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Good morning!
He is doing well on the backside pushes! The most successes came when you were moving up the line directly and making the big connection. You can make connection and start the cue sooner, as soon as he exits the wing so he doesn’t look at you.
When he lost it a bit at about 1:20, part of that was because there was not quite enough connection, and also you were sending and a bit rotated (which pulled him to the front) rather than moving. When you got back to the connection and moving up the line, he did great!
Doing the countermotion separately worked really well at the end! Yay! When you add it together with the backside push, you can still drop the reward in on the landing spot as you move through to the countermotion exit. That way he learns to look for the bar behind you and not follow your motion. And, as you move through the countermotion, you can shift your connection to the landing spot as you throw the toy there to help support commitment.
Great job here!
TracyHi!
>>so far, he has shown he is not a fan of thinking when it’s hot out. >>
That is totally normal – he has not been alive yet for a hot summer 🙂 so he will take some time to adjust to heat and humidity. Short short short sessions with lots of breaks will help build up his heat tolerance.
This session went well – he got all of the tandem turns, and yes – I agree that the tunnel threadle at the end was awesome!!
>>I was surprised at the trouble we had with the tunnel in the warm up.
I don’t think you put the warm up reps in the video? He didn’t have any trouble 🙂 Was he missing the tunnel when you moved fast? You were careful on the early reps 🙂
>>That made for some quite ugly turns. I think I need to adjust my timing and tidy up my cue so that he wraps tighter there. >>
I think it is just a matter of calling him sooner (before he enters the tunnel to get a tighter turn on the exit of the tunnel) and a bit of decel on the tandem turns. I prefer young dogs go fast and a little wide because it is easy to tighten them up by adding in a little decel 🙂
>>All the passes around the wings felt a bit like racetrack.>>
That was probably a combination of the bigger distances and your acceleration – no worries at all, he did great and those lines will all get tighter as jumps start getting added in.
Great job on these! He is looking great!!!
Tracy
Hi!
The accordion is going well too! He is young, so you will see increases in power and the striding will change a bit. What was the distance between 1 and 2? It might be a little too big, plus he can be a couple of inches closer to jump 1 to push into that first gap between jumps 1 and 2.Rep 1 – I think the reward was in you hand on rep 1 so he was looking at you over 2 and 3. The other reps had the toy on the ground and they all had much nicer form!
Rep 2 -he released when you dropped the toy, so hard to tell what the jumping was
Rep 3- yes, as you mentioned, the distance not comfy so he tried to bounce and didn’t quite get it done. I think a shorter set point distance and setting him up a little closer to 1 can help get more power into the gap between 2 and 3. He did add the stride between 2 and 3 on the next 2 reps, which was a good adjustment 🙂
And the last rep with the jumps back in the closest distances looked really balanced! Yay!
Nice work 🙂
TracyHi!
The zig zags are going well here! You can add a wing to the end of the last bar so it looks like a full jump. This eventually becomes a jump grid, so making it look like jumps for now is the next step 🙂
We are it fancier when he is a little over a year old, so he has more adult muscling to add to the bigger grid 🙂Tracy
Hi!
I agree that he really liked the bigger distances – more running for you, but he loved it!His tandems looks great! He got every single one of them perfectly! That means you were consistently clear and timely with the cues 🙂 Super!
He had a couple of questions here and there in the session, all of which were connection questions.
When he exited the tunnel on your left and you want him to go to the wing (:44, 1:05 and 1:25) you were pointing a little too far forward and decelerated, so he slowed down a lot too. You can go closer to the tunnel exit in that scenario, then make a big connection and run forward more as he exits to get more speed to the wing.
He had a little blooper on the ‘out’ at :29 – you used a high arm and pointed forward, which turned your shoulders past the wing so he went past it. Compare to :52 – you handled with great connection and he got it very easily!
The other small spot was after the FC on the out wing at 1:15. He didn’t see the connection so he didn’t read the side change. You said tunnel, so he went into the one he was looking at. Good boy 😁
Huge difference there on the last rep – big eye contact exiting the front cross and he knew exactly where to go 🙂 Perfect!
Great job here!
TracyHi!
The backside reps looked great! Her lightbulb was totally on – she never looked at the tunnel or at the front of the jump. Super!! And nice connection from you! The little tunnel was perfect to use – it is still plenty distracting 🙂Looking at the lead outs – yes, that stay is starting to look really solid. And starting her really close and having the wing you were next to pretty close was good for setting her up for success.
On the 2nd and 3rd video, you were further away (landing side on video 2, much more lateral on video 3) and she still had no questions. Yay! I don’t think you bent over too much – the handling looked good!>>I think in both games I could have had more distance. >>
Yes, both games are ready for more distance. On the backside game, you can move the start wing further away.
For the lead out games, there are 2 variables to change: her position relative to the jump, and the distance between the jump and the wing. To help maintain her success, change only 1 variable in each session: for example, you can start moving her further and further back from jump 1, but you stay with the wing pretty close to the jump. Or, you can leave her close to the jump, and the wing you are standing next to gets further and further away.
When she is successful with both, we can start combining the variables.
Great job here!
TracyHi! Great seeing you last week!! He worked through the bird egg really well!
Good start here on the accordion grid! There are a couple of things we can change in the structure of the session that will get better jumping form:
For the stay, line him up closer to jump 1 (that bar can be super low, like 2 inches or a jump bump). He should be about 6 inches from that jump, so he uses his hind end more. Being further from jump 1 causes him to come in from his front end more, so he was trying to figure out what to do with his front feet. Starting closer will get him pushing from his rear.
The other thing to tweak is to move the reward target so it is about 15 feet past jump 3 on all reps, so move it out when you move jump 3 out (and back a little when jump 3 moves back towards jump 2). And, use a reward target that he will look down for – he was jumping head up looking at you (plus you were moving) so that was inverting his jumping. If you can lead out to the target, stand still, and use something he will look at – he will practice better form throughout!
A manners minder is great for that – the stay might be harder (because you don’t want to be moving up the line, you want to be stationary at the target when you release) so that is a fun game to practice indoors: stay with a MM 15 feet away as you lead out to it.
Nice work here!! Tracy
Hi!
He did well with the lap & tandems here and gave good feedback on timing and motion.His wraps on the wings and tunnel sends looked great! By the last several reps, he was hot and going a lot slower and wider… as the temperature heats up (his first real summer of working outdoors!) be sure to shorten up the sessions into one or two reps, then let him get into a baby pool or under a hose. And stop a session before he gets hot & fatigued. His heat tolerance will build up, but we can do ti carefully so he doesn’t run when hot/fatigued.
Back to the lap and tandem turns: You are going to chuckle! On the reps where he didn’t turn away or find the wing?
You were going too fast and/or you were too early. Usually we handlers are slow and late, so fast and early is a new adventure!
The lap turn and tandem turn (and eventually the threadle wraps) are decelerated moves, where we decel our motion and change the line (facing him on the lap turn, or puling away a bit on the tandems). Then we have to let them get almost to our hands, then we turn them away (the threadle wrap is a bit more independent but still a decelerated move).
The first few reps were too quick and too early, so he was confused.
Look at :56 – :59, where you were decelerated and waited til he got almost to your hand, then you were relatively slow (this is a good thing) as you drew your hand and leg back. Worked really well!
Compare to 1:06 – 1:08 – too early and quick so he did turn away but didn’t see the wing.
1:16 was better in terms of letting him get to your hand. But then your turn away was super quick so he didn’t turn away (he turned towards you there).
Driving into your hands for a cookie was good – he was happy to do it! You were at a hard angle relative to the tunnel exit on those, so he had to come back to you but definitely came back pretty quickly.
On the other side, at 1:25 he took some time to get to your hand because you accelerated straight as he was entering – you did call him, but the acceleration overrode that so he exited straight.
The cues were earlier at 1:31 for sure an he got it!The tandem at 1:42-1:43 was nicely decelerated and well-timed (letting him get almost to your hand) so he did really well there! He did not find the tunnel after it, probably because the tunnel was not really on his line (he would have had to turn really tight to get into it – I don’t think it was the toy throw anticipation). Changing the angle of the wing so he has a better line to the tunnel will fix that question.
He had questions on the last 2 reps at 1:55 and 2:08- your hand was up for a tandem but you were moving sideways towards the wing – so he looked at you (for clarification) then followed the motion and went to he other side of the wing. Good boy. So for a tandem, having your hands up and turning your shoulders away from the wing and away from him will help draw him to you before flipping him away. I let the dogs get pretty close to me on both the tandem (a foot or so away, or less) and the lap turns (2 inches from my hands 🙂 ) as that gives me the chance to show a really clear (and slow 🙂 ) turn away cue.
Let me know if that makes sense! Nice work here!
Tracy
Hi!
The smiley faces are looking good! After the very first rep where he had a question, you ramped up the connection then he had no more questions 🙂 He was very fast and also committed brilliantly, looking ahead. You can get a feel for his speed even more by spreading things out even more: you might find that you don’t need to hold up an arm to support the line; it might be easier to have low arms and lots of connection.
The accordion looked great! He was actually jumping for real 🙂 And he looked balanced. No worries about not bouncing the 11 foot distance – it didn’t look like a super comfy one-stride, he really had to shorten it up. So as he matures and gets confident with his power, we will start to bounce.
When you are feeling more secure with his stay (which looked good here), you can start moving the toy to help get even more power.
The very first wing send on the wind in your hair game (:51) was not that connected (from you) and he was thinking about the toy on the ground behind him 🙂 The next rep was great and so was 1:05 (we forgive him for scooting off for the toy at :59 LOL!)
The RCs are going really well!!! He committed to the jump and turned correctly on all of them, which is impressive because that means you got all of the info to him before he turned the wrong way. That is HARD to do! Yay!!!! So now keep trying to get on that RC line sooner so he drives forward and you can cut behind him before he takes off – you can get on it as soon as he exits the wing wrap, even before he passes you. While running forward to the center of the bar so you don’t push him off the jump by accident. That will help tighten up the turn, and experience will help too, so he can read it sooner.
The backsides are also going really well!!
>>I felt I needed to be over near his wing to keep him off frontside but then I don’t know how he could see wing>>
Yes, we want him to see the wing as much as possible – so try to run to where the wing and the bar meet. That way he sees the wing but doesn’t have an easy line to the front. On the successful reps, you were a little too far over but he still knew it was the wing (and yes, don’t get too excited like on the last rep LOL!).
On the rep at 1:51 where he went to the front side, you were running the correct line but closed your shoulder a little too early to maybe try to send him past you – and that shoulder rotation showed the front of the bar. So keep your arm back and eyes on his eyes until he is going around the entry wing to the backside.
Great job here!!!!!
Tracy
Laps on one wing very strong in both directions (these are precision rewards, so the food in your hand was great, because you are rewarding the instant turn away)
Adding the wing before: You might have been a ting bit early on the first couple, which is why you ended up sideways on some of them (stepping back too early can produce that) After 1:01 you were actually later in a GOOD way by letting him get almost to your hand then doing the lap turn. He read them all really well, especially after the FCs and the race tracks.
Strategically, when setting up for the lap turn, sending him further away to the wing before it helps you get into position for it (facing him and nearer to the lap turn wing) without having to back up. 1:56 is a g good example of that.
Tandems –
He is really great at reading the difference between sends around the outside of a wing and the tandem turns. All he needed to see was the the 2-hand cue starting and he zipped right into the tandems.SUPER!! Like with the lap turns, you were able to add the FCs and more speed really easily. Happy dance!So the next thing to think about here is a threadle wrap verbal 🙂 Yes, sometimes tandems are done on the front side of a jump (similarly to a rear cross on the flat) so that could be front side directionals (left, right, wrap, etc). We are seeing these moves a LOT nowadays as ways to pull the dog to the backside and do a turn away (including a full 360 degree wrap). So, new verbal needed!
I say “close” to mean enter on the wing closer to me and exit towards the other wing (threadle slice). And “in in” to mean enter on the wing closer to me and exit towards that same wing.
The different verbals are very helpful for speedsters like Jackpot so he can set up his jumping with knowledge of the exit from 18 feet away.
Great job here!
Tracy
Good morning!
>>that’s been a huge weakness this whole class. Cleaning up my reward system is at the top of my list.>>
Overall, your reward system is pretty solid because he is learning things quickly and he does not appear to be frustrated at all. There are a couple of things to do to make things easier, but in general you are doing great! One suggestion as you sort out where hold rewards: decide if you need a precision reward (a toy or treat that needs to be placed in a specific spot at a specific time to get the best behavior going) or a ‘hooray’ reward (a ‘good job we are finished with the sequence’) reward. A precision reward should be in your hand the whole time so you can get it to the placement as fast as possible. A hooray reward can be in your pocket or in your waistband and come out with a couple of seconds of delay, as you praise him.
Have fun!
TracyGood morning!
The zig zags went well! No problem with the wings and bars touching. He seemed fatigued on the last couple of reps where he missed the first jump, so now that there is more actual jumping involved fewer reps are good to keep him feeling powerful 🙂 You can add the last wing on to the end of the last bar, so it is all jumps & wings now (we are slowly building up to a really hard jump grid 🙂 )
On the tunnel threadles, he definitely reads your feet as a BIG part of the cue! On the very successful moments where he went to the threadle side of the tunnel (:54 and 1:16 for example), your feet were turned and facing the correct side before he exited the wing wrap before it. Super!!!! On the reps where he went straight rather than threadled (like at :47 and 1:01), your feet were facing the straight-ahead tunnel entry so that is where he committed to going. Good boy! So the earlier you turned your feet, the better his line was.
One other detail in this session: he did best on the lines to and around the wings when you kept your arms low and back, so he could see your face. When you were pointing forward, he would slow down and wait for more info (like at :35 and 1:07) or almost go behind you because it looked like the beginning of a blind cross (like at 1:13). Pointing forward ahead of him changes the line of your shoulders, which changes the cue. When you had lower arms, your shoulders faced the line better and he had no questions 🙂
Great job here!
Tracy
Thanks for stopping in and have a blast in Europe!!!!
I found a bunch of really good places that I think will be close? Hopefully I got the correct geographical area LOL!!! Here are some options. If any look interesting I can put you in touch directly. All are really good!
Canine New England in Walpole
Kate Biggar at High Fidelity (just outside Boston)
Agility Rush (Uxbridge) and John Nys
Andy Winther (not sure of which town exactly)Tracy
Hi!
The get out is going well! I think the clearer cue was when you used your outside arm at the beginning and at :38 – that was a really obvious get out cue compared to the dog side arm reps. That can help you take out the small step towards the jump.You can also turn the jump 90 degrees, so the bar is parallel to your running line. That will add challenge by asking him to slice the jump moving away from you.
Minny pinny is also looking good!
>>Not sure if extra step is collection or due to spacing?>>
I think it was because you were standing still 🙂 And that is fine because it is a collection game for the soft turns and he was bouncing on the first part of it. The spacing is good, s you can emphasize getting the verbals more independent. Have him start next to you and gently hold his collar. Then start saying the verbal 3 or 4 times, then let him go so he starts moving (and keep saying the verbal). That way he is hearing the verbal separately from handling cues and he will propel himself into it.
He seems to be listening to the verbals: It was interesting on how the one rep where you had the wrong verbals it was also the one rep where he touched the bars!
Nice work here :)
TracyHi!
The get out is going well! You were really good about running as straight as possible and letting your upper body do the out cues (and she was also really good about NOT doing an out when you didn’t want it 🙂 ). You can keep adding distance away from the out jump – you might find using the outside arm pointing to the jump is useful as more distance gets added, and that can also help you get the FC or BC on the jump because you have more time to start the turn when she looks at the jump.
Zig zags are looking good! She wants to bounce through them, which is a good thing, so we can help her do that by having the end of each jump bar touch the next wing. That will shorten up the distance and you will see her start to bounce rather than add strides.
Mission transition – more distance between the jump and the wing will make this a bit easier to time the transition to be sooner. Because they were relatively close together, your decel was happening with her closer to the jump. It was fine with the lower bar and she got good collections (:11, :26, :38, :45), but as the bar starts to get higher, the decel will be ore helpful for her if you start it just after she exits the start wing. And then keep moving forward/facing forward until she lifts her front feet for the jump – rotating too early will pull her off like at :18. As she gets more experienced, you can rotate sooner but for now you can wait til her feet are lifting to guarantee the commitment 🙂
The lap turns and tandems are going well!
>>I think my arms were a bit flaily (apparently that’s not a real word, lol), especially on the tandem turns. She still figured out what I wanted for the most part as long as I was not on her line>>
I think you arms were fine, not too flaily 🙂 What was happening was that you were too early (yes, too early!) on the lap turns when she went to the wrong side of the wing. Your arm and leg were stepping back to soon, so it looked like a cue to go to the other side.
After :21, though, you were great about letting her get almost to your hand and then stepping back into the lap turn. Nice! When you add more motion from a wing before it, you can send to the wing from further away so you don’t have to run backwards 🙂
On the tandems, your arms were good! She went a little wide because you had a lot of forward motion, so be sure to decelerate into it to tighten up the turn. You had decel on the last rep at 2:18 and that was lovely!
Great job here :)
Tracy
