Thursday, June 25, 2009

Tuesday Night Class with Bug

Tuesday night, Bug had class. He was excellent!

Katrin had set up two sequences that could ultimately be run together – if we got that far (we did not). Both sequences had a distance challenge.

8” dogs went last and I spent that time getting Bug warmed up and then stretching. Currently I am still giving him Traumeel before class.

Sequence #1 started with a serpentine. Between jumps #2 and # 3 in the serpentine you needed to cue your dog to “switch” as they would be heading left after the final jump. Depending upon the amount of distance your dog has, Katrin wanted us to try and be on the right side of the serpentine (looking at the drawing, left side in real-life). With Bug I knew I would need to be on the left side (right-side in real life), but I had no idea how much I would need to “support” him. (Please excuse my poor course drawings! I did them in PowerPoint.)


I asked Bug for a sit at the first jump, angled so he could easily splice it. He self released and made a beeline for the jump. YES!! My corgi who was afraid of jumps now finds them reinforcing! HOORAY! I was pleasantly surprised my how fluidly he handled the serpentine. I babysit the switch because I am so unsure of it.

Here is the truly exciting bit – I was actually able to stay fairly close to the serpentine. Bug went OUT for the jumps and stayed committed to them!

His teeter performance leaves more than a bit to be desired. He does Eeyor ears on it. I need to get my teeter set up and do some rehab work on it. Now that it has finally stopped raining, I might be able to do that!

Sequence #2 started at the teeter and went into a pinwheel. Katrin asked us to do a “switch” after the teeter and before the first jump. Because I did not have to micro manage the switch on the flat I wasn’t sure what Bug and I were doing actually counted! I am sure Katrin thinks I am a dork, but I am so used to having to work much harder at a poorly executed switch versus Bug who seems to naturally “get it.” Katrin and I were talking about this later and she thinks it is because he has more speed than either Ike or Carmen.

After teeter, jump, jump we were asked to send our dog to the weave poles. I had no expectations since Bug has not done the weaves since he was injured. Well, not only did he naturally do the switch after the teeter he went out for the poles and finished them correctly 3 out of 4 times (the final cage was off). Hooray, Bug!

I was pleasantly surprised by how much more obstacle motivation he seems to have, his distance, and his switch. We need major work on the teeter. I almost wonder if his head is out of alignment again because he seemed to be almost cringing when the board hit the ground. However, it could also just be that he needs more exposure to the teeter and I need to make it an AWESOME place to be.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

your blog is good .
I like it.

Katrin said...

yes he did have a great class didn't he! :-)

101mutts said...

That looks hard. I can't quite imagine doing it. Yay Bug! Sounds like he's having more fun with agility and herding.