Forum Replies Created
-
Posts
-
Hi! Poor Indy, she wants you to win the lottery so you can stay home all the time and never leave!!! Ha!
The serps are going really well! At this point in the training, I think the next step is to decide how you want to handle serps with her, stylistically 🙂 Bearing in mind that she is already fast and will be getting even faster, I think we can make it easier for you:
On the reps in the 3 videos, you were doing pull-then-flick serps from behind. And sometimes she got it and sometimes she would look at you (or run past the serp jump to go into the tunnel LOL!). What I mean by pull-then-flick is that you were turning your shoulders away from her, then using upper body motion to turn her away to the next jump.
If you want to use that style, we ca play with timing so she has no questions. But…. (you knew there would be a but hahaha) I think we can streamline it and just keep you moving up the line without the upper body motion pulling her in and out – which will also keep you ahead and get the turns really nicely.
Looking at the first video, your upper body position on the one jump exercises was perfect and on 2 jumps at :20. She read it perfectly to come in and then go back out. Now, that is the streamlined upper body you can use – staying relatively close to the jumps, move up the line with your upper body open like that and she will bring herself in and send herself out so all you will need to do is keep running. I think it will be easier and it will answer the questions she had.
You can see some of the questions at :36 on 3 jumps: you closed your shoulders forward towards the dog walk, so she read it correctly as a left turn, which is why she did not understand to continue to the 3rd jump (be sure to reward that, because she was correct).
:46 looked good – And we can streamline that too so you don’t have to turn forward to indicate the jump after the serp jump by just having you keep your upper body open and keep moving.
At :55 you turned towards the dog walk and moved towards it, which is a left turn cue, so she was correct to think you wanted her heading to the DW. Same at 1:07 – she was heading to the dog walk and was correct based on the cue.
Now, compare it to what you did at 1:13: you sent her to the backside of 1, so the serp was on that #1 jump and you had the lovely open upper body position as you moved up the line – and she nailed it. YAY!On the 2nd video, when you added the tunnel – she did well on these but you will find it easier without having to do all of the upper body steering and you can just run 🙂 Plus, the upper body steering is putting you behind and you’ll want to stay ahead of your little speed demon 🙂
Later in the video with the line back to the tunnel – the upper body in and out was causing a delay in your running line towards the tunnel entry (because it was really hard!) so on some of the reps she was looking at you then getting i, like at 1:12. And if you are a little late, she rockets past you like at 1:22, skipping the jump for the tunnel. I think the same was happening on the last video too – she was getting it but you had to do a lot of steering.
Let me know what you think! I think she will easily let you do the more streamlined serpy handling (easier for both of you) and you can use the bigger upper body motion when she is working at a big distance away or ahead.
Great job! Let me know if the streamline idea makes sense 🙂
TracyHi! Both dogs are doing well with the threadle wraps here.
I think leaning forward might have been part of her question? It might have blocked the threadle arm a little? But some other ideas for you, especially as you add motion:
It was hard to hear the verbals, so if you haven’t added the threadle wrap verbal, let’s add it. More on that below!
Now that you are adding motion (yay!) you can fade the arm swoosh and go to just a little wrist flick – I think they were relying a bit too much on the arm motion to out around the wing. Don’t let your elbow or upper arm move away from your body.
We don’t want the movement of the arm to be the cue to go around the wing, because if you are a heartbeat too early then they might end up on the other side of the wing (Min, in particular 🙂 I think she was wanting you to be perfect on the arm movement)For both of them, be sure to lock them onto the hand, shake it, look at it, before you release them – they each had a moment of going to the other side because the hand cue is not as strong as the value for the wing (not yet, anyway :)) If the hand and verbal come at the same time or close in time, we can raise value of the hand by moving it up and down and also looking at it.
Which brings us to the verbals – I think you were saying break? I would add the threadle verbal because that will help a lot – break means “take what is in front of you” and the threadle/wrap verbal means to threadle/wrap 🙂 So – onwards to adding the verbal: Line up both dogs near the wing and show them the hand a bit – then say the verbal and let them offer the wrap. I think they will be fine with it and you will be able to add more motion very soon too.
Great job! Let me know what you think!
TracyHi! Min looked great here!
Wheee nice opening, fast fast fast! On the line from the tunnel to the weaves: Keep accelerating to the poles don’t stand like you did on the first rep, as she slowed down. You drove her more at :39 and she was faster.On the first run, she saved you on the 2nd jump after the weaves: stay connected and drive in on the line – I think you were trying to remember where to go LOL! Then you lost connection at :25 and she did not save you LOL! That was good handling on the jump after the weaves, nice and fast line, it would be fun to compare it to the other direction but the double blind was a little wide.
2nd run – I liked the acceleration to the poles and the double blind after it! For timing of that double blind: try to get the first blind finished while she is still weaving, so the 2nd blind can happen sooner – when she is almost at the wing but not quite at it yet. You did the first blind as she exited which made the 2nd blind late. You were also quiet there, I would use a threadle verbal to help her out. This is a good skill for her, she will be super fast with it!
Nice backside send at :38!!
Oopsie After the straight tunnels where you forgot where you were going, but you were in a good spot and fabulous independent weaves after it! And it was no fluke, she did it again when you ran it again!! And she TOTALLY showed us why we can’t “yay” them on course when she stopped for her cookie LOL! Min is also a “just the facts” type of dog LOL!
Great job here!!
TracyI wonder if the wrap to the inside is faster!
Hi! Lots of good work here!!
Seq 2:
Baseline – his commitment looked great! That makes it really fun to ‘try all the things’ because he has all the skills 🙂
For the wrap at jump 4: I think it is a matter of funding the right balance of acceleration and decel. Bearing in mind that he is very responsive, I think you can power him more in these and you don’t need to decel as much or as early. At :06 you decelerated then waited – I think he didn’t need all that, yo can do a short decel and leave for 5.LOVED the blind to the tunnel did I mention I LOVED it?
For the ending: Connect more on the go, nice adjustment on the next rep to connect and get the last jump 🙂Training – For the turn at 4: as you reward, accelerate more and throw the reward, try not to stop him – let him rip after a tight turn 🙂
On those wrap reps:
at :45 – toooo much decel there, he responded but didn’t need you to hit the brakes as much.
Better at :58! Just a little hit of decel is all he needs.7-8-9 to the tunnel: I liked the FCs you did, they looked good, but when I timed it the blind was much faster (also faster at the end when he was more tired). Yay!!!!
Seq 3:
He is doing well here – I am happy with the opening (1-2-3-4-5) all the way through, each time, nailed it. I think you were most confident about sending and leaving at 2 on the last run and he looked great there!
The only spot to tighten is the Blind after tunnel: your reps at :18, :56, 1:06, 1:16 all started after he was in the tunnel, so he was wide on the exit. You started your verbal much earlier at 1:44 and you got the BC starting too, so it was the nicest turn 🙂 One other option there is to send him away to 7 and do afront cross after the tunnel (I know, I love my blinds, but in this case he might see the FC earlier and tighten the line)
On the ending line , I am not sure the BC between the last 2 jumps is better than dog on right because it adds an additional lead change where none is needed for this particular sequence. It would be fun to time it and see if the BC there is faster than just running out dog-on-left!Good thrown rewards here – he loves to chase Nemo 🙂 Wheeee!
For some reason, on the last run he looked at the pinwheel jump between 6-7 at 1:41. When I compared it to the first run, you looked to be more connected on the first run and I think you said right on the first run tooand he read it really well.
One other thought: On some of turns, I think you were saying left or right in places you don’t need it (like the blind on the last 2 jumps) – you can just call his name there, it isn’t really tight end out of a turn to need a directional (unless I heard it wrong LOL!)
Great job here! Let me know what you think!
TracyHi!
>> When she is jumping 500 mm she jumps more in a square and it doesn’t look as fluid. Thanks for analysing the differences in each sequence.Feel free to run some of these at full height so we can compare and figure out what she needs 🙂
>> When I read your notes about the layering of the dw and the non-numbered jump letting Ruse do the weaves independently I thought that’s crazy!
Well, you’re not wrong, it is pretty crazy LOL!
The opening line looked good – you can play with going to the other side of the backside at 2 but I think this was her best line (the way you ran it).
Good blind at :09 and on the next rep but then your position and line of motion turned her off the weave entry
Maybe more GOGO GO and cue the weaves later, for more verbal emphasis? Yo can also run closer to the jumps before the blind, so she sees a very straight line of motion before going into the tunnelThe other option there is to send her away after the aframe and support the line between frame and tunnel with you heading to the other side of the DW, so you are closer to the weave entry (then rear cross it)
One more option: move the weaves closer to the tunnel exit for training so you can make it easier for her to find them for training. Great job training them at the end of the video!
Wow – check out the flip away at 1:41 after the dog walk!!! That put you in such a perfect place for the entire ending line. YAY!!! We will keep working to get the flip away even more comfy. My only suggestion is that you can try the slice line on the jump after the teeter at the end: it might be faster! That is a good compare and contrast moment to see which is faster.
Great job here!!!!! Let me know what you think!
TracyHi! It was fun to compare the different levels of handling and figure out what worked best. These went really well!
Seq 1: Comparing the different levels of cue:
It looked like the turn cue for 8-9 at :19 was appropriate for her, but you can leave sooner so you are moving to the correct line when she lands and so it doesn’t look like the wrap cue (you were tending to remain facing the the jump on the collection cues til she took off, but I bet you can cue and then leave :))I think the main thing is that you don’t need to turn towards her on those collections cues – you can cue it without rotating your upper body so you can leave sooner but doing everything the same but not rotating your upper body towards her as much especially on the turn at 8. The best turn at 8 was at :19ish where you cued and left for 9. That was faster than the last rep where she you didn’t have as much collection cue (1:21) but also she was not coming into it with as much speed. Even so, I think the softer cue that you did at :19 was better – without the turn cue there, she slipped on landing which means she didn’t know the turn was coming.
Sequence 2: oh yay this looked great! Freeze the video at :08 before she lifts off for 4: you were already turned and leaving. Perfect! You could decel a tiny bit more there to get it even tighter but otherwise, it was a great example of cue and go!
The FC 8-9 looked great too and she didn’t find her own line on the ending LOL!Seq 3: the opening might have felt awkward because 2 was supposed to be a backside 🙂 It will run much nicer that way 🙂 To get it nice and tight on the front side, you can stay right by the wing on the takeoff side with a big decel to cue massive collection.
About the backside at 5: Once she’s got commitment to 3, take off for the backside line so you can be there sooner to help her see it more like what you did at :19. You stood still for too long as she committed to 3 on the rep where she missed it, so she just outran you to the 5 jump (you didn’t have enough time to set up the connection needed to get her out there – great adjustment in the moment to get it the next time around!)
I had trouble making out the verbal you used at 6-7? Sounded like in in but it might have been and in in from the 5-6 line? She was a little wide on that 5-6 section but I thought she was SUPER fast, so I don’t want to change anything 🙂 As she gets more experienced, she will make adjustments to stay super fast there and be a little tighter, no need for us to intervene 🙂
I liked the sequence you ran, going directly to 10, that was actually a little harder LOL!
Great job here!!! Let me know what you think!
TracyI would want to leave the dog in the weaves to blind cross the bottom of the dog walk, then blind cross between the 10-11 tunnels.
I need to go look at the map again to see where the last one was.Hi!!
>> I think I am close to having my full vocabulary
I feel this pain LOL!!
I think your list is pretty darned comprehensive 🙂 the only thing to add eventually is the weave threadle but it is a low priority til evolving course design makes it more important 🙂He did really well on this threadle wrap foundations here!! I think the only thing I would recommend is that you hold his collar, your threadle hand stationary in position… then say the cue 3 or 4 times and then let go. He will probably bark 🙂 and also he will probably turn his head to the wing, which is good – but I think it will highlight and isolate the verbal. The timing of the verbal and hand cue was close here, so I think you can separate them more.
Otherwise… time to add motion. Wheeee!!!And about the teeter down… I’ve seen many folks train it as a gateway to a fabulous 4on performance, so that might be the same path for Presto? Very few fast dogs maintain that in the ring (he counts as a fast dog!!)
Nice work here 🙂 let me know what you think!
TracyHi! She is doing really well here!
I would reverse some of the steps you outlined – by using this much hand cue and waiting to add the verbal, the behavior will barely on the physical cue for longer than we want. If we add the verbal cue sooner and have less hand cue, it will become a stronger verbal, sooner 🙂 And based on the trends in course design, we want it to be a very strong verbal because we won’t be able to be right there for the dogs 🙂
So now that she is turning away so nicely, try to use less hand cue, maybe just a little tiny flick away to get her head turned. And if she can do it on the smaller hand cue: add your verbal before you give the hand cue. Then when the verbal is attached, and she is turning away with very little hand cue: the motion will be easy to add.
Let me know if that makes sense 🙂
TracyHi!
No threadle wraps in sequences yet 🙂 Stay tuned for the next set of games!He did really well here too – the ‘don’t take anything’ moments were great – we don’t want him to self-flick!
When you tried the cue for the threadle/wrap when you were next to the weaves, I think he was confused for a moment about whether you wanted the weaves – so get a little ahead in those moments to clarify for him what you want, before starting the cue.
He was basically perfect on the other side! You can keep adding motion to this, or even start him from a wing wrap before it so you are both moving fast. We will build on it in Games Package 4 🙂 And if you prefer the close hand as the cue instead of the outside hand – that’s fine! As long as it is clear to you and the dog, it will work really well too 🙂Great job!!!
TracyHi! I am at a Flyball tournament 🙂
His instant focus looks good here! He wants to watch you,so this is a good prop to use. You can have it closer to you (because it will be closer in a trial setting) but now that there is value, the main this will be about taking it on the road (which I think is what you said to him at the end LOL!) Does he like toys in different environments? You can totally use a toy as a reward! But if he is food-only at a trial, that is perfect. So when you take a road trip, bring him into the environment, then plop the prop down, and then him offer behavior 🙂 Start with an easy, calm environment and see how he does! When is your next time in a trial environment?
Tracy
Thanks, this is a great! I see several spots where the threadle/wrap or a version of it would be used, but we can also creatively get ahead so we don’t need to use it in a couple of spots 🙂
Thanks!
TracyGood morning again 🙂
The Baseline run looked good here! A couple of ideas for you:
On thr 1-2-3, he read it really well. You can start him further back from 1 so he can power into it in extension with a long stride or two – he was a little close so had to collect and sort out his feet, which slows him down.
He did well on the 4-5-6 line too! You can play with sending him from landing of 4 then peeling away more, to see if you can get a better turn on 4 without any reduction in speed, and also so you can get further ahead.
8-9 looked good – you can try it from more laterally away, as that might set you up a little better for 11.
The turn on 11 was a Goldilocks moment: too much, too little, just right LOL!
On the first rep, you had too much decel at 11 and too much OOMPH on the turn cue so he didn’t commit. He is super responsive, so I don’t think you don’t need to crunch down on the takeoff spot for him. He should be able to read it perfectly with decel and a rotation.
Next rep – this on had a good send, but you connected too little on the bl;ind on the exit, so he ended up in the wrong tunnel entry (:45) – it was rewardable, he was correct because he went with the last connection he saw.
Then you had a just right moment on the spin at :57, just remember to keep moving even if you want to reward 🙂 Note how you didn’t need a lot of pressure into the takeoff spot and you just decelerated, rotated, and connected. Nice!
1:13 was a too much moment: too much pressure into the takeoff spot so he read it (correctly) as a backside cue: also rewardable because he was correct 🙂 Pay all the off courses because it is almost always a correct response to our cues 🙂
1:21 was just right! Nice!!!! And good info from him about what he needs and doesn’t need to get the tight turn.Great job! Let me know what you think!
Tracy
