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Hi!
Thanks for the video!
She did well on the opening run on that first line. Yes, she read the cues perfectly! One thing that can make it easier is to put wings on the backside jumps such as 4 and 5.
You can set up a shorter line for her if you turn her to her right on 4 other than slice to the left. You can blind cross landing of 3 to get her on your left to make it easier.
On 5, stay super close to the jumping so you can set up the next line very smoothly without being too far away. You walked it well at :31 in terms of being close and pushing your feet into the gap!2nd run – she read the Rc on 4 correctly 🙂 Watch your feet at :41 – you were decelerating and turning your feet towards the RC wing rather than the slice wing, so she thought it was a RC. Good girl! I think that threw you off a little and you got the push but then she didn’t take the jump. That is a good default behavior to work on with her: take the jump when you get to the backside no matter what da momma is doing 🙂 (The Custom Skills Sets have this from the previous package). At 1:31 you got her to the backside again but had to move backwards a bit to get her to take it, so we can work the default behavior so you can just run through there to get the next line.
Nice slice at 1:02! You had her do front sides on that rep and at 1:08 she dropped the bar before the tunnel when you said good girl – that is another thing we will be working on with all of the dogs: keeping the bar up before the tunnel when the momma talks (so many dogs drop that bar!) – stay tuned for that skill set coming tomorrow!
So overall – I think she did well getting to the backside when yo cued it, but when she gets there she needs more understanding on coming in to take the jump so you can just move through to the next thing (the convergence). You can play with the default games there and then do them as a warm up before running the sequence.
Nice job! Let me know what you think!
TracyGood morning!
Wow, he looks really strong on these. He is organizing really nicely on both angles (entering from the front or the back) and he had no trouble reading different heights – he was balanced throughout and rhythmic. He is able to step right into the grid on that first jump on the front sides, which also shows some real plyometric strength too. He is NOT pattering his feet on the backside approaches and that shows good organization too! He had one question in this session: on rep 2, as you released, you also did a big arm motion: bam! bar down. Arm distraction! In a perfect world, we would all be perfect about not doing a big arm motion like that but in reality, sometimes we fling our arm 🙂 So, let’s show him that distraction and pay him for keeping the bar up: release and fling your arm! If he drops the bar, tell him he is cute and start over, no reward. If he keeps the bar up – BIG party! I would do it on 3 jumps so you can reward quickly. If the first jump no longer becomes an issue with the distraction, you can go to 5 jumps and add in an arm distraction on jump 3.
If he has trouble, it can be a more subtle distraction. You can also add in verbal-over-the-bar distractions because, well, we all yell things over the bar when we really shouldn’t LOL!!!Great job! Let me know what you think!
TracyGood morning!
Novice courses can be so much more wicked than Masters courses because there is so much more speed 🙂
Course 1 – I am sorting out the skills sets to add for this week and I think that the drive-to-handler after a turn and come off a line is a biggie for several of the dogs! At :08, you gave a good “cap cap” (I think that is what you were saying) and she collected really nicely1 So a default behavior we want to add is driving back around the wing and NOT looking for the next obstacle (looking for you instead :)) You added her name on the exit there on the next rep and that really helped (and a tunnel cue after that is a nice built in reward).
Good job stopping for the go tunnel bar – such a hard bar for young dogs!!! She did a nice job on the 2nd rep there.
The RC 8-9 was a great option – the BC there is nice but so hard to get to with her speed, as you found out 🙂 She did a great job on that line, both responding to the verbal AND the physical cue. Yay!
It was hard to see what was happening on the very end – I think that is the spot where you were saying she and Lever both had trouble seeing the last jump. From the camera angle, it looks like she was on a right lead and needed a gentle push back out to the left lead to help pick it up – so a bit of added connection there will help as she drives ahead. For example, at 1:00, you can intensify the connection by looking strongly at the back of her head (it looks like she was past your there) and that can guide her back out to the last jump (particularly if she is not used to seeing a jump there!). It looks like you did that at 1:26 along with a bit of convergence, totally helped! Looked great there!Course 2: yes, the push at 7 is hard – the tunnel turns her right and the push requires a left turn on the tunnel exit. You can try adding your verbals before she enters the tunnel (the backside verbal or a ‘get out’ so she turns left on the exit). And convergence in towards her as she is approaching the tunnel will help too, rather than rounding the line.
We can also look at creative lead outs to get you up there so you are ahead of her at the end of the tunnel – you can try leading out further up the line and pushing back into 4-5 rather than running into it? You can try handling the lead out from as far up the line as the jump before the tunnel, so then you can out run her to the tunnel exit 🙂
On the push cue – motion in towards it (feet converging into the backside line like at 1:00) totally helps so that is something to play with (converging in and showing pressure from further and further away). I think we can also make a slight change in the upper body cue – you were leaning in towards her with a lot of connection and both arms back, which was not pushing her away as much as we wanted – I think a stronger cue would be to get your opposite shoulder ahead of your body rather than back, she can push away more. So it would still be an intense connection like you had, but less leaned-in and a little more upright so your opposite shoulder can come forward. Being a little more upright will actually help you keep moving in on the convergence too. so you can see your feet more on a parallel line and not needing to turn your feet as much.
She turned left nicely out of the tunnel at 1;14!! You can call her name or give your left cue there to help her find the next line too.Course 3 – yes, sorry about the rogue 11!!!!
Yay she totally looked confident on the FFC at 2!!! And it sets up a nice line 3-4-5. On the right cue 4-5, you were a little late at :30 so she went a bit wide. As she lands after 4, you can start the verbal and this is also a good place to use a ‘no cross’ arm (soft outside arm) to help set the collection.
As you keep building the FFC at 2, you can begin to move it away from the 2 jump so you can actually be closer to 3 as you cue it! Using the verbal and FC she will be able to read it really well and you will be miles ahead to get the cue at 5. That can get you up to the BC 5-6 very easily like you did at :38, which will allow you to set up the left cue verbal & rotation before she enters the tunnel.
The BC at :47 was really nice! But yes, not needed there LOL!!
On the restart at :50 – the verbal left started right before she went into the tunnel but the rotation didn’t start until after she was in, so she had a little too much forward motion and went a bit wide on the tunnel exit. You were already showing rotation at 1:03 and 1:40 and she turned a lot better on the tunnel exit!
On your first rep through the 7-8-9 section, you went in a little deep to 7-8 so she read it well but it made it harder to get the turn away after the tunnel at :58. At 1:09 you were moving away beautifully (I bet you can get get a BC on the tunnel exit!) and that presented a ‘go tunnel’ bar there. You showed her the ‘way ahead’ challenge on the go tunnel bar at 1:45 and she did great with it – which allowed you to set up the turn away on the flat really nicely at 1:46 🙂 Yay! That skill looks terrific!
The next step would be to add motion on that go tunnel bar to go with. the ‘way ahead’ element. It is on my list of skills sets for this week because soooooo many dogs have the same question! And then the next step after that would be…. getting the blind cross on the exit of that last tunnel. Wheeee! That would allow you to set up a nicer rear cross on the last 3 jumps – or another blind on that ending line. The main thing would be convincing her to allow you send to the 2 jumps between the tunnel and sprint away, without changing her jumping form.Great job here! Let me know what you think!
TracyGood morning!
The first video is the skills sets from August 13, I think the link is not the one you wanted to post?On the 2nd video –
On the first rep, were she backjumped 3: you drove forward a tad too long, so she jumped long – that presented the jump on the way back to you. Add a little transition there (slowing down while still facing forward) and then turning – that will help her collect and drive around the wing.
It was much nicer on on that 2nd rep – nice transition and rotation on 3, so she set up a nice turn! yay! I think she read the 5-6-7 line really nicely – you were super connected and and she followed your lines perfectly. Nice decel into the turn at 7!!
3rd rep – another nice opening here 1-2-3-4!!!
The middle section looked good too – at :59 she pushed into the backside at 7 because you got a little far off the line for the FC at 6 then pushed her back too much to show 7. At 1:16 you made a very clear line to 7 and she read it nicely! So on those parts of courses, you can find your line and be careful about not pushing back too much – keep your connection and shoulders one like you did here 🙂
Your connection and lines looked really good on this video! And great job keeping it fun for her even when it didn’t exactly go as planned 🙂Let me know if I am missing a link!
TracyGood morning!
Wow, 2 seconds faster is really significant!
Sequence 1 looks great – you pushed hard on your turn on 2 and 4 with nice commitment and early cues and he did great!!! My only suggestion is that on the push to the 6 backside, stay a little closer to the jump with your shoulders open. At :14, you had a really nice backside push but your first step was back towards the tunnel so you had to step back in towards 7, which caused him to ask a little question. If you stay closer to 6 with your shoulders open to the bar, he will have a more automatic turn back to 7 for a smoother line. It is a subtle tweak but everything else was perfect!Sequence 2 – this is also looking really good 🙂 You might have gotten a tiny bit too far ahead on 1-2 so you had to wait a little to push to 3, so you can play with a shorter lead out to see if it s easier to push to the 3 backside without waiting. Great job driving the line to 4, he seemed to have no questions and had gorgeous slice lines 4-5! He was so fast, in fact that I think you were trying to handle 5 and he zipped away so fast to it! When you seem him looking at it, you can just leave for the tunnel there at :40.
Seq 3: wow, he did an amazing jumping job on the 2-3-4 section. The boy is an expert jumper, those slices were not a problem at all! And it looks like the 3 bar was full height too! that is one thing we have seen from Ivan all summer – anything that might be challenging turns out to NOT be challenging, he has a massive depth of understanding of so many things 🙂 Yay! His only question was on the tunnel exit at 1:13 – you were looking forward and not quite connected) so he looked up at you and had a little zig zag line. That was where the time was lost a little bit.
Great job on the convergences on this sequence – your feet were pointing into the lines so he easily pushed into the backsides as needed. Actually, all of your convergences on these sequences looked terrific – great job here!
TracyAwww crud! The #11 has gone rogue!!! The sequence should be 8-9-10-12 (leave out 11) and I will fix it when I get home. Sorry!
Good morning!
> did the Masters Sequence #3 and Mookie wanted to do all backsides. I really had to cue him as to what I wanted and did succeed. This was a handler issue which I resolved.
I have seen that happen a lot with plenty of dogs, especially BCs – they get into the backside zone and then it is hard to convince them to do it the other way. -so balance the reps a lot: one backside rep, one front side rep, one backside rep, one front side rep, etc. That can help prevent the dogs from getting themselves into a loop of only backsides.
>> However, he tended to knock the bars doing his backsides slicing them too closely.
A local instructor had told me to place a pole or a stool on the backside of the jump to teach Mookie to round his approach. The bars most often knoked on the Masters Sequence 3 were jump # 2, 5, 11 and 14. Once the poles on the backsides were in place he kept the bars up better at his height of 24 inches but kept all the bars up at a 20 inch height for which I also left the poles up.>>While the pole or stool won’t hurt with the jumping on the backside, it won’t necessarily help in the long term when. the pole or stool is not there (we have tried all sorts of different things and then when the thing is gone, the dog reverts to knowing the bar or hitting the wing. What really helps are the zig zag jump grids – you can see them in the zigzag thread. Those grids help the dog figure out how to organize the jumping on those slices and not touch the wing or bar on serps or backside slices.
>>Do you think I should use the poles regularly to give him the motor memory of how to round himself more for a backside approach??>>
I have not seen this produce motor memory in this dogs. They mark their jumping off the pole being there, but it doesn’t necessarily educate them about how to approach the jump when it is not there! You can always try starting with a big pole then gradually fade it out so they jump properly without it – it would be a progressive fading process that makes the pole smaller and smaller. But I much prefer the zig zag grid 🙂
>>I know this is a work in progress and we or I should say, I feel I have progressed. I will be working on all this well into the Fall when the weather is cooler.
Awesome!!! Yes, you can totally use them set ups so work the skills or even number your own courses on them!
Tracy
Hi! The ‘eat it’ cue is SO funny!! It just makes me chuckle.
On the threads – as he is approaching your hand on the ‘come’ cue, try to say eat it just before he touches the hand and without moving at all (leaving your threadle arm back behind you where it was when he was coming in). You were almost perfect about being stationary but you wanted to close your shoulder a little bit as you sent to the food. I am bugging everyone to keep their shoulders open so we can add motion – and he appears ready for you to add motion now (very slowly :)) I posted the motion stuff on Saturday in the course syllabus.
On the serp – yes, a quick detour to the food bowl on the first rep but the rest were great 🙂 He is doing a great job of finding the bar AND turning back out. And he is really responding to the eat it cue nicely without you needing to help out much at all! As with the threadles – keep your shoulders open on your eat it cue until he arrives at the bowl. The shoulders cue the 2md part of the behavior on serps and threads (the next jump of the serp and taking the jump o the threadle) so the shoulders being frozen open are very helpful for the pup 🙂 As with the threadle, I think he is ready for motion to start here! Start on easy angles (position 1) and add very slow walking (your upper body showing position as you stat moving to the jump) and I bet he will do a great job!
Nice work here! Let me know how it goes with motion 🙂
TracyHi!
That prop has so many cookies invested in it that I can see why he didn’t want to go past it LOL! You can show him the difference without motion at first: placing him on a direct line to you with the prop out laterally, and you will lead to past it – your break release means “come to da momma” and the get out cue (without the break) means go to prop. I think he was anticipating a bit when you were moving so when you got way ahead (like on the last one) he was pretty sure it was all about the prop 🙂 The lead out will add challenge and also give you a chance to connect strongly before the release to help him not anticipate.
About the reward – yes, it was smart to put lots of reward on you for Not going to the prop 🙂 You can also have him come back to you after the prop hit – I think it is better to have him hit then come back to you line (rather than you go out to his line) because that will simulate what will happen on course (he goes out to a jump then returns back to your line). Let me know if that makes sense! Nice work!
TracyHi! This looked like it felt much smoother with the extra room outside. He was a little more distracted by the environment for some reason, I wonder if the food was too ‘calming’ 🙂 so you can get him really wild with toys and or dancing cookies before asking for the sit stay. I think the driving to your hand and turning away then finding the prop on both the lap and tandem turns looked terrific! You were very clear when you wanted him to come into hand. If he was having trouble when you were closer to the prop (as you described above) you can reward right from your hand for passing the prop (balanced with the ‘normal’ parallel path going to the prop). This is also a great warm up for future contact/tunnel discriminations too 🙂
nice job here!
TracyGood morning! This was a really nice high value set of sessions!
He did really nicely with the double cone set up!!! And his work on. the squished tunnel looks good. And great job building value for the big barrel – he looked MUCH more comfy wrapping it here! And great job with the turn and burn on the laundry basket LOL! He is learning to wrap ALL the things 🙂 And he did a great job with the rotated sends as well. The value of he ball makes it easier because he really loves it. You can mix in throwing the reward back past the object as you run away to keep the value evenly balanced. You can start the rocking horses with more running on the tunnel/cone set up, I think he will do really well on that!Tracy
Hi!! These are looking terrific! she is finding her serpentine from all sorts of different angles. She is taking the jump really well, but more importantly she is making the 2nd turn back out on the serp as you move through. That is great! The motion does not appear to be a problem for her at all – excellent!!!!! Since we were talking about releases – you were using ‘here’ on this session. If ‘here’ is an attention cue or directional you would use for serps on course, then that is perfect! She was staring to anticipate, though – it looks like she was starting to inch out of her stay later in the video when you started moving rather than waiting for the hear (I don’t think you were saying ok but maybe I didn’t hear it?). So, to help remind her to wait until she hears the cue: you can throw in reps where you physically move all the way around the jump, make connection, etc… but do not say the cue to release. Then either throw a reward back to her or go back and deliver the reward. That way she will get some value going for *not* moving just because you are moving 🙂 Moving lead outs are super helpful on course, and this is a good game to help her out to remember that.
Yes, eventually you will want to add motion to verbal only reps of this, no arms – but that is after she can let you run through showing the motion and arms along with the verbals. It is hard but she is doing a great job!!!
TracyHi! We’ve been testing the dogs for a while about whether they will get confused about the different releases – and as long as we are consistent, they are fine and hold the stays beautifully. For example, I use 4 releases on the starts line (especially in training): “break” (which, like your “OK” means to leave the stay and start working). “Close” is lie your in in which means take the other side of the jump in front of you. “Catch” means you can get up and get the reward I am throwing. “Get it” means to leave the stay and get the toy on the ground. So 4 different behaviors are cued and the dogs learn them really nicely 🙂 and they don’t break the stays on stuff like praise or motion. Let me know if that makes sense!
TracyGood morning!
Sequence 1 is looking good! The turn on 3 looked good at :07, :24, Nietzsches timing and connection on the cues!
Cuing 6 with the outside arm at :13 and :27 worked really well! And when she lands, you can cue 7 the same way (early rotation) rather than stepping forward then rotating (:14 at :31) – I bet she can take it as more of a throwback and that will tight then turn and get you out of there even sooner.
On the 3rd rep, you turned her left on 3 which is a god one to try – you had a really nice collection before the jump but then she went wide on landing – as you move away, you can all her name a few times to see if that helps her drive back immediately – she might have been looking for a line and the name call can help bring her back.
On the very ending line, I liked the early rotation on 6 as you moved away – definitely earlier than the previous reps and she had a question on the bar, but worthwhile to show her as it helped you get to the rotation on 7 even sooner – which set up a better collect there at :45 Like on jump 3, she didn’t back immediately so you can try calling her name after the turn cue to see if that helps st the next line.Seq 2: watching it from a jumping perspective, I am happy with how she was organizing herself on the hard slices, like at 5-6!!! The modifications are good, and yes, she doesn’t need to see very many automatic backsides 🙂 The opening line and push to 5 was strong 💪, one detail to try:
between 3 and 4, I think a stronger collection cue, more shifted back to her eyes and the landing spot of 3, will get her to add a turn stride before take off for 4. And doing that a little closer to 4 (rather than landing of 3 and help it even more (which means handling 1-2-3 more laterally away from the line).
On the convergence line to 7 – your running line at :29 was good! She needed a bit more upper body turned towards her, so that the outside shoulder help to ping her away to the backside (you were looking forward a bit there so it opened up the front side more). You were definitely stronger with the upper body at :57 and it really helped – be sure to maintain the running speed there too that you had at :30 so you can support with running line and connection.
Yes, the go go was a little late on the tunnel towards the end – in those moments you can exaggerate your upper body turning towards her so she can push back to the line – you turned forward so she followed that line.Seq 3: very nice!!!! 1-2-3-4 looked really smooth and fast, especially the nice right turn over 3 to find 4. The timing on your turn at 4-5 was a tiny bit late on the first rep but really nice on the 2nd rep at :25! As you begin that rotation, you can try dropping the ‘new’ arm (right arm in this case) down low and towards the takeoff spot, rather than higher and out. Now, that is easier said than done when running LOL!! So, you can decelerate sooner into order to rotate and get the arm in, which will lead to an even strong turn cue.
She was collecting nicely on 7 here too! This is a spot where you can add in her name to help her drive back around the jump – she was landing and looking for you, waiting for the next cue – so it can be her name to finish the turn and then the go tunnel cue.
Good job on the get out on the exit of the tunnel, that is difficult! She was exiting turning left, so you can play with giving her the get out cue just before she enters – so she is prepared for it on the exit (I start it when the dog is 3 to 6 feet before the tunnel entry, then give it again when they are exiting. The other option there is to give her the right cue and then the get out (right happens before try and get out happens as she is exiting).Great job here! Let me know what you think!
TracyGood morning!
Seq 1 – the opening section went really nicely with the wraps on 2 and 4 on both runs, especially the 2nd run!! On the 6-7-8 section, your connection got a little soft, meaning after you got her to the backside of 6, you turned forward at :15 sp she didn’t read the serp at 7 as well (your shoulders should e ‘open’ to her, facing the jump bar, on the serp there rather than facing forward. Then ar :18 you were facing forward on the convergence at 8, so she read it as front side. On those seraph convergence lines, remember that your shoulders will face her and your eyes will be on her eyes – resist temptation to look at the jump. On the 2nd rep ar :41, you used more motion to converge into the gap and it really helped! Keep adding in the connection, looking at her eyes, an that will make it even easier for when you can’t get as far ahead.
Seq 2 – on the opening, you don’t need to call her as much while she is in the tunnel because that turns her towards you when we want her to turn away to get 3: so you can make a strong connection ke you did, but use a ‘get out or backside verbal to push her away sooner.
Really good running line 3-4-5!!!! Your path set up a really nice path for her. The only thing I would add there is opening up your shoulders to face her on the serp jumps (3 and 4) rather than facing forward.
I think on 5 you forgot for a moment on the first run that it was a tight turn back and you accelerated down the line rather than turned her – nice save to get her back to the tunnel! Good connection throughout, too!
On the re-do: remember that 4-5 is a convergence line, so you need to turn your upper body very directly towards her nd one your feet into the gap. That upper body connection is really helpful! At 1:21, you were running on the ‘normal’ serp line, looking ahead – your arm pointed out and you did say your backside cue, but the physical cue said front side so that is what she took. At 1:49, you had a stronger upper body turn (you even use a bit of outside arm) and she got it! You can support it even more with your feet turning towards the gap there, which is more of what you did at 2:19 and it worked really nicely!On the wrap at 9 at 1:58, you showed the cue as she was lifting off, so remember to lock eyes with her as she exits the tunnel, so you can decelerations and show the cue early enough to help her set up a tight turn. At 2:31 you turned without decelerations or connection, so she didn’t end up taking the jump. Remember to work the transitions of fast-slow-turn to get commitment and the nice turn (you did a great job on that in the opening of sequence 1). So you might have been thinking decelerations, but you were already turning a bit sideways and not connected so she turned on the flat.
At 2:07, she ended up in the purple tunnel! I think it was mainly because you were running really close to the pink jump and then disconnected a bit, which probably made her think you were pulling then sending her back out. She seemed pretty sure of the choice!Nice ending on the last rep!! Especially that last backside – you had a really nice convergence line (note your feet pointing into the gap) and she was able to read it really well! You were getting your feet going really nicely on the convergences, so the only thing to add is your upper body facing her more (more direct eye contact, shoulders parallel to the br rather than looking forward.)
Nice job! Let me know what you think!
Tracy
