[Tracy Sklenar]

Hi!

>>Jump training will be put on hold for a little while. Promise got spayed on Friday. She is doing very well and today has decided she is perfectly well and this crate/cage rest is a huge injustice! It’s going to be a long recovery . It’s never a good time to schedule these things, but now was a good time in terms of competition and in preventing another heat which she does not do well with at all.>>

Yes, there is never a good time to do it but it is a good thing to do 🙂 I like my boy dogs intact but my girl dogs spayed LOL! I am sure she will make a quick recovery and will be angry that she didn’t get to play LOL!


>>I think potter and Annalise will get to take my working spot in the two week class>>

Great idea! We are going to keep it open til Thanksgiving, so it is a but longer than 2 weeks LOL!

She did well with the slow motion parts of the session here, I totally agree.

>>I thought it went really well at the slower speed and then started getting sloppy with fatigue and increased motion. >>

 I don’t think it was fatigue of the Hund end muscles, I think maybe it was a brain explosion from having to run past the reward target? That seemed to be all that she could thing about LOL!! I bet she has no trouble with it next time 🙂

Next time on the backside circles, we can add more of your motion – rather than standing still, you will walk forward into it, with you heading to where the wing meets the bar so she can see the wing. As she passes you can turns her head, you will slowly walk forward past the wing, still asking her to sit til released then go t the reward target. You will have to move very slowly 🙂 because we are challenging her to organize with counter motion.

>>I’m guessing these activities will be the perfect activities to start with slowly once she gets released by her vet.>>

Yes, especially the very beginning ones with just the platform. But they are core-heavy and if you did a traditional spay, her core is going to be sore 🙂 so my guess is that you will want to wait a minimum of 14 days and maybe more.

Great job here! Let m know what you think!
Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Hi!

>>I had to switch to a Cato Board for the slicing exercises as my Aerobic Step was sliding in the dirt as Street was pushing off and I didn’t want him to hurt himself or get scared. It’s wider than the Aerobic Step but he still organizes pretty well.

Yes, the Cato plank went really well!!!

>>He is a bit slow sitting on some reps but I think he is anticipating the release.>>

Yes – a slight delay because he was thinking ‘forward’ and his brain waves had to travel to his butt 😁

One thing I noticed on all of these was that he was either thinking REALLY hard or he was a bit stiff in the hind end, kind of keeping his back feet together as he moved more than I remember him doing on grass. Maybe it was the different footing, or maybe he has been partying too much lately LOL! But give him a bit of a massage and see if he feels tight anywhere.

He did really well with the front side slices! I think you can trigger the MM sooner, so he looks at you even less. You can click it as soon as his butt sits on the Cato plank because there is a slight delay between the click of it and the grinding noise, so then the release will happen with perfect timing to get him looking at the MM.

The next step can be to add more speed with you moving faster, or another 2 inches to the height of the bar (but not added speed from you. Both are good to work on, you can start with a bit more speed from you then raise the bar and do a couple of reps with less speed from you, all in one short session.

The backside wraps are going well – he is organizing as we want him to and looked pretty balanced on both sides. He was a little forward on a couple of the right turns but he fixed that pretty quickly. The bar down at about :20 was just because you were in the way but you fixed it on the other reps.
He was able to pass the cookies that were already placed in the bowl towards the end of the session, but there was a LOT of thinking about that happening LOL!! So you can put the MM in that cookie target spot, he seems better able to ignore it.

So now the next step here is to keep you moving, slowly, the whole time. Move towards where the backside positional cue (where the wing and the bar meet, so you are not blocking the wing) til he is past you, then you will slowly move forward past the wing (while he does the sit then release on the Cato plank). That is what the handling cue will look like, so we can now challenge him to continue to organize himself while you keep moving. You might find it easier if you send him to a wing before it, so you both are in motion right away.

On the backside slices:
AS with the other skills, remember to stay in motion so that decel is not the cue to organize. Your motion can be very slow as long as it is steady the whole time . You were sometimes staying in motion, sometimes stopping with him, so we want to be consistent that you will always be moving.

Of the 3 sessions here, was this the last one? This was the one session where he looked like he was carrying his hind end over the bar more than pushing off, so he was probably just fatigued. You can structure the training a little differently: since it is such a big workout, you can do 10 or 12 reps of any single skill (or split tat between 2 skills). If you want to do a circuit of several skills, limit to 3 or 4 reps of each skill on each side, so you stay under 20 reps total for the entire session. That will avoid fatigue and form change. I think he will be fine for this skill but you can start the next session with it so he can feel the power 🙂

Great job! Let me know what you think!
Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Oh wow! Congrats!!!! Sounds like he was AWESOME!!! I can see him being even faster in that pumped up environment 🙂 This is so exciting!!!

It is smart to NOT do anything else today. Tomorrow is perfect! And I am sure we will keep this forum open longer than the 2 weeks, to be sure everyone can get a chance to play 🙂

T

[Tracy Sklenar]

Yes! Now I remember! I will need to go watch that episode again. It wa such a good show.

Sorry to hear about your calf 🙁 Looking at the calendar – would it help if we kept the forum open til Thanksgiving? Let me know!

T

[Tracy Sklenar]

Good morning!

He did really well on all of these!

Looking at the jumping away from the course on seq 1:
The mark/focus forward looked like the tightest option, he jumped it well and you got far ahead. The throwback was too tight, good for wrap starts. The behind the back got more extension over jump 1 when he was pretty close to it to start… but towards the end of that section you were further from 1 and that worked better! He was not as tight as on the mark/focus forward, but you were further ahead and I believe he was faster 🙂

The slicing starts to the threadle also looked good. You can start him a little further from jump 1 there for a little more power into the first jump, but he jumped it all really well and his turns looked great – especially when you did the FC on jump 2! NICE!!!

The last section was jumping towards the course on the slice angle. That went well too 🙂 His only question was at 1:55 where you sent from a distance that is a little outside his comfort zone. You needed to be maybe 2 more steps closer to the 2nd jump like the other reps as you sent him (and send before he passes you). This is a good spot to work, because you can extend the distance on his send by starting where he is comfortable (maybe 3 meters from the jump) then gradually work getting further and further away from it as you send & reward, so you can extend the distance away on the sends up to 5 or 6 meters.

Great job! Let me know how the next sections go!
Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Hi!
I’m so glad he is feeling better!!!! And it sounds like sequence 1 went well 🙂
Sequence 2 looked really good on the video! He was definitely acting more like himself: fast and ball crazy!!!!
He found the lines beautifully. You can try him more on the jump 3 backside: make sure he can see the wing, with you on the landing side. Then when he passes you, you can look at and point to the landing spot while you move forward past the wing to get ahead of him.

Great job!!! Let me know what you think!
Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Hi!
Sounds like he did really well at the seminar! Super!!!!!!

And the 3 jump session here looked really strong too. His stay looks awesome 🙂 and he is doing a great job with the zig zags!!!

>>He did well, though the off side he still doesn’t get – a project on it’s own I guess.>>

Yeah, but not a high priority at all. He would have to jump away from you to get jump 1, so it doesn’t make a lot of sense to the dogs. Having him jump towards you on 1 like all the other reps makes more sense to him and he looked good!

Since this looked really strong and we don’t quite have enough moving target room, I’d say the next session is the 2 jump backsides, with a reward target placed in advance so he can go past you. That will also have more handler motion, which he is definitely ready for!
Great job!
Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Hi! This is looking great!!
She is finding the line really well and doing the proper zig zags 🙂 Super!!
The MM is helpful for keeping her head down. Ypu can click it sooner: as soon as she lands between 1 and 2, and before she looks at you.

When you are going the other direction, try to also have something in the reward target before you release her (so she doesn’t look at you at all) or you can bring the MM to the other side too!

The next step is to flatten the angle, by moving the outer wings of the jump further from each other, an inch at a time. And you can also see if she will play with a toy as the reward target, so we can use it as the moving target.

Great job!!
Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Hi there!
Sorry about all the rain!!! But these sessions looked good 🙂
The magical cream cheese moving target works like a charm! Super!!! I think you’ll definitely be able to use that.

And the head turning is looking really strong – he is really turning so nicely! His left turns might be a little better but they both looked really good 🙂

When is the rain scheduled to stop? I am excited to see the cream cheese target on the Zigzags!!

Great job 🙂
Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Good morning!
Maisy was DEFINITELY happy to do this with you! And I think we are seeing jumping improvement already, thanks to your training. YAY!!!!

Looking at the 1st set of sequences: I think the throwback options where you are rotated are terrific for her. She is able to get a nice tight turn AND keep the bars up!
You did a throwback on a low bar on rep 1, looked good! She ticked the bar but that was just her getting things sorted out.

On the 2nd rep, you died a send but she was too close to the jump so didn’t get organized in time. You had her more settled and looking at the jump for rep 3 and again at rep 6, she was looking at the bar more, and they both looked good!

The other throwback reps (rep 4, rep 5) looked great! She was also REALLY strong with her jumping on the circle wraps on the backside of 3. And I think there was only one bar down on jump 3 (on rep 4) because you decelerated and threw the toy. When you powered through jump 3 (front or back) she was perfect 🙂

On the 2nd sequence with the threadley opening: She did well with jump one and was coming through nicely to jump 2 when you rotated. That’s a clear cue for her! And since you were already rotated, you can use a throw back on jump 2 (this is what I did with my big dog in the demo video) rather than rotate towards her to bring her in then rotate again to face 2. When you rotated again to face 2, she would brush the inside wing of jump 2 with her shoulder or bum (hard to see which it was). Jump 3 also looked good – she had one bar down on the backside circle wrap but that was towards the end and maybe an bout of fatigue? You can work on those in the other class too 🙂 But she finished on a perfect jumping effort there!

Great job! Let me know what you think!
Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Good morning!

I don’t know him that well, but he looked pretty enthusiastic in the 2 reps here! Was he not feeling into it in the other reps? You can post more reps, maybe I can see why he wasn’t into as an outside observer.

On the first video, he was doing really well and found the line! When you were cuing jump 2, you were looking forward ahead of him so he knew it was jump 2, but he was not sure if it was slice or wrap. Try to keep looking at him and not at the jump, as you move to the outer wing of jump 2. It will feel weird to run forward but looking at him 🙂 But will work really well because he can see your shoulders better.

He found the slice nicely on jump 2! He looked happy to be playing with the ball and he held the stay nicely (even though he was pumped up!). You needed to be one more step past jump 1 to release, to set the line to jump to. He had a question because you were a little behind, but your connection was good here!

Keep me posted on how he is feeling!!! Looking forward to the next reps 🙂
Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Good morning!

Lots of really good work here!!!

>> For the zig zags, we kept the same angles and the 10” height – she seemed fine – consistent, as far as I can see?

Yes, she did great! In fact, it looked like she was powering more into a center landing spot towards the end of the session, and not landing as close to the bars. This is SUPER considering we are giving her absolutely zero momentum to get into the setup!!!!

So when you come back to these on Sunday or next week, you can choose your next adventure: either the 2 jump backsides using this angle (with her starting next to you where the wings meet, so you can send her to the backside), or with the 3 jump setup and the angles slightly more open (because it is harder).

For the backsides, you will be moving and not that far ahead, so I suggest the toy already placed out past the 2nd jump (12 to 15 feet past it) for her to drive to as you move, because you are not likely to be able to outrun her to get to moving target position, and also we don’t want her looking up at the toy in your hand.

For the 3 jump game, you can do the lead out and moving target you did here with the 2 jumps, that looked great.

>> Later we tried the organizers with the wing again, this time with a toy. I felt like this was better – she was more focused forward, but still (mostly) able to sit! I missed videoing a couple reps on the right side, but they looked a lot like these.>>

YEAH! She did well here! The toy is the magic focal point, and extra credit that it matched the jump wing LOL!
When she was on your left… looking good! It was harder on your right at first (she even offered being on your left, which was clever LOL!) but you slowed things down a little and then she sorted it out. Perfect!
So next steps would be to move the toy reward more fully around the wing, and to add the jump bar in. This probably means doing it outside, so before the bar goes in you will want to refresh this skill in the great outdoors because things are different outdoors (and no cats available to help haha)

Great job! Let me know how she does in the next steps!
Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Good morning!

I agree, the zig zags went well!

>> With the same angles as our last session. I thought went really well, so flattened out the angles just a little bit.

Yes,that was the right move, he was ready for a bit more challenge and did really well.

All of the left-to-right reps looked strong! And he did have trouble with the right-to-left reps at the end (but not at the beginning, those were the reps you started with). Why did it happen? Could be the harder direction, could be fatigue, could be a slight change in how the reward was moving, could be answered D) All Of The Above LOL! He definitely was running more than jumping on those last two reps, and since it was later in the session, stopping was the right choice (any loss of physical or mental form is a good stopping place :))

>>One thing I have definitely learned from this class is that he is much more comfortable turning to his left. Would you expect this much of a difference?

Yes, it is expected and these technical jumping skill stuff tends to reveal the side preferences because the dogs can’t compensate and we don’t chalk it up to something like a late turn cue. I saw it in all of my dogs during training. It is really no worries – we humans are exactly the same and can learn to be more balanced.

>>Thinking I should get him in for a massage just to make sure something physical isn’t going on.

Because he is now in the stage of his career that he is doing all the big fast stuff, definitely have some regular massages – partially to keep him loose, and partially to make sure nothing is brewing that might be restricting his movement. My guess is that there is nothing brewing, but I am a huge advocate for body work for our canine athletes 🙂

So on his next zig zag session, you can do a quickie warm up on the easier direction, same angle, one or two reps… then go to the harder side and see what happens (this should take out any fatigue factor) If he still has the question, you can dial back your motion to a very slooooooow moving target or even being stationary. If he still has questions, you can open the angles up a bit to make it easier.

>> And some Organizers with a Wing. Took a bit to figure out how to let him know what the game was and sort of sort out my mechanics. I’m guessing you’ll have some suggestions on this one

The organizers with the wing are all about figuring out the mechanics and teaching the framework to both us and the dog – there is a lot going on LOL!!! The original conditioning exercises bring this to a jump right away, and I am like: let’s start on a wing so we can all get our mechanics together LOL!! That wing is a powerful visual as a thing to wrap, so he had trouble realizing he needed to sit on the platform which is currently a lower value skill – and hind end work fades into the background of processing a bit when presented with a powerful visual like the wing.

You did a really good job of setting up success with a big obvious physical cue, then fading it – he really had the idea by the end!!! I think the hardest part for him was when you were facing him – giving him a little more room to come in between you and the wing as a serp or recall to heel will help. But, we also address it in the slice games so you don’t need to worry about it here. The handler position facing the dog was mainly to get the dog to stop in position and you got it with you facing the wing, which builds us to the jumps.

Even as you sort out the mechanics on just the platform, you can count reps so he doesn’t do too many especially on one side. You can limit to maybe 5 reps then switch sides to keep him balanced and avoid fatigue.
If he can start the next session with the organization he ended with here, you can switch sides and do some right turns. Then the session after that can have the bar added in.

Great job!!! Let me know what you think!
Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Wow, Wendy, she is doing SO WELL!!!! Thoughtful, fast, organized AND holding the stay, all with the moving target happening. SUPER!!!!

I am very happy with this so I think we can move on again to the next step:

Definitely flatten the angles a bit more. You can repeat this session on a flatter angle, but also I think you can do the backsides too on the flatter angle. You can see the backsides version of this on the Course Syllabus page.

The backsides don’t involve a stay, she is starting next to you can you send her and move – this is good because the stay has looked really good, and I don’t want her to get mad about all the stays LOL!! So you can start her at your side with you both in the middle (where the 2 wings touch) – send to the backside so she jumps the grid with more speed and a harder approach. You will be moving forward the whole time, walking at first then build up to jogging then eventually running.

Because she is fast: when you do the backsides, you should have a reward target on the ground about 4 meters past jump 2. That way she won’t look up at you holding/throwing the reward, and you won’t need to try to outrun her to do a moving target.

Great job! Let me know how she does with the backsides!
Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Good morning!
We have been SO LUCKY with this weather! Glad you got out to enjoy it 🙂

This session looked great – he did really well with the zig zags at the angle, including with the moving target. The one oops moment was when you were on the ‘outside’ of the setup and he did really well when you were on the inside of the setup (the side where the 2 wings were touching). So you can stay on the inside, keep going with then moving target… and flatten the angles a little more, moving the jumps an inch or two flatter for each session.

With the jumps at this angle, you can also add the 3rd jump (same angle, same moving target) or you can keep the 2 jump setup and do the backside version of it! He has reached the point where you can choose your adventure 🙂 of flattening the jumps or backsides or the 3 jumps. You can choose a different one for each session, to keep things spicy 🙂

Great job here! Enjoy the seminars with Lee today! Keep me posted about how Coal does 🙂
Tracy

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