O.k., time for your first homework!
1. find a way to make your dog run as fast as he can, tape him from the side and study his striding in slow motion or even frame by frame: how far apart his hind feet are, how far forward hind feet reach over front feet, how long and high the stride is, how his back looks like and where his head is: many people think you want low head for running contacts, but in fact, you want the head look exactly the same as when running full speed in the fields 🙂
2. have a dog run over the plank, tape him from the side and compare it with the video above - tape it at the height you're currently at. If you're just starting, restrain the dog before your plank, carpet or whatever you're using, throw a toy and release. Slowly bring the dog further away from the plank to really have them come to the plank with full speed. Mark anything that looks like running in the fields from the first video, jackpot when feet are hitting at the end of a plank/carpet (where the contact will be), but reward anything that is running. Don't forget to click it or at least mark it with your voice! I prefer clicking, but you can also first use a voice and start clicking later, when you know your dog's stride better and can predict it better.
This is a good check-up for those who are already running their dogs on a raised plank and a good stride-study that will help you see and mark the correct striding better for those just starting. Once you see your dog is running nicely, with an even stride, hind feet separation and hind feet reaching further from front feet, you can put a brick or something under one end of the plank and have them run over slightly raised plank - I'll tell you when you're ready based on the videos you'll send.
And yes, we're for now throwing a toy in advance, letting the dog chase it, in order to get full speed. So yes, the dog is rewarded every time with a ball - so make sure that you really make the best tries even more special, use excitement in your voice, a play of tug on his favourite toy or food if that's his real preference - in short: make a party about the really good ones and don't worry about not so good ones - just throw that ball again! 🙂
3. to make it easier for the dog to understand what you're clicking for on that plank, we'll be teaching some tricks that are important to help them understand how to use their feet and that you might be clicking them for using them. The two things you will try this time is cavaletti work - walking the dog over drawers or boxes on the floor - and teaching the dog to step with front feet on an object and clicking for any movements of hind feet: the final goal is a full circle in both directions, but first click even for just a weight shift and then go from there.
Post a video with all 3 assignments, first two in slow motion please!!! - But PLEASE cut out all the parts where I can't see the dog: because seeing just the plank, and that is slow motion, is absolutely no fun - and you can't imagine how many planks in slow motion I saw by now!
Also, read all the comments and see as many videos as possible, you can learn A LOT through videos and comments of others, that's why we do it in a class form in a first place!
Two pictures showing what I mean by hind feet reach: hind feet must land further ahead from where front feet were:
Two pictures showing what I mean by hind feet separation: hind feet must be hitting two different spots as far apart as possible (vs. staying parallel, hitting the same spot).
To take the explanation of hind feet separation and reach forward even further, here is a discussion we had with a first class on it, this is my comment to those two videos:
Experimenting with a full low dogwalk
Experimenting with throwing his toy
My comment: he doesn’t run fast enough – That’s my answer to 90% of problems with running contacts, so you will probably hear that a lot in next few months
Any BC, running full speed, is deep down the contact if doing two strides on a dog-walk ramp, period. Even my PyrShep who is 37cm (14.5″) does the down ramp in two hits and I even know a Papillon that is trying to, despite we would prefer him to do 3 hits
Meaning that if a BC does 2 hits and is too high, he is not running enough. That’s some general info for everybody, I’m just using your videos to discuss this topic as they show some very nice tries and some “not running enough” tries.
On most tries, you can see his hind feet come just shortly more forward from where the front feet where. Normally, when the dog runs full speed, hind feet will land significantly further ahead from where front feet were – just like you can see in “experimenting with the toy” video at 1:16, 2:16 and 2:27 tries for example – those were very nice!!!
The faster the dog is moving, the further ahead from front feet hind feet will be landing and as a consequence, you will have MUCH bigger length covered as if hind feet hit where front feet were – meaning that if Bi’s front feet are above the contact, her first hind foot will be in the middle of the contact and the second one will be right at it’s bottom. - While if the dog’s hind feet only come to where front feet were, he is missing the contact in this situation - instead of getting a perfect one
That’s exactly why I always get suspicious when I hear people saying their dog is hitting with 4 feet. With a BC size dog, running full speed with good hind feet separation, it’s pretty much impossible to fit all 4 feet in. 3 is possible, but if they can fit all 4 feet in that small area, they don’t cover enough of an area and when they will be higher, all 4 feet will be out of the contact. Bi on the other hand is a typical example of the dog covering LOTS of an area, meaning that even if her front feet are landing in the middle of the down ramp (yeah, she desperately wants to do it in one hit), the second hind foot will be in the contact, as you can see in this video:
Complicated? Don't worry, it gets easier when you start to see the dog's stride 🙂
Hi Silvia; I am finally sending videos although we have been working and trying to catch up on our assignments.
For the tricks videos I see my timing is very bad; So happy Arrow learns anyway! For the circle trick I first taught clockwise and then confused him by trying to train counterclockwise. Now just back to clockwise. Poor Arrow tries so hard. Would it be helpful to name it? Any suggestions?
Here is what we are doing for Running Contacts. We had been at 14″ unsuccessfully and dropped down to 11″ but then did 90% if restrained releases and 80% with tunnel and small ramp to table to 12 foot long wide ramp. We were off and on working on static ball after jump and had some success if not repeated too many times. I thought he would do better with longer up ramp and so then increased the height to 14″ and that is the set up now. I just started this today and just tried restrained releases to early thrown toy because he always does best like this; did try tunnel start with 50% results so Not Ready.
Biggest problem for me is that I am not always seeing hits correctly so not able to mark good hits and even in slow motion not sure what is OK.
On this video please help me to be more accurate;
1. Jackpot. Reinforced.
2. Leap. Not reinforced
3. OK. Incorrectly Not reinforced
4. Jackpot. Reinforced
5. Leap. Not reinforced
6. Jackpot. Reinforced.
7. Leap Not reinforced
8. OK Reinfoced
9. Leap. Incorrectly Reinforced.
Sorry; I forgot to send my running on the flat video. With ball retrieving; He runs fast. I included 2 returning runs back with his ball; Not as fast. Interesting to see the difference. It seems his rear legs are more separated in the slower one; Should I be looking for lateral separation like width of his body or separation front and back like an open scissors?
You’re looking at the separation front and back. And yes, when the dog is just starting to run, the legs are together to accelerate: but then they separate: you can see that well in the run after the ball at 1:00. That’s why it’s important the dog comes to the plank with good speed.
Great job with tricks! For cavaletti, low and wide spread cavaletti are the best as they require the best separation. You can try naming circling, but I usually don’t name this phase just yet, but simply go with whatever direction they offer first and then use a hand signal when I want another direction.
About the plank work: not bad if this was first time on this set up and it’s a hard one for him. If he does better on restrained releases, you could start with that and then backchain to start him further and further back. You can also just continue like this and select for hits, but definitely go back to restraining if you get too much leaps in a row. As for what to reward: 1 is perfect! 🙂 I would also jackpot 8, but I don’t like 3 and 6 so much, it looks leapy. Is your contact painted? That might help you seeing things right. Or, a tape on a line under which you want him helps too, for most people tape is even easier as colour change to see if the dog was in.
That makes sense about the cavaletti. I can do that; Have lower and thicker items to step over. He seems to need that!
We have continued on this set up and are doing better with faster starts from tunnel at about 70%.
I am wondering about changing to a Dogwalk set up. I will have my very own first dogwalk set up to use in a few days. On the current set up with teeter plank to table to wide planks; We sometimes reverse it and he is staying on the narrow plank and doing some nice running through to the tunnel.
I can set up the dogwalk planks at same height as what we are training at now.
One reason I would like to change is that this set up is very time consuming to change/move and no matter what I do it seems to have some bounce or noise and also the yoga mats I am using for the wide plank are starting to wear.
What do you think? What are your criteria to switch over?
Sure, you can definitely use a low DW if you have one! And wow, 70% is really good already!!!
This is the first time we’ve added any height -- it’s only 10cm. Seems i chose the wrong one to jackpot …
It was o.k. to jackpot what you jackpotted. On this length, you can’t get hind feet hits anyway as she needs to start the plank with front feet and then even fitting just front feet second time is hard and hind feet is pretty much impossible. Can you find a hilly part of the park? If you could raise it by using a hill, that would give her more striding options as she won’t need to jump on the plank (front feet first) but will be able to hit it with hind feet first too and then you might get those second hind feet hit too. All in all, she is doing great, but the shortness of the plank makes it extra difficult for her.
Thanks! There aren’t too many hills around here but i’ll keep my eyes out. What length plank do you use -- i thought mine was the right length -- it’s 3.5m
🙂
Well, you actually need to check the Australian DW down ramp lengths… Ours are from 3.8 to 4.1m, so it’s good to have this length for big dogs (doesn’t matter so much for short-strided ones) -- two end to end is even better. It’s o.k. to continue like that, but do try to find either a hill or another plank 🙂
Oh, that makes sense. Yes, Australian down ramps are 3.5m, didn’t realise yours were bit longer. I’ll start thinking about making a second ramp but in the meantime will search for some hills 🙂
Ah, o.k., then it’s good. It probably means she will have 3-stride DW at the end though 🙂
Hi Sylvia,
Finally posting the second assignment of the first homework (ladder and pivot) for Mister Rev.
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Nancy
Great! But try pivoting without your movement next so that he needs to think more about his feet -- your movement is a kind of a lure for him to move without much thinking. You can also try gradually adding more speed to the cavaletti work and have him trot through. And how is his plank work going?
OK, got it! Will post plank work videos today. Moved to a different set up and I am not pleased with it.
Nancy
Hi Silvia, After going thru lots of information last night I decided to count strides today. I did about 20+ reps and he was 100% consistant and instead of making you watch 20+ reps, I picked out the first two and did slow motion of them. My question is he always enters the plank close to the end which allows 3 strides but when he runs a DW he jumps the apex and lands about 1/3 down the plank which then makes this striding nothing like he is doing on this plank. (no room for 3 strides, and 2 strides somewhat of a stretch) which I think is where our issues are. So… will this practice help? I sent him from all directions and distances and he 100% enters the board the same. Should I elevate the end to see if I can get him jumping on the plank like he would the apex? BTW, he jumps on a teeter the same way (near the end of the board) not sure if it is vision related or just his style?
Beth and Scoot
Yeap, that’s not unusual: starting the plank on the same spot every time and then hitting it the same every time. That’s not bad if the dog is just starting as you do need lots of hits to jackpot, but as Scoot is somewhat further in the process already, he probably really doesn’t need that anymore: he needs some more challenges that would give you different stridings. As a raised plank will make him start it on the same spot again (somewhat deeper, but still high I think -- too high to go for 2 hits), a low DW would probably be the best next step. You can then try different approaches (straight, angled, ugly 180 degrees approach etc.) and try to get different stridings because I think you’ll need them.
I was thinking the same thing about doing a low DW, but did not want to rush things. You know I just took my DW completely apart today, and now I will be putting it back together… 🙂 This DW is not 100% adjustable, the first set of legs would make it about 2′ high, should I just try to keep it lower around 1′, I could get some bags full of sand to make it steady but lower. I am afraid if I make it too high I will be fighting him jumping and then I would not have enough good hits to reward. Scoot loves running it for his ball and I think all the reps is going to make a big difference in his confidence to flat out run. Thx.. I am heading back outside to put it back together.
1′ would be better yes if you can make it stable.
I think this was the perfect solution, I filmed 18 reps before my camara died and 5 out of the last 11 were perfect. I see that he takes 2 hits and when his front feet land above the contact the rear feet are deep when he pushes off. Most of his misses were from not getting deep enough with the 2 hits and the 3 hit missed the contact, but there was very little jumping except with the first couple of tries. I was sending him thru a tunnel some to get speed, but for the most part just throwing the ball gave us plenty. I will try to get some video posted tomorrow.
Scoot says thx… he loves to get to play ball this much!
That’s a good start, I would keep straight approaches for a while to help him hit with 2 hits. But we’ll soon need to challenge him some with different approaches too so that he learns to adjust his striding when necessary.
well, not so good today, out of the 19 reps (all were filmed), he only had maybe 6 that I would call good. He is pushing off at the apex instead of striding over it as he would be if the DW was higher, so I am not so sure this height will help his striding, seems like where he lands it encourages him to try to leap to the end of the plank. I thought 3, 12, 14, 15, 17 and 19 were fairly good. I am not sure but it seems the height is not enough to get him striding over the apex, but if I raise it I know he will start to jump more. I thought about putting a small stride regulator on the apex just so he would have to stride over it since that will happen anyway when the DW is higher? I know you would rather not use a SR and I can understand why, but how to I get the same stride on a lower DW that I would on a higher one so we can practice his strides on the lower ramp. I do know the whole thing plays into the picture in that he has to have the right strides going over the top in order to leap over the apex and stride the lower plank. Or.. am I making too much of this. 🙁
Well, if it were as easy as trying to force that or another striding on them, then there really would be no point in doing things at low height and one could just go full height and set stride regulators. But it doesn’t work that way. They can’t stride the same way every time, that’s why I’m all the time saying that he needs to learn to do the adjustments when necessary. Without him knowing more than one way to hit and without him knowing he SHOULD hit, you will never get consistent RC. So I would take this height that doesn’t “force” one way of striding on him as an opportunity to practice different ways to hit and the importance of it. Try starting him on different spots of a DW, find a good one, practice it for a while and then move him somewhat off that spot to force him to do adjustments to hit.
Ok, I did put him in different places a few times yesterday and it did help, thx for the good advice, I suspect that is why he is a 50% hit dog today since I have always tried to help him be right instead of him figuring it out on his own. Good advice.
Ok, Here is a sampling of 5 runs out of the 20+ we did this morning. 1 and 2 were great, 3 and 4 not so good and 5 was great. I did some restrained sends from various places on the DW along with letting him run the entire DW. I assume I should stay at this level for a while so he can figure out striding and still have a good enough success rate to be highly rewarded for trying. I would say out of our 20+ runs we have about a 70+% success rate today. Not good enough, but much better than yesterday.
Did the same starting points give you bad&good hits? Try to find one that is giving you consistent hits and then work from there, moving him back for like 5 inches and trying to get some adjustments in order to hit. Because yes, he is obviously not putting an effort into it yet as he could reach in better in #4 and could drop in one front foot in #3.
I did my second session today and he is getting better, I agree in that I do not think he “understands” what is gaining the rewards just yet. This dog also has run a DW for the better part of 2 years without consistancy so we some history that may not be helping either. Our sucess rate was probably around 80+% now.
Hi Silvia,
Scoot’s toes were alot better today and it stopped raining so we did another session. I put the towels on the DW today, but I think tomorrow I will try it without them. (not sure if they play any part in how he runs it) His first 3 runs I thought were great, especially #2, which if I could have that all the time I would be VERY happy. Then I switched to the other side and got lots of leaps, several of the runs he had one stride and a leap, oh my… He had a few good runs from this side, but I was wondering, have you seen where dogs are better on one side more than the other, seems to me he is better when he is on my right than on my left? I am limited to how many reps I can do since his one toe will still bleed if I do too much so I guess it will force us to take it slower than I would have liked.
The good thing is that you got some really beautiful hits and then some leaps -- so a perfect learning situation -- IF he understands the difference? You are throwing a ball in advance for now? Do you see he understands the difference between jackpots and not so good tries? If not, you could maybe go to the lesson 4 and switch to a toy thrown after the jump/tunnel if the hit was good so that he starts to try harder. I still don’t see any adjustments in order to hit and am just thinking how to make him try harder. And yes, it’s not unusual they do better with a handler on one side… Keep switching back and fourth one and another side. I hope you find a good solution to keep his toes safe!
I 100% agree I do NOt think he understands, (or really cares) if he gets a jackpot or not, he got his ball that is really all he wants. He will drop it for food sometimes if he is really hungry, but he loves that ball more than just about anything. Plus my other terriers have all been soft, this one is not, he tends not to care if I am pleased with him if he has his ball, life is good. 🙂 What he is though is very bidable and will keep trying to earn the reward so I will start throwing the ball only after a good hit. I will start out with starting him on the DW in a location I know he will hit so reward is high and he gets his ball afterward the good hit and then work up to a full length DW with ball thrown afterwards. I did notice this morning that if I let him get a full run at it he is wanting to leave out the second hit and just land in the middle of the DW down ramp and leap. While if I start him from like a 180 or on the DW he had a better chance of adding the second hit on the down ramp. One thing I read in lesson 4 though is you are already having them driving to a tunnel or jump, If I throw the ball afterwards and there is not something else out there for him to take, I might get him looking back for the ball instead of driving forward. (actually I am pretty sure I will). He likes tunnels, but I do not think he will feel it is a big reward if he does not get his ball. Or… do I just try to time the throw right, I can try that too? the booties I bought did not work, so back to finding a different type. The good thing about this dog is he could care less and will keep working even if his feet are bleeding, the bad thing is that is how we got into this mess. I just have to monitor his activity for him.
If he runs full speed into nothing without you throwing a ball in advance, you don’t even need a tunnel/jump after. For most dogs, it’s easier to run full speed ahead if they have something to focus on and I make the transition as you can see in lesson 2-3-4 -- you can go for whatever makes it easier for you to get good speed while being able to withhold the ball when he leaps. Definitely start with things that are easy for him, but then slowly bring in the challenges to make him think some more.
I tried your above suggestions, a couple of things… He tended to slow down just a little if he did not get rewarded for more than a couple of tries. I then would backchain him on the DW where I could throw the ball and get him running full speed again since I knew if he starts somewhere on the DW he runs thru the contract very nice. Also if I run with him he will keep better speed, I have done alot of decleration work with him and him running full speed past me if I am not moving and without me throwing the ball probably will not work. He also tends NOT to run full speed to a stationary object unless that stationary object is an “open” bowl of food. I can have my kids help on this one and just pick up the food if he misses. (he knows this game). If I put a lid on the food he will no longer run full speed, I think he figured out the game, he can’t get the food until I get there if it has a lid on it so why run extra fast just to wait on me. Basically with this little terrier, his prey drive chaising something moving will get him running more than something laying on the ground. I do think I had a much higher success rate after your suggestions and I will film it tomorrow to see that I am still getting two hits like I should, but I think I was. I do think his “understanding” of what I want is where I missed on teaching him a running DW over the past year… 🙁 I did not get called on it much at a show, but it is no way what I would like in the end.
When I get my consistent two strides at this height, do you find the striding changes at all when the DW raises? Or is my goal for him to understand how to adjust to hit correctly now and then he will adjust as needed when the height and approaches change.
thx again….
If he runs well without a toy thrown in advance, you don’t even need a stationary toy. If you feel the need for it at one point, you can ask the kids to give a toy a life and then either let him have it or not based on how he does. By starting him on different points, what we want is teaching him to hit with different striding patterns. If you saw the video of my dogs I posted you can see many different stridings that Bi is showing: it’s necessary in order to have her hit every time. If you go for one particular striding and that’s the only way they know to hit, then you’re not ding much more as if you could do with stride regulators. We wat them to understand that hitting the contact is important and that they know how to drop in one front foot if they’re too short with two hits or to add additional stride when necessary. Relying on the same striding will never work (especially not in Europe, with different lengths we see) and until I see him adjusting the stride in order to hit, his contacts won’t be reliable. Once he gets that part, adding height is a piece of cake.
Ok, so there is the answer to all my problems… I was trying to force him to stride correctly when really you want him to know he needs to get into the contact and he must know how to adjust to do it. I get it, but now I have to reward correctly so he gets it. That is not so easy. The below video is 29 runs… sorry, I am sure you have more to do than watch Scoot, but I need to understand if I am rewarding correctly, I think some of them should not have been rewarded and yet I did. This is so hard throwing the ball afterwards because you only have a moment to decide if you should throw or not. A few questions:
1. Do you think he is losing too much speed?
2. Should I reward when he is turned around looking for me (at least for now) if he is clearly in the contact?
3. Several times he put in 3 to 4 strides being careful, should I reward those since he was clearly in the contact, but slow? It does show he is trying to figure this out? But since that is not what I want, should I reward.
4. When he is slow should I throw the ball to get him running again or try to work thru it with me running (no more ball throwing)
This was all of his runs and 27 ,28 and 29 were perfect I think, so I quit there and had a party with him and ended the session.
BTW, I had to have your speed DVD, can’t wait to watch it.
thx again
Beth
Well, the good thing is that he can obviously do it with different speeds and has some kind of understanding about the end. However, that is too slow now yes as this is not how he will run in a trial. Of course, reward when he is clearly in even if slow, but we do need more speed. Maybe time to include kids and have them show and move the toy after a short straight tunnel? Would he run for that? After he starts to expect a toy there, you could start throwing a toy after the tunnel. That way, timing of the throw will be easier and hopefully, we get the same speed as with a thrown toy. You can of course run with him to help with speed.
With kids involved he would run his fastest (I think) with an open bowl of food, plus it is easy for them just to pick it up.
This morning my back was hurting and I could not run so I sat him in front of a tunnel at one end of the DW and then I placed his food bowl at the other end of the DW. I was able to walk to the other end and release to the tunnel, he ran full out and had 5 perfect runs. I prefer to be on the side of the DW instead of the front so I will use the kids when possible.
I also have a toy on a long like horse whip that I could use and if he misses I could pull it away, but I would have to be fast. Worth a try I guess. And yes I think he would run full out chaising that toy since we play games with him chaising it, it’s a great way to wear out a terrier. 🙂
thx!
5/5 perfect hits sounds great! You coud try a toy on a whip too, but yes, you would need to be fast and maybe just trying to chase it would be rewarding for him? Anyway, I think he just needs to get a concept of a toy coming after a tunnel and then it will be easy to simply throw after the tunnel.
well it is raining now and is supposed to for days, so when it stops I will try throwing after the tunnel, you are right that does give me some time to decide to reward or not.
If possible, try with kids behind the tunnel first to make the transition to a toy thrown after the tunnel easier.
It finally stopped raining, but started snowing.. I did do a few reps this morning with the straight tunnel and that did the trick he ran full out and it was MUCH easier for me to reward since I had the time while he was in the tunnel to decide to reward or not. I had to give him a bath when we got done since he was so full of mud so I will only do one more short session today. Meanwhile I started working on his turns in my basement on a short plank. Because he already understood to go around stuff, he did it the first try. There were some things though.. when the plank was flat he learned very fast to come off the side of it so that it would be easier on him to turn. then I put the plank up higher and I either got a bit of a leap or he slowed way down. Maybe it is too high, I could lower it, plus it is kind of slippery compared to the rubber DW. Does it matter if he is slower, at least he understands to turn. I was also rewarding with food when it was higher and that does not drive him as much as his ball which I was using when it was on the floor. I also switched to a can at the bottom since I saw no reason not to fade the pole, he never even considered not going around it.
thx
Beth
It’s better to work this exercise with some height yes, but maybe not as much as in your video: try half of that height. Also, support the plank better, with something that isn’t soft as a pillow doesn’t help with the bounciness -- you need a bucket, a brick or something like that. Then, don’t have him run that % of a plank yet as it allows him to leap and not hit with front feet. Start with him getting on the broad so low that getting on the broad as such gives you a nice front feet touch on the contact, so that you have something to reward. Reward with a tug toy to keep as much speed as possible on turns. Have him get on the board higher only after having a couple of sessions of nice front feet hits only (not so hard when you start him low enough).
I lowered my DW some since I did not think my reward rate was high enough, it was a nice day today so we did a couple of sessions. In this session he probably did 20+ reps, he had two big leaps and one small leap but the rest (I think) were good. I think this was one of our best sessions since he has been on the full size DW and not a plank. I am also able to reward after the tunnel and retain good speed. My question is how long should I keep him here without raising it. And should I only raise it maybe 2″ or so (size of plank of wood). I don’t want to raise it too quick, but I also don’t want to stay in one spot if not necessary. It is supposed to start raining again tomorrow, so we may be delayed again.
thanks again!
That’s a very nice successful rate and most of those hits are really beautiful. I would keep this set up for a while to get many good hits in and then maybe try some different approaches first, before raising it. Just throw out some jumps on the approach and send him to different jumps and at different angles to have him get on a DW with different speed and see if he can still hit.
Ok, thx.. since it is raining again I will work on my turns in the basement instead. Hopefully in a couple of days we will be back outside.
Hi Silvia,
It’s been raining and we still have to watch since his toe will bleed if I do too much but I have had three sessions with this success rate, there was one bad run with a leap but the rest 20+ reps II thought were good. I did not show all of them because they are all about the same now. I have been doing 180 approaches and straight approaches and it does not seem to matter. Some of these are 180’s and some are straight. BTW, he had to run two full size DW’s one in a game session I was in at my local club and one at a show today and he ran nice DW’s both running no jumping. He has never done that in the entire time I was training DW’s. I just ran and hardly looked back and he strided fast and nice right thru the contact. We are no way going to call victory, but I think he is “getting” it. Also I added one board on the DW today which made it 4″ taller, we will see what change (if any) we get tomorrow. I sure how winter holds off I feel like we are on a roll and I really love training this.
Beth
Those were sure beautiful!!! Definitely time to add some more height, but do keep playing with the approaches, sending him on from different angles. Try different handler positions too. And oh, click sooner…. -- you are late!!!
I knew I should have muted that track because you would hear that VERY late click. I am much better with saying “yes” than clicking at the right time, but will work on that too.
wow, I added height and did two sessions today and he was 100% flat running, not even one jump. I hung back sometimes and sent him from 180’s etc… I am impressed. I will send a video tomorrow.
Wow, sounds great!
Here is a video from today, the first was a leap, the first leap I have seen in about 4 or 5 sessions. I do have a question, I see his striding is very consistent even if I send him from a 180 or straight on, but not the striding I would have expected to see on a full size DW since there is not leap over the apex. Have you seen that as the DW is raised his striding will change? I sure wish it would not because this is just too nice.
Yeap, would be great to keep this striding, it sure looks great! They do tend to fly the apexes yes, but it’s possible to get them to stride through too… We’ll see how it goes. With that successful rate, you can definitely raise it some again.
This evening session: we are worse than last august… I’m depressed 🙁
She could have done really nice jackpot, instead she reduced her strides or leaped…
Both of us are really confused…
Well, it could be a bad memory of stepping on that ugly edge… I think I would do some more carpet work and then switch to somewhat raised plank, softening the edge with some rubber or cloth.