We had a wonderful training session tonight, although I must say that maybe taking 3 dogs down to train may not have been my most brilliant though
I have continued to live with my denial about my contacts. I have always felt that Ice man was one of those dogs that could “get” a running contact concept. I spent months and months on it and it ended without success. I have talked about giving them up, even went in and taught and “touch and hold” along the way, but somehow always returned to the hopes that he would someday have them. So, like I said I have continued with my denial.
I took some time off because of my foot and inability to run but Sunday night I went out and ran the contacts (being that I have a show this weekend) LOL. I placed a stride regulator right above the yellow as well as a hoop at the end and we ran that a couple times. I was not pleased with Ice’s questions about what to do (I completely understand he would be confused since I have managed to paint him the most perfect gray photo of his critera,) He would do a nice up and over but creep the down. I removed the stride reglators and swapped my square hoops for my round ones. He responded much better but not exactly as I would like - I accepted it as a start.
Tonight, when I began I moved the hoops well off the contacts and used my clicker to mark the stride that I wanted. The first run was awesome!! Lots and lots of praise and tug. I love when he is really pleased with himself because he wags his tail as he tugs. :) Way cool. Second run, going the other direction, he strided completely over the yellow. I didnt say anything, just ran back and tried again. Third run was gorgeous again, lots of priase and celebration. Forth rep was equally as successful. And we quit.
We came in the house and pulled out the doggie crack and worked on some of our new tricks. He was very eager to work… success!
I was thinking that Ice had an issue or two in his back that was presenting in his right rear leg so I took him out to Jim DeKeiffer this weekend to get him a massage. Jim says that basically he is a little tight back there but nothing major. He gave me some exercises/stretching to to do that I had been doing with Ice prior. He says if I can get him to stretch the rear we could get a much better stride. Glad to hear that all his muscles are even, recommended some road work of some sort - I am thinking a nice trot on the tread mill to keep everything even. May have to teach a lunge to him for warm up. Headed out now to see what I can do. Its cold!!!!!
His back has been giving him trouble so I took him to Jim deKeiffer for a massage. He says he just feels alot stiffer in the back. I think he feels better tonight and ready to work. I watched Susan Solos dvd on jumping and I think we will start working on things… building him back up
Ice and I have been really working hard on our foundation discrimination and distance work. Since I am locked into my stinkin boot for 2 more weeks running is a bit of a pain. So, distance is the thing. I am working on getting him to take the obstacle that I am “looking” at (not pointing at) on verbal and eye only. This is coming along Our “left” and “right” commands are getting much better as we learn to read each other and listen. I have to be quicker with the command and he needs to actually pay attention to the words and not guess the answer.
As I was teaching the “around” (to take the backside of a jump) I realized that I had one word that meant two different things. I send him around me with an “around” and I was asking for the back side of a jump with an “around” me. I couldnt figure out why he just did not seem to grasp this move until the little light went on for me. So I changed the word to “push” which some of my students used and low and behold the little guys light went on too - so that is now progressing well.
Our discrimination from tunnel head to tunnel head has been going awesome as well. Things not going well…. hhmm. Wraps.. this dog will not collect himself on a jump if there was a fire to avoid on the other side! We will be working with gates (as suggested by my favorite instructor) so we can gain the muscle memory for these collection/wraps. Oh, contacts - still struggling with the running contact. I know that this dog is super smart and if he is not grasping this its because I have not found the right way of presenting it, I will keep trying. We do have a nice aframe, but still have trouble with teeter, dogwalk and the shut down on the table, other than that and collection/wraps and confidence to drive out on something other than weaves I am very happy with what we have. Two more weeks of boot and then we will compete again at CKC after being out for 4 months.
There are some really neat parts to this video. For one, we hit all our contacts!! Yeah!!! Every contact held up. Now, I will say that he did not hit criteria for them, he tended to wander off the end, but I want running eventually anyway so I will fix it in practice. There are two great running contacts one in snooker and one in relay. In relay there is a funny part where I tell him to weave and he just takes off out of the ring - like he does when he goes to the weaves, but the weaves were the other way! I was panicked! But then you see him wrap an electric post (used to mark the ring) poor guy! The look on his face was What?, where are the rest of them???? Then he sees the right ones! LOL. We also miss a gamble by a wrong jump, but we got the hard part - I think only 1 other dog got the tunnel part of the gamble, so good boy :). Enjoy!
click images to enlarge. Another fantastic jump, what a beautiful jumper - and check
out the concentration on that a-frame!
Ice did a wonderful job this weekend. He did better than I did. I really lost mental game with him.
He was really working hard, and I put him on the specialists courses because I needed to practice for the regionals. We didnt q much BUT we did have two spectacular runs with qualifiers (I will post video later). He held up everyone on our contacts. Remember 3 weeks ago we did not have contacts on a consistent basis. We had the touch and hold which he hit almost every contact. Those that were not hit were trained in the ring, but he did a great job. I am feeling more confident now going to regionals that I will have contacts.
Due to the regionals I have temporarily given up the running for 2020 contacts. That is not what my final will be, but I will go ahead and train him as Baby trained me.. we will get them, just not before regionals. :) He understands the 2020. Like I always said, if I can get him to understand what I want he will gladly do it, he’s just that kind of dog. The problem has been the communication between us.
When I came home from Wyoming I came home with new thoughts for my training. I realized that I have not been raising the bar for my little boy and therefore he could not rise to the occasion. So, I decided we would train smarter - with more intensity, with higher expectations. I am happy to say that he has risen to the challenge without a second thought. :) Dumb trainer! I should have realized this along time ago. Like I said, people who have instructors are lucky, you have someone catching things sooner.
Tonight I went out and did a quick little jump-grid-type-thingy with about 8 jumps. With jumps and wraps and turns… he really turned on! So, two more weeks of this training and we should be ready! :) Ices weaves also continue to be awesome from all angles and all speeds.
Uhm, …. pretty sure you will not see any of this video footage. I really sucked! I figured out Ice’s stutter problem - yep, its me. In all my mental preparation I just cannot find it in my to trust this dog and let him go. I try to monitor his turns causing him to be confused between handler focus and obstacle focus. Poor boy! I find myself indicating a distance jump with a flung out arm… no words and no body backing it up, no wonder he asks me twice! So, in gamblers I decided to let him go and go he went! Wow! Because we are not doing contacts right now we had to pick anything else. Once we hit the back it was tunnel to a jump to a way far out set of weave poles. No one in my class was taking them because they were so far out of the way, but heck we had nothing else to do. Besides, this is my 100′ away weave pole king! We went for it. He hit that tunnel hard and out - I just said weave! He jumped and took off for those weaves like a mad man! Hit the entry and every pole. twice!!!!!! :) Thats my boy! :) The finish was a jump out to the chute then a jump at the end. I told him chute and he never turned around… thank goodness the answer was that jump ahead!!!
I know alot of people were looking at my runs and wondering what was wrong with Ice… and I just want everyone to know that Ice is fine - its his handler that needs a major brain implant at shows. At home, we are awesome… although I must say I do freeze with words at home too, so I think its just me not trusting the training, or knowing what the weak points are and trying to compensate for them. :( I have two more weeks before I become the weak leak of my Regionals team.. I dont want to let them down so I will keep on practicing!!! :) What a good boy!
Photo by Ken Gee Photography
