Contacts...Weaves...Contacts...

This week guess what we worked on? O.K. the title gave it away. We had 2 good practice sessions at home plus we went to Course Of the Week and our last Novice agility class for this session. I am signing up to take novice agility again next session. Plus I have signed up for a couple of agility seminars at Teamworks.

This week during COW, the Youngsville Agility Club met. The Youngsville agility club is a newly found AKC club that was formed so we could have AKC Trials in Youngsville. During the meeting we worked on planning for the first trial in November. We held a match this winter to get a feel for it. Clover and I have never competed in an AKC trial and the trial in November will probably be our first. This meeting was about an hour long, so we didn't have quite as much time on COW.

I am continually intrigued by the changes in clovers performance that are directly related to changes I have made in training. It is very rewarding. I can clearly see the changes but it also highlights my training faults. Contacts is a prime example. As I have been working more with Clover I discover what she is cuing off me, how she is reading my body language etc. OK, it points out how much training I need! ...afterall Clover is my first agility dog!

I have been trying to train Clover to use a stand stay on each end contact. When she is excited, she ignores them. But I have also discovered that she also ignores them when I am excited! If I stand, she stands, as soon as I move, she moves. And if I run past a contact and we haven't practiced contacts immediately before, she will run past the contact with me. Obviously, during a trial I am going to run past the obstacle much faster, prompting her to miss the contact. Overcoming these bad habits are what we have been working on.

I have also discovered that my vocal commands have been inconsistent. The vocalizations that I have been using are... when she is in the middle of the obstacle I say stand, and then at the contact, I say stay. I release on OK. This kind of developed through circumstance. I wanted to use stand as the contact command, but I was always early in giving the command and I discovered she would not stop unless I said stay. Thus