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Good morning!
The lap turns on one wing are looking good! One step back is fine… but I am not a fan of multiple steps of backing up because it slows the dogs down and also it causes us humans to land on our butts 🙂 You can send her to the first wing from further away, then run forward to the 2nd wing – using a decel to be able to turn and be in position for the lap turn (distance to send to thar first wing is really helpful so you don’t end up running backwards).
The tandems are looking really good! I really like them because we can keep moving forward. She does best when you are moving parallel to the line to give her room to get to the correct side of the jump – all the reps were clear with thar except on the one blooper at :37 when you were moving towards the wing rather than parallel to her line.
Because she reads all the details of motion, you can add more motion into the tandem turns: send to the first wing then accelerate away – start the tandem cue and decelerate a little to et up the turn. That will help her drive into it more and also prepare the cue for what she will see on the bigger courses where you will be urnning more 🙂
Great job! Fingers crossed that the weather cooperates and gets warm again!!Tracy
Hi!
>> It seems that when I support the take off of an obstacle with my body and eyes, I get a much tighter turn vs intense connection and no support of the obstacle with my eyes? I’m sure it has something to do with my body following my eyes and thus giving him the strongest/correct information?>>
Actually, it looks like 2 separate elements: collection before the jump and line after the jump.
When you are intense in your connection before the jump and not supporting the obstacle – you get great collection before takeoff, really impressive! But when you are not connected after – he widens the turn to figure out where to go next. Here is what I mean in the context of the video:I think the wider turns on 1 and 3 are a pretty easy fix 🙂 His collections *before* the jump were really really good on all the reps! It is the exit line connection that he is questioning:
At :05 and :09 on the first rep and :15 and :21 on the 2nd rep as he is landing, your shoulder is closed forward and you are not moving a lot so from behind – he doesn’t know which side of you to be on, so he drifts to buy time before committing to a line because the line isn’t obvious yet.
Compare that to the 3rd rep: same lovely collection before the jump at :31 and :34! But as he exits the turn at :32 and :37 you are closer to the wing so he sees more of your eyes, less closed shoulder, and definitely more motion to the tunnel you want.So I think that your instinct to move forward on the first reps towards the tunnel is a good one – but keep your shoulder open back to him so before he comes around the wing, he can immediately see which side of you to be on – that will allow him to immediately drive in to the next line.
The get out on all reps looked great on this first run!
On sequence 2, same thing in the opening as far as getting nice tight turns.
Nice collections before takeoff at :48, 1:03, 1:17, 1:30, 1:42, 1:56, super super nice! He was Wide at :49, 1:04, 1:31, 1:44, 1:57 coming around the wing because he was trying to figure out which line – the open shoulder and showing him your eyes will tighten it right up.
1:18 almost read FC then popped back out to the other side – you held onto connection over your left for an extra heartbeat and then switched to your right.
At the end – great collection before takeoff! He almost went super wide at 2:14 because you said go more strongly and he was not yet looking towards the tunnel. This is where you will want to see his eyes more and that will drive him into the line – plus wait to deliver the strong go until you know where he is looking.
On the get out reps – the left arm use was fine on these (you can use more or less of it, depending on preference) but the motion change/decel and rotation was late at :52 and 1:09 so he was wider there. Compare that to 1:21 and 1:36 and 1:48 and 2:01 which were much earlier on the decel into the rotation and he was NICE on that turn!! And super connection drove him right into the next line.At :56 – great collection on the front of the jump! Then without exit line connection at :56 he hesitates on the line until he sees the connection (and drifts a little but that might also have to do with your stepping back before you did the blind). On these wraps, you can turn your head forward sooner and looked over your left side before he even takes off – that way he will definitely see the correct line as he comes around the wing. You were watching him over your right until he wears in the air, which gives you very little time to get to the next side quickly. There is more about this in the package posted this morning 🙂 At 1:24 you held onto the connection over your right side for a bit too long, so he didn’t collect as nicely and he stumbled a little when when he landed – usually he is pretty cat-like on his tight turns 🙂
At 1:11 and 1:36 and 1:51 on the throwback: you had great collection in front of the jump again – but now check out your gorgeous connection as he came around the wing! No questions from Juno, great turn! At 2:01 you added a blind there and it went nicely: connection around the wing then motion helped show the line, no wideness. You didn’t get quite far enough past the tunnels entry so he misread the exit but then you nailed it on the last rep. yay!
Let me know what you think about the difference in the elements of the take off side versus the landing line? I think your take off side collections are fabulous, so now we can focus in on the Lines after landing. Great job!
TracyHi!
Really nice runs here!!! Now we can obsess on the exact size of her bubble for getting the best jumping form:
You had asked above about whether the jump after the tunnel can be tighter – her first rep here was great! Timing and connection worked together to get a really spot-on collection. You were within the bubble and cued it really nicely!
On the get out, she read it well at :22 but it might have been on the edge of the bubble: she had to really thing about her jumping there and took off a bit earlier than she needed to. So for front side get out skills, getting a little closer to line will help.
Great FC connection, position & timing at :23!On the 2nd run – She had a good collection on the jump after the tunnel at :40 too – it might have also been a bit on the edge of the bubble because she really slowed herself down between the tunnel exit and the jump to sort out the jumping – so you can go in 2 steps deeper to the tunnel after 1 so you don’t get too far ahead of her there. Gauging lines with smaller dogs (how deep into tunnels should we go?) is one of the big learning curves in agility!
The around cue being earlier was great at :42 – she exited the tunnel looking at the backside and had a great line there. And – it was totally within her bubble for backsides – you were pretty far but she understood how to jump the backside without you need to be close. The ME cue was a little later than you usually give it, perhaps because her backside was so efficient and tight! Woohoo!!OMG the rooster looked so judgey that he didn’t get a chance to run the sequence! LOL!!! What a handsome dude!!
Nice work here 🙂
T
Hi!
>> Perhaps that’s why I’m finding our disc to be coming together more easily than agility, despite my greater experience in agility…sorry, nerd pondering!>>>
Agility is super complex, it is different every single time. I think it is one of the more complex dog sports.
>> Do you think I’m expecting too much for her to turn even more tightly than our best videos? Specifically jump 3 out of the tunnel.>>
I think the turn on 3 specifically might get a tiny bit tighter, but not much tighter or it becomes too much of a wrap and not enough of a 180. But for now, no need to ask for more because she is still sorting out all of the jumping on that type of line 🙂
TGood morning!
>> him. I dont know why I struggle so much with this with him!>>
Because this is a really hard game (we are all wrestling with it LOL!) and because he is really inexperienced so he can’t help out when you aren’t perfect 🙂
He is really getting the idea nicely, though! Your race tracks are going well – the hard part is that he is fast and needs clear info, so you have to be pretty perfect. It will get easier when we add bars to it and he practices it more. You can go in closer to the tunnel on the big lines, so you don’t get as far ahead – when we are too far ahead, we tend to break connection on the race track (speaking from personal experience hahaha!!!)
The blinds look GREAT!! Those are my favorites too 🙂 His commitment is good so you are showing the info early enough that he can commit and turn tight on the wing – very cool!!!!! I think you will find this to be super useful because he can bend so nicely that you will be able to blind and run up lines to stay ahead as the courses get bigger.Great job!!!
TracyHi! It sounds like you had a crazy week!!! But it is pretty cool when the sassy one doesn’t bark in a session 🙂 It is almost like she is giving you a click/treat 🙂
The session went really well! Verbals were clear with the mask (masks are here to stay for a while in my part of the country, at least, so good to train in them even if it wasn’t planned for training purposes LOL!!)
You did a particularly good job of keeping your feet pretty forward to the running line on both cues and not really stepping to the jump on the outs. Yay! And your out cue and your run-the-line cue were distinctly different in verbal and upper body, and it looks like she had zero questions 🙂 Happy dance!!
Connection also looked great (as you noted, that is NOT easy with a small dog and when wearing a mask!!). Onwards to adding the advanced level of the blind or front as soon as you see her turn her head away to the line 🙂
Great job!!! Stay warm and I hope your mouth feels better ASAP!!Tracy
Hi! He did so well on these, especially when he was in the neutral position!! Very nice over the bars – and I totally see where he was asking about the treats on the box 🙂 It was a great distraction for him to have to turn away from on the left turns! One thing I noticed were that the left/right turns over the bars were spot on and he did great! And then on the last turn towards you, he was not powering the same way. At first I thought it was because turning away from the cookies on the box was really difficult (left turns) but then I noticed it on the right turns too, where he would be turning towards the box – he was definitely hesitated after he landed from the last bar. So – we can add more power into that last left or right with a little bit of turn and burn – as he is coming over that last bar, turn and run at a 90 degree angle away (parallel to the first jump bar) so he chases you for the reinforcement. It could be that he doesn’t want to drive into you when you are stationary (respectful little dude :)) so the other option is to keep you stationary but as he is coming over the last bar, turn and throw the reward on the same line you would run on a turn and burn. Everything else looks great so this will help make it perfect as he powers out of it too. Let me know if that makes sense!
Great job! 🙂
TracyHi! It has been really bad with wind and rain here too, hopefully the bad weather is past!
Great job on this session – you kept your feet moving forward the whole time and the upper body was distinctly different on each cue: perfect! The hardest part is to NOT step to the jump on the away cue and you were great about that.
Your arm didn’t seem to be too high – I think in order to make it obvious like you did, your arm had to be at about shoulder height. It wasn’t over your head or anything crazy LOL!! I think belly button height might not be as visible as you move.He did make the one mistake as you described, but overall he was REALLY good about heading to the jump on the away cue. He seemed perfectly fine on both sides, too! His head turn to the jump was nice and early and he wasn’t looking back… so onwards to the advanced level where you challenge his commitment by adding the FC or BC as soon as you see him turn his head to commit to the jump.
Great job!
TracyHi! Sorry about all the rain 🙁
Nice run here!!!! You seemed REALLY connected and he was driving hard! Love it!!!!
Little details for you to tighten up a couple of turns, but it was overall a really lovely run:
You can turn sooner between 1 and 2 so he can collect more before takeoff: when he lands from 1, stay connected by start to turn your shoulders.
You had awesome position after the first tunnel at :13, so I think you can have your FC done before he even exits the tunnel! That will help tighten up his turn there (and call him right before he enters the tunnel too, that will also help).
The middle line looked great to the weaves then to the tunnel after it.
He got mad at you at :23 LOL! Big bark! It was because of the position of the FC: you were moving between the uprights towards the center of the bar, so he took off thinking he was going straight. When he was in the air, you started the FC. He landed then turned – a position cue with you nearer the next jump will be clearer for him there, so he can set up his turn before takeoff.
Ending line looked great! You were both flying!!
Great job 🙂
TracyHi!
That is funny that the other day she couldn’t take the jump, and now she couldn’t NOT take it LOL!!! I think it had to do with her line up position. On the first part of the video, when she was on your right, she was far enough from the jump that it was a significant lead change to go take the jump (it was most definitely not on her natural line). When she was on the other side (on your left) – she was set up closer to the jump so I think it was easier for her to take it because it looked like it was on her natural line, so she didn’t have to work hard to get it – it was right there 🙂 So I bet if you move her 6 feet away from it, she will be able to take it only when asked and not take it when you want her to follow your line 🙂
She did well on the get out! I think you can soften the outside arm send so that your feet can keep moving straight (and not stepping towards the jump). If the outside arm cue is too strong, it will cause your feet to rotate and step to the jump. So on the next session, try to keep your feet moving forward on both cues, same exact line – and let your upper body and connections show the different cues. That will allow you to get even further up the course 🙂
Nice work!!!
TracyI think you are pretty darned hip to handling trends! Anna is a great teacher and it is so cool that she comes to your local school! I can’t wait for things to go back to normal so we can all obsess on these trends in person 🙂
