It was also interesting to see the differences in trainers. Caroline had people run the entire A frame. With Denielle, we back-chained the whole thing for months before she let us run it.
As usual, Spot was fearless. He did everything I asked. We worked on a jump chute, the A frame, the tunnels and the table.
On Friday, Shelby had agility class. The course was 20 obstacles and tricky, with some difficult approach angles and sections requiring lateral distance. I've recreated it to the best of my ability. Some of the angles are off a little bit.
The first jump was set up at an extreme angle, probably a 270. So the dog needed to jump left, but then head to the right to get jump 2. Shelby handled it like a pro. Then there was jump 2 and 3 with Shelby on my left, then a front cross into the right end of the tunnel.
Coming out of the tunnel, it was over jump 5, then to the A frame. The handling choices were to push out of the tunnel exit to the right in order to get a nice line over jump 5 to the A frame, or run up and be on the landing side of 5 laterally and pull the dog toward you then over the A frame. I chose to run up past the jump, just because it motivates Shelby more to see me ahead. For a small dog like Shelby this wasn't too difficult, but for the larger dogs it was necessary to give them a good approach to the A frame.
So, Shelby goes over the A frame on my right, then a front cross to the tunnel underneath the A frame and onto the teeter, then another tunnel to the right of the teeter. This was also a place where you needed to choose between two handling options. You could do a front cross after the tunnel, then the teeter with another from cross at the end, then into the tunnel. Or, you could handle the the teeter on your right, being sure to be in a position at the end of the teeter that indicated the dog needed to exit to the right. That's what I did.
After that there was a double jump to the dogwalk, then a jump staight ahead, a jump to the left and a 180 to another jump. At the end of the dogwalk, you needed to move laterally to the left to indicate the turn. Then you needed to do a post turn for the 180. After that, there was another jump, somewhat angled, then 6 weave poles. Shelby did execellent in this section. I was able to run really fast, and she read all my cues. I was so into going fast that I didn't even have time to be concerned about the weave poles. I knew I was running the right line, so I just went with it and it was no problem!
After the weaves, it was a tunnel under the A frame, to a jump, then another jump and one last jump to finish. Denielle recommended doing a front cross at the end of the weaves and having the tunnel on your left, running around the A frame and doing a rear cross after the tunnel. But I figured why bother with all those crosses? The dog is on your right in the weaves and exiting towards you and the tunnel, so why not handle the tunnel on your right? I guess the thinking is that if you didn't run fast enough, the dog might exit the tunnel and turn back towards you, which would be bad. But I knew if I hoofed it, I could make it. So that's what I did and it was fine, and we breezed through the exit.
We re-did the opening once, but other than that, I ran the whole thing, but did stop and click and treat at a few places. But Denielle didn't have us re-do any of the sections, which was great!
On Saturday Spot had Earthdog class. We're working on Senior. Spot is super fast at entering the tunnels, and this week he was also super fast exiting. I didn't even really have to call him. Once he saw the rats were being taken out he started backing out of the tunnel. Plus, the great thing is, once the rats are gone all he wants are his treats! He doesn't even care where the rats went. I guess in his mind, his job is to get in the tunnel, bark his head off until the rats leave, then exit for treats! In any case, it's really nice to just stand back and let him do his thing. He is one happy dog after getting to do Earthdog.
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