[Tracy Sklenar]

Good morning!

He was great about finding the jump here (and also turning when cued). Love it! And he was super fast 🙂

There was only one blooper, and it was a connection blooper. When he exited the tunnel at :35, you were looking at the jump and far ahead – that means he could not see the connection on where to be so he came into you. When you were close to the line and running and saying go, the connection was not as important and he did great! When you were further away, the connection is more important – so remember to make a big connection and point your arm back to him as you add distance, so he can see the line you want 🙂

>On a separate note, Max hates the car. He hides when he sees me gathering things to go, even when we are out and it is time to get back in the car, he tries to pull away. I feel bad about this. We do spend a lot of time in the car, it is 2 hours to Levelup. Any suggestions? Thanks>

Poor little guy! He might get a little motion sick. A couple of ideas:

On days when you are NOT planning to go anywhere, scoop him up and put him in the car for a few minutes along with something he loves: a bully stick, a stuffed Kong, a Toppl with cream cheese in it, etc. You can even feed his meals in the car crate! That can help make the car crate a good place 🙂

Also on days when you are not planning to take him anywhere: gather your stuff up as if you were going to class or something, pick up your keys… then put it all down and go watch some TV or something. That can help un-couple the cues that he knows mean you are leaving (which cause him to worry).

And as he feels more relaxed, you can add in turning on the car while he is chewing his bone or eating his treats. Then build up to short rides.

You can also ask your vet about adding a motion sickness med for trips – I know there are some good ones out there that do NOT make the dogs sleepy.

Great job here! Keep me posted about how he does with the car!

Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Good morning!

>She turned 8 months on the 9th.

Still a baby dog! We have plenty of time. Fun times ahead!!

>Shes pretty awesome.>

Totally agree!!!

> Different than what I’m used to.>

The sighthound brain brings differences to training for sure!! But I really enjoy it (as evidenced by me now having 3 whippet mixes and 2 full whippets LOL!!!)

> Training for agility and flyball of course takes time plus taking care of an injured dog.>

Poor Snap! How is she doing?

> I’ve learned that she does need one session to understand expectations then Bam! She’s got it! Love her!>

That is the sighthound… they think their way through the first session. Then they sleep on it, and come back knowing what we want and also knowing the next steps LOL!! So fun!!

Great job with her 🙂

Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Good morning!

>if you read this on Tuesday, I’ll be joining the Zoom call late – probably 7:15-7:30.>

I saw you pop in! Thanks for coming!!!

>Ellie did well with these, which surprised me because at class she almost always runs past the jump after a tunnel on the first rep. >

This session went GREAT, she was pretty locked onto the line which is awesome!

For running past it in class… could be the environment is harder, or you were moving faster? Or could be that your trainer (and her BFF :)) was too much in the picture… so of course you can test the theory and move the trainer away and see is Ellie finds the jump.

>’ll probably need to wait until May to start working on varying the trainer position.>

May seemed so far away until I realized that today is April 16th LOL!!! It gives yo ua couple of weeks to keep building up the skill.

> I edited out the first two reps, which had big swerves toward me. The reps on the video have some hints of swervy-ness, but by then she was probably expecting the reward to be straight ahead.>

The big swerves and little swerves might have been because you were walking and quiet, but she was pretty perfect when you were moving faster and she seemed to REALLY like the big loud GO verbals 🙂

My only suggestion is that you can throw the toy sooner. The throws were coming as she was arriving at the jump or just before it – you can move them up earlier, to when she looks at/locks onto the line to the jump. That will keep her looking forward even more.

Since this went so well, two things to add for the next session:

You can run all the way to the tunnel, touch it, wait for a heartbeat… then start running forward. That can get her really driving ahead! You can throw early on those and if it is hard to get a good throw in when you are behind, you can place the toy instead.

As a balance, you can add in sometimes showing her a turn cue (like a FC and verbal) before she enters the tunnel (at least 6 feet before entering) so she turns on the exit and doesn’t take the jump. She looks like she is ready to add the balance in.

Great job!
Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Good morning! These sessions went well!

You can give your verbals before the tunnel sooner, when she is still 5 or 6 feet away from entering. They were happening as she was entering, but I think part of that was because the spacing was a little tight. Spreading out the wings will give you more room and therefore more time 🙂

For the wing after the tunnel on the relatively straight line, you can give a GO for the tunnel exit before entering – she curled into you on those exits, a go can help that
You gave a dig at 1:20 jut as she was entering, which can possibly indicate a turn on the exit. So the Go can indicate exiting the tunnel straight, then as she is exiting you can switch to the dig dig for the wing collection (I know, soooo many words LOL!)

One important thing to note: Excellent connection here! You were super strong with that. Only one blooper was at :47 so she ended up on the wrong side of you. More connection was needed there which you added brilliantly at :55. Yay!

Good job with the verbals in the minny pinny! She did well with figuring out the turning away from you too! One blooper, but that is useful for her: knowing what is correct versus incorrect (in terms of how to get reward) really helps learning as long as there are no too many bloopers (which would increase frustration and not be helpful :))

The SOTC probably has a bit more wear to it so it feels different? But what she was doing there was restricting her natural movement and not moving her front or rear with extension or shifting into collection. If you want her legs, she keeps them tight under her with very little ‘reach’ from the front, or ‘push’ from the rear. Her legs remained basically under her torso, probably so she could stay balanced – it created a bit of a ‘rocking horse’/up and down movement.

In the minny pinny, the skill doesn’t ask for any extension but note how she chooses to carry her rear rather than push from it – that is probably also so she can stay balanced and not slip.

They are good decisions from her! But they are both unnatural movement – I bet if you took these out on grass you would see her move very differently. And repetitive unnatural movement can be problematic, so I will continue to be a pain in your butt to convince you to wrap her feet so she can feel stable and move naturally on turf 🙂

Great job here!!

Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Good morning!

> I guess I just can’t help but feel behind on everything, haven’t even made it through most of the week 3 stuff. >

This is totally relatable and also unfortunately normal with young dogs… that feeling of always being a bit behind. You are perfectly on the right track! You are working the week 3 stuff which means you are in the correct week, and doing well with the training! Add in the up-and-down of adolescent dogs where they know something then they don’t know it then they know it again… it is hard on our human brains! (Side note, ask me what week of this class my 13 month old puppy is on… haven’t even started the pre-games LOL!!!)

>Trials and new places may be the majority of the chances we have to do training for the next few months.>

This is good, and it will make for a lot of great opportunities. Structuring the sessions will help you get a ton in while also making it easy to be in new environments.

>In all honesty, I was tempted to end the session after working the first direction, which would have been right at the 2 minute mark >

You can take a break, let her walk around or chill, then come back later or during the next walk through, etc. So it can be multiple 2 minutes sessions spread out during the day.

>but quitting after two failures would have meant quitting after the first two reps, which would have made this feel like a pretty meaningless session.>

The 2 failure rule is not about stopping after 2 failures, it is about adjusting to be able to keep the rate of success closer to 90%. So after failure 2, you can adjust the session like changing her position so the answer is extremely obvious. Or, if you don’t know why it was going wrong, stopping for a moment to watch the video in slow motion – I admit that watching the video in the moment is a BIG pain in the butt and goes against my inherent laziness 🙂 but it has always been worthwhile because I can see what is happening and change it.

Sometimes we don’t know why it is going wrong… so we can stop asking for the skill and do something else that is very successful for the rest of the session. For example, if she simply cannot hold a stay during your next training session, and there is no discernible reason why – chalk it up to adolescence and do some wing wraps or something else. That way she still gets super valuable learning about how to do stuff in a hard environment.

> I DID make my handling very easy and obvious at that point, knowing she now also had a person hovering behind her). >

She did well with the hovering person! That was a lot of pressure but also useful pressure: it was like having a leash runner in the ring!

>I knew I would not have another opportunity to work the second direction for probably a long time, and since by then she seemed to have figured out the game we were playing, I expected the second direction would be super quick (it wasn’t).>

That is where the 2 failure rule can help – if you get an ‘oh crud this is not going as expected’ moment, you can give her a simpler starting point for example: facing the bar more or a cookie toss start instead of a stay.

The environment increases the challenge significantly enough that you can take out one of the challenges like the toy on the ground, or the stay, etc. And the cool thing you will experience is that she might not need to work the skill on both sides – she is likely to be able to lock the skill in even if she only gets a session on one side. That is one of the joys of BW brain – generalizing skills even if you haven’t worked both sides.

Let me know what you think! And again – you are not behind, you are doing GREAT, she looks fantastic. You are getting so much incredible stuff happening with her, all while balancing your career work with other dogs & their people, AND judging AND training/trialing your other dogs. WOW! That is really impressive and I am super excited for what is ahead for you and Beat 😍🤩

Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Good morning!

This is looking super strong, Laura Rose! Yay! It was an efficient, happy session: the play and the transitions back to the ‘work’ looked very smooth and happy. He was happy to tug, eat a treat, get the toy back when offered or line up for the jump (he was almost putting himself into the line up). And when you let him have the toy to himself for a moment while you moved back to the start spot, he took it on a quick party trip then brought it back to you for more play.

This stuff makes my heart smile, because the play and transitions make the skill work very easy: his stays look great (nice reward at the end!) and the jumping looks really good too! YAY!

For the next session, you can raise the bar of jump 2 by 2 inches (I am sure he will do great) and if that goes well, another 2 inches 🙂 You might have to angle the set point to give him more room to land on grass the the bar gets higher.

Since this is going so well, have you tried any of the other games that will have higher arousal built in, such as the smiley face games or any game with a tunnel 🙂 I think he is ready and you can use your lovely play and transitions in those too!

Great job 🙂

Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Good morning! Thanks for the comparison videos, they are very useful!

In the videos, he is doing well in the class environment. But the big thing. See is that the class setting is a lot more sterile than the trial setting, which is why the trial was such a big challenge for him. The ring at class is enclosed on a couple sides with solid walls, there was no one else in the ring (one bar setter came in during the first video, another one came in in the 2nd video) and the rubber footing makes is very different touch and smell for him. Plus he has reinforcement history in this environment but doesn’t have any reinforcement history yet in the dirt rings.

And it was hard for him to ignore the people near the start area, you can see he had trouble sticking with the stay in the beginning of the 2nd video – food was available but it sounds like there were other people & dogs nearby, so he was leaving to investigate. This struggle is also an insight into why he would struggle at the trial – many more dogs and people outside the ring, and more people inside the ring… and no food available in the ring/no reward history.

>Most of his reward was back at his crate in the adjoining room after each run.>

This might be a little far away for developing a reward system that you can use at trials. It is working for the most part in this specific location, but since trials are wildly different, it is not clear to him where the reward is and how/when to earn it.

So one thing to add to class/home/lessons is a reward station that you can bring with you everywhere. I use a small soft folding stool 🙂 And while most runs in training still have rewards in the ring (to keep building the obstacle and handling skills, and keep being in the ring super fun), I do throw in runs where the reward is outside the ring and I use the remote reinforcement marker. Knowing where the reward is can be extremely clarifying for him, especially in new places where things are so unpredictable.

Also, in class, convince your classmates and instructor to get into the ring like ring crew and a judge. When you begin this, you will want to have rewards with you to pay him for ignoring him (ring crew being added plus no rewards is too hard as a starting point). And you should ask folks to have their other dogs outside the ring – being visible, warming up, etc. Add as much as possible so he learns to deal with what he will see at the trial. Pattern games will be extremely helpful for him assessing the environment as the challenges increase.

And for rewards – I definitely think we need to build a ‘bridge’ so you can do FEO/NFC runs in the trial environment. Since he is a foodie, using a food pouch or lotus ball on a toy is a good starting point: the food is in the pouch in training at first, and he can have the food from the pouch. The food toy will take on lots of value pretty quickly!

Then we incorporate the food toy as the bridge toy and not as food holder all the time. The food stays on the reward station outside the ring but you run with the empty food toy – and when you want to reward (after every few obstacles at first) you present the empty food toy with your remote reinforcement marker – then run to the reward station to get food. He doesn’t need to interact with the empty food toy in terms of tugging, it is mainly a visual aid to help him out as you fade the food rewards in different/harder environments.

Having that bridge will allow you to work through the FEO/NFC steps of ‘just like home’ and ‘empty hands’, and having a clear reward station will allow you to work through all 4 FEO/NFC steps! And the reward station is also good for if you can find a UKI trial that has a food reward box. These FEO/NFC steps & reward station are what will help him acclimate to the challenging trial environment more quickly. Trying without that will be a lot harder.

>Venture wears a belly band in the building and I remove it when we enter the ring to run and put it back on after each turn. Then we go outside, band off and decompress. I’m tempted to try this at the next trial even though it’s a dirt arena, just to reinforce the potty in the grass only rule.>

You can try it for sure! I am not sure it is an answer because the marking is a stress behavior, so we will want to eliminate the stress (which will eliminate the peeing :)) Also, at a trial, we want to be sure that there are no accidental context cues – and taking the belly band off can become a context cue for going into the ring.

In class, there has been a history of food rewards so that context cue has been helpful: belly band off = good times coming! Yay! He is pretty relaxed and happy, and no urge to mark in these videos.

But in a trial, there are no food rewards in the ring (in fact, entering the ring signals the end of the food rewards) so taking the belly band off can become a context cue for entering the trial ring, which at this point might increase stress.

So I think the more important focal points are to develop ways to work FEO skills and the reward station, so he learns to run without food in a challenging environment.

>Next trial opportunity is a local ASCA trial on dirt, under cover. I originally planned to enter all the runs but I’m now leaning towards only 2 jumpers and 1 gamble Saturday and 2 or 3 runs on Sunday. >

ASCA has a lot of FEO opportunities! And there are also trial distractions and pressure. I agree that only a couple of runs each day, maximum, is what you want to do – you might even do just 1 or two because trial runs are mentally expensive for young dogs. But more importantly… let’s have FEO plans in place so you can work the FEO steps for these runs, to build up the understanding of being in the trial ring and reduce the stress.

Let me know what you think!

Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Hi!

>Haven’t done really any agility this week since I’ve been busy with business-building stuff>

Your future clients, myself included, are grateful for this!

> but I’m really glad you mentioned what you did in regards to Reacher missing the weaves last week because it addressed my gut feeling that I felt was right but was doubting myself.>

I feel like your gut feeling has a long history of being correct!

> So after the the second miss I didn’t do any more weaves afterwards.>

Very SMART! My philosophy is that it is better to stop than it is to create a problem where no problem exists 🙂

> Then, after my post to you I felt like he had more heat in that area when he was stretching up on my like he usually does, but usually there is no heat flooding into his back area. The weather has indeed been up and down and I did do the skin rolling and some massage and while he was not crazy tight I do think that was it.>

I am glad you found spots to help him out! I think the cold then warm then cold (plus icy) weather does a number on the dog’s muscles.

>On another topic, since you are teaching these topics in June and if I should be so fortunate to snag a working spot, which would you recommend for Reacher considering where we are and what we need to focus on?
-Turning Tails: Mastering the Handling of a Great Turn
-Discriminations
-Introduction to International Skills
-Beyond Novice
-ISC/UKI Coursework>

Definitely Beyond Novice, that is going to be geared specifically for the Reacher And Friends Crew 🙂
My 2nd choice for him would be the Turning Tails – he turns really well, so our focus would be figuring out just how tight his turns need to be, and how to balance a ton of speed in and out of them.

The discriminations and Intro to international skills will be fun too, but it depends on how much you want to focus on that style of handling.

>I have some ideas on what I think would be best but curious what you think!>

Let me know what you think! I am looking forward to it!

Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Hi!
Great session here, and it looks like he was having fun!! He seemed to have no questions about finding the jump. Super!

It was hard to see the tunnel entry – you can be saying the exit cue (GO!) before he enters (and again as he exits :)) to help him drive out straight. And since he was so happy driving ahead, you can play with adding a turn on the tunnel exit: when he is going towards the tunnel but still about 2 meters from arriving at it, cue a turn and then do a FC and run the other way. That can challenge him to NOT go find the jump, unless you cue it 🙂

>The last repetition here I did put the toy on the ground for him to make up for 2 sessions of my crappy throws.>

Placing the toy on the line is great especially for when you are behind him. If it is easy to throw, cool, we throw. But sometimes we are just too far or too behind to throw well LOL!! And you can use 2 toys for when you are throwing in some balance reps: one toy stays on the line past the jump on every rep, and he gets it when you mark him correctly going to the straight line. And the other toy can be in your hand as the reward for when you cue a turn on the tunnel exit. A fun mental challenge for him!

Nice work here 🙂

Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Hi! What a fun session! And yay for working outdoors several sessions in a row!

>Sorry about the camera work – needed a bit more zoom on some of those reps.>

No apologies needed, it all looked really good!

The goal of this game is that the dogs go find the jump with line focus and speed, regardless of where the handler supports the line from. Mission accomplished here, he was spot on in terms of finding the jump each and every time, no changes in arousal, no questions, nice striding. Super! His only question was on the tunnel cue at :29 – you said it and disconnected/moved away pretty quickly so he looked at you, and then continued to the tunnel. I think moving away that early is fine but you can stay connected to him with your eyes for longer to help support the line.

My only other suggestion is to use your toy marker verbal 🙂 But he had no questions there either.

For the next session, we can work on him driving ahead to the jump. That means you should run to the tunnel, touch it (to prevent you from leaving position too early :)) and wait for him to be just about exiting… then run forward so he can power past you.

Great job!!!

Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Hi! This is a super useful video!

> The other end of the building there were dogs running, but she couldn’t really see them from here. >

She could hear them, though, some really big things audible in the background. She turned her head that way when there was a big teeter slam, and also at 2:47 approx when someone as yelling LOUDLY (at their dog?)

>but not the second person who walked past while she was in a stay.
Not sure if this was just too much for her right now? >

Yes, that person was basically walking right towards her, and she is a sweet, inexperienced 10-month old (not even 10 months yet?) So it was a little too much. Plus the session was over 2 minutes long at that point, and she had passed the 2 failure rule threshold so there might have been some depletion of impulse control in her brain there too.

>Not really sure how else to test the waters with giving her some chances to work in this type of environment without risking her making that kind of mistake. >

Don’t think of it as testing, think of it as gaining experience and building behavior 🙂 A lot of options for that here – it was not a terrible mistake, it looked like was a greeting. The person was close enough that all Beat had to do was stand up to get to her. Also, bear in mind that she is an adolescent… impulse control is hard! And what they knew yesterday might not be what they know today (but it will be back tomorrow LOL!) so you can always change the plan, especially in hard environments.

One thing to make the priority here is that the environment is the hard part, so the skills you ask for should be very easy and virtually fail-proof. That also means we humans have to be almost hyper-vigilant and if you see someone approaching, get closer to her or release her to you so you can reward not greeting the person 🙂 It will get easier for her with more exposure.

And, TONS of pattern games and tricks for toys in that environment will help! You did have some pattern games in the session here, but the cookie tosses were really quick, perhaps too quick for her to assess/dismiss the environment. You can let her really engage back up to you then toss the next cookie.

Also, use pattern games or reinforcement for engagement to transport her back to a starting spot, rather than a cookie on the nose. That will give her more opportunity to learn about the environment in those in-between moments, which can be key!

Also, setting a timer to do maybe 90 seconds then be done is great for this super ‘expensive’ environment. This video was 4:43 with edits for resets, making it a bit too long with too many failures.

Living by the 2 failure rule will also help with engagement in hard environments. Anything that is marked as a failure (marker, toy withheld or removed, change of body language: all of that counts as a failure even if there is a reset cookie or pattern game after it).
After 2 total failures, make things easy enough that there are no more failures, then end the session to watch the video and see what was happening. In the moment, it doesn’t really matter why there were 2 failures, it only matters that there were only 2, total, to keep engagement high, arousal in the right place, and frustration low. When she got to 4 failures, she was starting to check out a bit. After failure 5, she was starting to look around (frustration comes up, arousal changes, environment becomes more obvious). By the end, she was 7 or 8 failures in and was jumping up on you more than driving to the toy. So definitely be aware of how much failure was happening – and if you can’t identify why, better to end with something really easy then watch the video.

One other thing that was causing failures was the release: the hand and verbal were happening together on the successful releases, so I think the hand was taking on meaning as the release! Then when you did the hand alone without the verbal, I think she released every time. So as you move through a serp or threadle, have your hand already up and in position – then add the verbal separately, so the hand movement doesn’t get paired into the release. (And also live by the 2 failure rule with stays included in the 2 total failures :)) if you get an early release from the stay, always spot check yourself to make sure the arm cue is not accidentally releasing her 🙂

(Side note: failures on handling games are 99% due to handler or setup errors, which is what was happening here, making the 2 failure rule even more important. That way she is not told she was wrong when she was actually correct :))

>I tried to warm her up with just some static serps, but she was confusing it with the threadle cue. >

I think she was correct – on the first rep, for example, she was on the threadle line based on where she was looking as you led out, and then you released at the entry wing (:15) which is threadle position, so she threadled (also failure 1 of the 2 in the 2 failure rule).

>A while back I did feel like she needed a verbal cue, “push”, for the serp cue to help differentiate from the threadle cue, especially when doing it statically. >

You are welcome to add a serp verbal but it gets tricky with all the different types of serp lines. The small space serp versus threadle relies on handler position for the release and threadle verbal versus regular release or directional/jump verbal. So leading out with you arm up and connection, then releasing when you are in between the uprights near the exit wing will help a lot (and with threadle verbal near the entry wing will get the threadle).

Also, setting her up on a clearer angle for now will help too – a lot of the threadles she did were when she was set up facing the upright of the jump, and watching you. The release and re-connection and arm came simultaneously on those, so since she was already watching you and could see the threadle line, she threadled.

You can also reward great effort because the environment is very challenging and the skill was challenging. On the 2nd rep, you had much clearer handler position. The serp was not perfect, but it was ‘close enough’ considering the environment and you can play with her on that. Note the pressure of the person standing behind her and watching, plus your arm cue happened after the release at :44. So definitely rewardable at this stage! Without the reward, you have gotten to the 2 failure threshold where I suggest changing the goal of the session and ending it sooner rather than later.

And if she threadles when you wanted a serp? You can reward that too, because there was likely something cueing it 🙂 Then you can make the next rep easier to get success.

So overall, as the environment gets harder, keep the skills easier. And since sometimes what we plan turns out to not be easier, you can dial it back more if you are getting errors for whatever reason.

Nice work here! Let me know what you think!

Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Hi!

>The judge was Don Farage.>

Cool! I will add him to my list of judges who put up good courses 🙂

>I did notice he wasn’t striding through the poles as nicely. It didn’t occur to me that he might be sore. >

Small dogs can often get sore in dirt, because it is relatively deep for them. For my smaller dogs, that soreness shows up in the weaves and it is usually in their mid-back T12-T13 area.

>Jake, my older dog, got a a massage but hadn’t thought of Indy getting one yet. We are trialing next weekend in Blue Springs and I now have a massage scheduled for both of them.>

Perfect! And even if he is not sore then, it is great to get him used to massages and body work as part of his event lifestyle 🙂 He has big things ahead, so bodywork will be very helpful.

>As I was walking the standard course yesterday I literally said out loud, I need my teacher here! You!! >

Feel free to send an email or message! But you didn’t really need me at all – you had the answer!

>The line to the weaves was the exact same as the Exc/ Master course. It was a struggle for most teams. I did a FC after the panel for Jake & he missed the entrance completely so I knew I wanted to stay on the near side for Indy. I knew I needed to cue deceleration to get a tighter turn & I’m realizing now, I didn’t even give him the verbal La La to indicate it. Bad handler.>

It was challenging!! Those types of discriminations are very popular nowadays!

>Sonia was the videographer. She is so supportive of all of us. I didn’t even know she was filming.>

She is simply fabulous!!!!!

> It’s encouraging to me when the people who have hung around for the novice group are cheering every dog on regardless of what did or didn’t happen in the ring. I need to start doing that on Fridays. We don’t typically run on Sundays so when we are done on Saturday we are packing up to get on the road home since we have so few trials in town.>

The novice folks would surely love the support! It is hard to begin a dog’s career, so many ups and downs, and they would probably appreciate the cheers 🙂

>TY for the videos on skin rolling. I will start doing that. I really don’t have much of a cool down routine. I try to warm them up before we head to the gate area & then while we are there, I continue doing stretches, the find my face game, some rally healing just to keep their attention on me. >

For cool downs, I usually do a long sniffy walk and then more skin rolling 🙂 If I can’t do the cool down immediately (like when I am grabbing the next dog to run – you might experience this when Indy is in Masters), I do it as soon as I can. I also really like Back On Track coats – they seem to reduce soreness! I have used them on myself with great results too 🙂

>Yesterday was tall to small & a lab was barking nonstop in the ring which was making Indy nervous.>

Yeah, that would definitely be a little anxiety-inducing!

> So we went outside, with another team who was outside for the same reason, and we did the find my face game & got Indy happy again.

That was smart to take him out and get him playing to get happy again!

Enjoy the rest of the weekend!

Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Hi!

> we did a quick follow-up session with the Sends & Serp. The bar is lowered from 12″ to 8″ and the jump is angled a lot, at least 45 degrees. Success rate: 6 out of 7!>

This went great!! The angle of the jump was just right, to help her out. In the next session, angle it a little less 🙂 And you can exagerate the serp arm being held back, that will help her find the serp even better. And throw in some FCs on the wing to keep the handler focus balance 🙂

The Minny Pinny is going well too! She is bouncing a pretty big distance – good girl!!!
She got the turn aways to the right better than to the left (same with going right versus left from the ‘neutral’ position: right wasa little stronger. So you can reduce the help on the right turns by angling her/leaning less. And if you get one error, no biggie, ask for the next rep with the same exact body language and see if she can fix it.

For the left turns, I think that helping her with a slight angle is still useful for now – the lefts just seemed a little harder. The left turns will end up catching up to the right turns and I am sure she will be very balanced.

Zig zags looked great! The stay does make this game a lot easier 🙂 I am chuckling because my suggestion to you for when you get to 3 and 4 wings was going to be to cue faster 🙂 Then on the last rep you cued SUPER fast, and it was great! She was very fast here but also she was responding to the cues… so if you were late, the lines got wider. So the faster cues are the way to go: as soon as you see her shift her weight towards the gap you want her to take, you can cue the next gap. It might feel like a sped-up version of 70s disco moves LOL but it worked really well 🙂

Great job!!

Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Hi!
While I am thinking of it:

>> I wonder if I should work more with food for a while to get more focus on me or if I should be patient and happy that she will drive to the toy.>>

You can also do the balance reps like on the serp game, for example: the TnT is out there the whole time, and sometimes you serp to it. And on some reps, you do a FC on the start wing to change her line with handling… and if she follows the handling, you can then send to the TnT. The balance reps can totally help make sure we’ve got handler focus too 🙂

T

[Tracy Sklenar]

Hi!
Good for you for weighting down the barrels – the wind tried its best to push them over!
She did well here! Super nice tight turns on the tunnel exit (but also went straight really well when you cued it). She also did well with the barrel wraps – there were one or two moments in the beginning where you connection was not as clear so she was not sure where to be on the barrel, but you sorted that out really well so in the longer sequences, she found the line really well! Yay!

>She was still trotting, it helped when I picked up speed. She was also getting tired.>

Since she seemed to really understand what to do, we can now get more speed 🙂 What toy does she really love? A ball? You can use a reward that makes her wild 🙂 Also, you can spread out the setup to get as much room as possible: you can put the tunnel as close to the fence as possible and then try for 20 feet between the tunnels and barrels. That way you can really run run run, which will get her running too 🙂 She tends to decelerate when you decelerate, so more acceleration plus crazier rewards can get her pumped up to run. Plus, you can let her watch her ‘brother’ Wayne run it… then let her run it once. Then Wayne, then back to MissL. That can really get her pumped up and running hard 🙂

Great job here!
Tracy

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