thurrrrrrrrrrrsday

twas a good training night.

started with berlin, who again was protesting having to wear panties in class. speaking of said panties, i cant seem to find them now, where did they GO little miss????

we started with working attention individually through a channel of dogs, berlin of course had to go first, and she rocked. didnt once glance at any other dog, she stayed staring at me no matter how close the dogs were. the second time we transitioned from the attention work straight into heeling out and she did well there too.

then we did heeling, first as a group- but for some reason there were about 1212312312 dogs in the class tonight and we ended up having to break into groups of three later to work on fasts since we would all have run into each other, especially since just heeling i had to pass people because they were heeling too slow. we had a metronome out and i matched with it perfectly. nice attention, she got much better with her turns, she's overcompensating with her halts but she's maintaining a much better position without any extra cues from me. her halts are very cute.

moved to SFE - im going to keep doing her against some barriers for the time being since im tired of her popping out so far to the side so she stays straight. shes got a perfect kickback, but she's kicking out so far.

worked fig8 - she needed some pops for the outer post since she lagged and dropped her head once but she came back up. she naturally has such nice tight sits she's a good girl.

recalls were disastrous because she cant handle the pressure of other dogs coming in at her face - since we did recalls in both directions at the same time, the minute she passed another dog she would veer off to avoid them rather than just continuing in on her path. she just cant handle the pressure - need to work on that.

skipped out on her stays to put rah into open stays instead, sorry - she hasnt had stays in two weeks! oh well. rah nailed open stays.

started with individuals again - fig 8 was nice and hes purposefully really avoiding hitting me on the inner post sometimes and it looks marvelous. someone at the last show complimented me on how well a big dog like him can move his back end, i was happy with that. hes bouncing like no other on the outer post though. i dont think im ever going to get him under control.

moved to working transitions between drops and ROF repeatedly, he did nicely for that, i also mixed in some heeling. then we went to ROH with terry - he anticipated a few times, and we worked the transition into set ups, and we discovered if the angle of the db is too far to the right, his wide loop made it so that he was missing the jump back. so im going to have to work on that with him. we also worked on where i will be putting my db for the shows as a signal for rah that he will be finished v. when he will get the db back to play.

utility.....

or futility :)

started with go outs - we did about 60 or so foot go outs. i put his toy out there first and of course he goes out straight immediately, i tell him to sit, and he turns, toy in mouth, and decides to just take off running. butthead. put the toy out on the ground and he spends the next go out (also perfectly straight) trying to dig it out from behind the gate. next time terry tells me to just put nothing out there at all, i send him 60 feet and tell him to sit and the damned dog turns on a dime and just sits perfectly straight. i ran in so fast to reward him!!!!!!!!!

we rotated out on that and let the other dogs in - and then went back out. did the same thing - put NOTHING out there and just did three go outs with no reward there at all, and he ddi three perfect go outs with perfect turn and sits that i rewarded with the toy *i* had on me. terry said he just may be like quest, her crazy fcr - that the toy blows his mind so much, i will only need to put a toy out there once every 100 or so go outs because he knows his job so much, he thinks too fast for us. his reward and drive for it is just to great.

still, im going to start drilling random turn and sits everywhere. he SHOULD turn off these things. am i just picking my battles? but he DID do perfect turn and sits :)

went to work pivots, and he did lovely pivots, he's a good man for these. im sure im going to get funny looks since i wont turn him to the right at all, ill be turning to the left the entire time, but he gets his butt in so well.

then we put out 9 gloves and had all the dogs work them at the same time - they were just all over the room and we walked around at the same time and pivoted and sent our dogs for random gloves that we wanted. rah needed more work on leaving the gloves than retrieving them - because he sees a glove and he just wants to retrieve it. but he's marking very well. i think he's a lab on the inside.

moved to moving stand - he still needs a back leash to prevent movement, but he did lovely. i on the other hand, screwed up his call to heel both times. one time, i had to use a left, since i had scout on my right and rah couldnt get a right finish. the second i gave him the VERBAL for a left and the signal for a right - his mind was blown and he tried both and i think i saw steam.

signals - not bad, nothing spectacular. he's taking a few steps, or at least moving his front feet, while i walk away. need to work on that. its not that he's not locked in, maybe its stress? anticipatory? who knows.

then... jumping. rah got to jump.
at least he stayed out at the go out spot this time. i got across the room and again he was picking a jump already, and terry saw that it was clear he wasn't looking for my signals he was just waiting for any motion from me at all as a signal he could break and jump. so we started teaching rah some patience (ha ha ha) and then made him think and wait for the actual signal. it took awhile but he did three actual right DJ's, so good for him.

then we did articles, and he worked the entire pile and was completely right, which i was thrilled about.

sooooo all in all a very nice training week. im pleased. and looking forward to the show on sunday. maybe.