Agility training

xpaeanx

Active Member
Joined
Jul 10, 2008
Messages
8,387
Likes
1
Points
38
Location
Long Island, NY
will they let you do that? I always feel like if you enter things you have to at least make an attempt to run the course. I know this is a fun run... but the rule books always say "no training in the ring."
 

Laurelin

I'm All Ears
Joined
Nov 2, 2006
Messages
30,963
Likes
3
Points
0
Age
37
Location
Oklahoma
No idea. The only thing I see is that dogs must be registered to run the fun run. I'm guessing it will be touch n go? Since that is what is running after? I hope it has hoops in it...

I just realized Summer will likely be the very LAST run for jumpers. It's the last class and they're doing tall to small. Since she's a veteran, she'll be in the lowest height of 4 inches. And the tunnelers is in the morning. Trying to think of how to make Saturday less exhausting for her. I think her fatigue issue was from beign so pumped all day and not resting. I may go home for part of the day. :/ But it's an hour away. So I don't want to drive home then 5 mins later drive back.

Friday will be easy, everything is just a couple hours from each other.
 

xpaeanx

Active Member
Joined
Jul 10, 2008
Messages
8,387
Likes
1
Points
38
Location
Long Island, NY
Trying to think of how to make Saturday less exhausting for her. I think her fatigue issue was from beign so pumped all day and not resting. I may go home for part of the day. :/ But it's an hour away. So I don't want to drive home then 5 mins later drive back.

Friday will be easy, everything is just a couple hours from each other.
How hard will it be for you to pull your car out? Is she crate trained? When my dogs are getting cranky but I can't go home I usually just put them in their crates in the car, cover them with a blanket so the visual stimulus is gone and drive somewhere quiet (sometimes eventhe far corner of a parking lot) so I can chill in my car and read for a bit while they settle down and nap.
 

Laurelin

I'm All Ears
Joined
Nov 2, 2006
Messages
30,963
Likes
3
Points
0
Age
37
Location
Oklahoma
I usually crate her in the car. Haven't seen the venue so no idea what it'll be like.

She... doesn't settle well. We have had some progress but haven't tested it in a trial environment yet. Covered or not makes no difference at all to her. She just gets very excited and alert by all the sounds and people and dogs. I also think it may be related to her separation anxiety.

I may bring my gameboy or a book to mess with and just sit in the car for a bit. That's a good idea!
 

Beanie

Clicker Cult Coordinator
Joined
May 17, 2006
Messages
14,012
Likes
0
Points
36
Age
39
Location
Illinois
will they let you do that? I always feel like if you enter things you have to at least make an attempt to run the course. I know this is a fun run... but the rule books always say "no training in the ring."
In a fun run? Unless they're totally different than every fun run I've ever been to, you can do whatever you want. You can make up your own course. You can do contact obstacles over and over again. You can bring cookies and toys in with you. A fun run is basically for the purpose of training in the ring.
 

xpaeanx

Active Member
Joined
Jul 10, 2008
Messages
8,387
Likes
1
Points
38
Location
Long Island, NY
ok, I wasn't sure. I haven't been to any agility fun days as they literally never have any close to me it seems.

I went to a couple JRT fun days but they didn't have agility. The did racing, earth dog, and obed/rally... the big thing was that toys and food were used as encouragement and dogs had more time to try... but you still "did the course."
 

BostonBanker

Active Member
Joined
Jun 2, 2006
Messages
8,854
Likes
1
Points
36
Location
Vermont
If the fun run is in the trial ring, I bet you can't use food. But I am sure you can do what you want otherwise. Shoot, I still will do "training" of sorts in the ring with Gusto at trials, like running out of the ring to jackpot something and forfeit the rest of the class.

Plus, I think NADAC actually allows training in the ring.

Our club's NADAC trial leaves a hoop next to the warm up jump, since people from other venues won't have seen them before. No idea if that is normal.
 

PWCorgi

Priscilla Winifred Corgi
Joined
Apr 12, 2006
Messages
14,854
Likes
0
Points
36
Age
34
Location
Twin Citay!
We had agility today for the first time in a month. I was worried because I have not been practicing like I should....I have not been practicing like...at all. Bad Lauren!

Despite that we had an awesome, awesome session. Siri was up and ready, and on fire the whole time! My instructor set up the teeter board on 2 FitPAWS Balance Discs. Siri thought it was the. best. toy. ever. EVER! She ran full speed across it at plopped herself into a 2o2o at the end (seriously, I cannot get consistent 2o2o behavior at home, but she can do them no problem in class...), she showed off her spins in both directions on the board, she did sits and downs and all kinds of fun stuff. In fact, she thought it was SO fun that whenever I wasn't occupying her mind after we moved on, she would run back over to it and jump on it. :doh: So we covered it up to make it less distracting.

We also started working on serpentines with Hoops. And she nailed every. single. one. EVERY ONE! On both sides! It was awesome, my instructor was thrilled. YAY BABY DOG!! (additionally, it's a really good thing I signed up for a gym membership today, holy out of shape)

And, to top it all off, we saw our first jump today! :p My instructor is teaching jumps very slowly and really working on making Siri think about what she is doing with the jumps. She said she sees a lot of terriers who just throw themselves at jumps, and she really wants Siri to learn to jump correctly. Which makes me happy. The exercises she has us doing are also a huge test of Siri's impulse control, which is always good for her!

She also recalled 95% of the times I asked today, which has been a problem recently. And she did dog catches EVERY time I asked! YAY for listening skills!

Every time I'm away from agility for a while (we only do half an hour every other week, it's all I can afford and Siri loses her brain after half an hour) I start thinking about how much money I spend on it and think about dropping it. Then we go to a practice and I remember how much Siri and I BOTH love it.
 

DJEtzel

Active Member
Joined
Jan 1, 2010
Messages
3,267
Likes
0
Points
36
Location
Kalamazoo, MI
^ that's awesome!! Go Siri! :banana:

I know what you mean about the out of shapeness though... Went to flyball a week ago after being out of the gym for a few weeks. Death. I was death, for days. No bueno.
 

PWCorgi

Priscilla Winifred Corgi
Joined
Apr 12, 2006
Messages
14,854
Likes
0
Points
36
Age
34
Location
Twin Citay!
Siri is getting purple snap on jump cups and 5 way connectors. Because purple.

Also, HOW ARE CONNECTORS SO FREAKING EXPENSIVE?! I thought I could get them super cheap on Amazon (since they don't have them at HomeDepot, since they aren't for plumbers :cool:) but no. So I'm getting purple ones because they are only like $1 more per connector. And purple.

(Important decisions have been made: All of my Hoops tubing is getting wrapped in green tape. All of my jumps are getting purple tape. BECAUSE STYLE IS IMPORTANT!)
 

Elrohwen

Active Member
Joined
Oct 9, 2013
Messages
1,797
Likes
0
Points
36
Location
Hudson Valley, NY
PWCorgi, I love the purple and green color combo! Just this morning I was thinking about what colors I want to use when I build jumps.


Last night Watson decided to be a brat and run away from me. He had been doing so well too! I don't think he's run away from me in the last 4 classes. He's definitely worse when I can't exercise him before class, and early classes don't leave me any time for a walk. I hope he grows out of this with maturity and practice. Part of it is "whee!! I have lots of energy!" and part is "OMG I have to sniff the butts of the other dogs!" I've decided his new name is "No-No-Bad-Dog" :lol-sign:

In positive news, we did our first front cross!
 

nikkiluvsu15

Wild At Heart
Joined
Aug 17, 2009
Messages
1,816
Likes
0
Points
0
Age
32
Location
North Florida
I still haven't heard back from Harleigh's (former) agility instructor.

She said we could fit into the Wednesday night class, but we just can't do Wednesday nights here. Any other day is perfect. I know they have classes on Tuesday as well and I told her we could do that day, but still haven't heard back.

I hope I do soon because I really want to get started back! It was so much fun
 

k9krazee

Active Member
Joined
May 29, 2006
Messages
2,423
Likes
0
Points
36
Location
Michigan, USA
I didn't get any video today, unfortunately :( My videographer (husband) is out of town. I'll bring the camera tomorrow and/or Sunday and see if someone'll tape us.
 

krissy

New Member
Joined
Sep 20, 2013
Messages
809
Likes
1
Points
0
Location
Edmonton, Alberta
Omg. So freaking tired. The hounds and I went to a Christine Zink seminar today. We go back tomorrow.

Morning was all lectures on nutrition, effects of spaying/neutering. Afternoon we talked about conditioning exercises and tried them out with our dogs. I'm glad I had already started Kili on "sit pretty" and "wave" so we didn't have to start from the very beginning. Then we got to play with FitPaws equipment. I have a balance disc at home but no space for an egg or peanut, so got to try those out.

I am exhausted and so excited to incorporate my new knowledge into our routine. I think this is going to be so great in the long run for Kili's and all future dogs' agility careers.
 

Laurelin

I'm All Ears
Joined
Nov 2, 2006
Messages
30,963
Likes
3
Points
0
Age
37
Location
Oklahoma
Well day 1 went well. No Qs but I'm still very very happy with it. My trainer got video but I don't have it yet.

We just had 2 Touch n Go runs. It's interesting.... the course was the same for masters, open, and novice. Is that typical? My trainer who is running masters said our second course was really hard.

I was also surprised that there's no veterans class for non jumping events. So Summer didn't get any extra time (not that we needed it. We were well under it even with a fumble in each run). But it seemed weird that vets get extra time on jumping courses but not on regular courses?

I also FINALLY figured out the proficient vs skilled thing. That's confusing. Anyways, we were the only proficient in our height, everyone else was skilled! So we had faster course times and couldn't make any errors. If I'd known that I'd have run her skilled and we would have Q'd. Oh well.

Our first run was perfect save a missed dogwalk- EXACT same thing that got us last trial. I got to rewatch and I think it's a combo of her going WHEEEEE YAYYYY AGILITY! right off the start line and me not being good at cuing it. We also missed a tunnel/A-frame discrimination. Second run went fabulous. Except for the fact that Lauren ran the wrong course at the end. Whoops! My trainer said it was a gorgeous run... except I ran the wrong course. That's the second tme I've done that. We also missed another tunnel/dog walk discrimination. We need to work those, haven't visited them in a while. I guess it's a GOOD thing because she hated tunnels previously, lol.

Also, this trial is FULL of papillons! Everywhere! Maybe the most populous breed there. So weird, we've always been the only pap!

And probably most important- Summer settled in her crate! One minor barking fit then she settled in and relaxed some. She also ran very happy and focused and had a lot of fun. Very happy even though no Qs. We did get a third place which actually meant something since there were so many dogs running in the short dog class. I had a lot of fun too. There's 3 of my classmates starting to trial too so it's great to see the teams start to compete.
 
Last edited:

Members online

No members online now.
Top