Going The Distance

I remember a few months ago we were working on a jump sequence in class that was basically a big 'U' around the perimeter of the building. It required a send to a jump on the 'bottom' of the 'U' so that with my fast dogs I could scramble to get ahead of them as the second jump after the send was an off set tire.

I remember that Trophy, of course, with his 18+ months of training nailed it perfectly... Demo on the other hand, not so much. Demo let me send him over the jump once... then refused to send the rest of the time. Forcing me to babysit that jump and never letting me get far enough ahead of him that I could get him through the tire without him spinning into me and back talking.

Then I compare that class to Demo now.

What a difference time makes. Demo is mastering the send, especially to tunnels and jumps and he's pretty good about sending to the dog walk consistently as long as there isn't a tunnel sucker right there.

He is so fast it really helps to be able to trust him to get out and do his job now. He has also learned that this is a team sport, and he checks in with me more for direction. Of course, he's also a lot more barky on course when he thinks I'm doing it wrong.

we even tried to send him to the teeter... however since I usually collect his royal barkyness and guide him onto the teeter, I think he took the send like it was the dog walk, despite having done the teeter already, and he almost flew off the end. Put him in again and he jumped off. Put him on again and he c.r.a.w.l.e.d. down it into 2o2o. Good boy.

Trophy was especially animated in class this week, I think he really liked the trial He was so enthusiastic about taking the course and ran the dog walk instead of poking along at the top like he usually does... until I had to crush his happy thought for walking out of his 2o2o on the dog walk AGAIN. It was still really nice to see his happy attitude especially since I almost dropped him from agility last year when he moped thru the class so much. Apparently we both like running agility together now. <3