aframe. Needless to say she took the aframe! I took her back and we did the tunnel and then kept going until she knocked a bar in the middle part of the course. Open Jumping she knocked a bar in the distance challenge so we withdrew again. Masters Jumping she kept all bars up but was handling really wide due to basically not really caring about where I was on the course and thus of course got a refusal. However she did keep all her bars up. She did keep all her bars up in Open Agility too and did a cracker run for a second place less than a second behind Domino (aka 10mps dog!).
The afternoon was much better for Cypher who could quite well have been four for four if his handler had not been intent on running her own course in Masters Jumping. I walked the course about 10 times and ran it exactly the way I had planned and he was with me the whole time again not putting a paw wrong. Unfortunately I’d walked the course wrong (either that or the judge had sneakily moved the numbers when I wasn’t looking *vbg*) so no pass there. Oh well the course I ran was much smoother I felt :-). He ran clear in Open Agility for a lovely pass and second place again to 10MPS dog! Then in Open Jumping and Masters Agility he also ran clear – he was a bit slower in time in Masters Agility as I hadn’t quite got the course stuck in my head and was looking at numbers (never a good sign). In Open Jumping lots of good runs, he ended up in 6th place. Raven didn’t crack a pass in the afternoon – in Masters Agility I was just too slow for her, she’d been done for the seesaw in Open Agility so I doubled my verbals for the wait on the seesaw in Masters and she did wait beautifully but I was just too slow directing her to the next jump correctly. She kept all bars up in both those courses and had a bar down in each of the Jumping runs. So it wasn’t a complete write off as I was pleased she’d kept her bars up in half her runs given how feral she was. Not so sure Ken should have lowered her chemo dose last Tuesday!
Spryte is coming up for 14 months old next Friday. I have been tackling the running contacts the Silvia Trkman way and I have to admit that if only I could train this everyday with her that I would be much farther along, at the moment the board/down plank is not much higher than her height (45 cm – 17 inches).
Then I started watching some videos on the net of running contacts – and I’m wondering if they are worth all the work required. The only two major advantages I see are 1) Much faster 2) Less impact. The disadvantages: 1) I cannot run/handle fast enough to give directionals after them 2) They require absolutely spot on, exact, extremely consistent and very precise training. This training I have only seen done well by a mere handful of people in the world, and many more very seasoned, experienced, at top level, well respected trainers/handlers have made the decision to steer away from them. So I’ve made a decision this weekend based on the fact that I want fast consistent contacts by next year – I will start target training with her this week, we are going to two on two off on the dog walk. The aframe we will determine later when I see how she goes on it at full height.
Her jump work is going well – we have started doing the bend work on a single bar and also bounce grids of three jumps. Her weavers are slightly staggered still and will stay that way for quite some time. I am also working the entries separately.
So I better get off this blog and into some training!