Kiersten Pt.2

Saturday night was really great. We got some good information and the main focus was -Know your dog, know your breed, and know yourself. It was pretty good- and very motivating for our students I think. The video was great aswell for everyone to see different types of drive, motivation, temperament etc.

Sunday morning was the advanced session. I had planned on rotating Boone and Vito but Vito is no where near the point where he would have been succesful with what we did. I worked him on the sidelines, and over one jump at the back.

So Boone got to do all the work and I was very impressed with him. I have been working with him every week and every day on little things at home, but really he blew me away. He was ULTRA confident and didn't have one moment of worriedness. Things I need to work on with him:

1) stays- because he is so sensitive about things I haven't been super serious about teaching him what stay really means (he has his own variation but it's not quite right!)

2) don't babysit him- and for doGs sake keep your arm down- if you always run with your arm out then how the heck is the dog supposed to know when to actually move out.

3) more teeter games...

At the end Boone ran a full course- with no problems. I was very happy with him and I am looking forward to more training with him. I also need to get serious about the whole weave thing.

Wicca ran in the afternoon Masters session. Kiersten knows my dog very well as I have run under her a lot. (she is a judge) So she knows exactly what her little quirks are. I was both glad to hear that she had some tips for me but also a little anxious about being picked on!

Well, I was picked on, but it was great!

We started with Snooker Strategy and Planning. I am pretty good at Snooker I think. Over the years of running Wicca (sometimes just a few seconds) I have run a lot of snooker and have the game down pat. The problem is that together Wicca and I just can't get it. It all comes down to her not wanting to come in close to me. So- back to the snooker. I had a great plan but Wicca wrecked it not once, not twice- but three times with knocked bars. Now- to give her some credit two bars were my fault. One was a late rear cross and the other was just bad handling. So once we managed to get it through to her that I was serious about keeping bars up Wicca ran it well. I was pretty happy with her. (I have decided to re-enter snooker at the next few trials...we'll see how it goes)

After snooker we got into a discussion about "the evil arm." As you read in my blog post about Kim Collins- she really hates the off arm flip. Despite my reasoning she made it sound like her way was still better. So I have been working very hard at not using the flip, and trying to put a verbal cue to it. Kiersten disagrees. I was ecstatic. I have been struggling with the reason behind not doing it and wasn't sure if I fully agreed- but if everyone else agreed then there must be some truth to it right? (after all a flip is essentially a rear cross on the flat) So I vowed to keep my evil arm down and use a verbal cue instead. Kiersten said that she doesn't have a problem with a flip, and in fact uses one herself- but it should be done properly and the dog needs to understand it. My dog understands it just fine, but I need to follow through more. I am in the habit of letting my arms do the handling and I should be using my whole body. So I am going to make my flip better and that's that. =)

Kiersten then set a course which we picked apart and ran piece by piece before putting it together. She addressed our issue of Wicca not wanting to come close and she suggested I teach it and put it on cue....why didn't I think of that? Or had I, and just not put it into practice????? (I will have to look back on my blog and training notes) Anyway- so she had me work on that, over, and over, and over again until Wicca started to somewhat respond...I am confident that I know what to do now to get her to that point and can't believe that something so simple could fix such a huge problem. At the end of the day we ran the course and it was great. Not perfect- but pretty close, and it felt awesome.

I am understanding more and more how my dog thinks, and what I need to be doing to keep her focused on both me and the equipment! It was also great to listen in to what she was saying to the other participants- particularily our students...we push our students hard so when she set up the starters course I could see their confidence rise. It wasn't a super challenging course, but I think (and hope) that everyone got a lot out of it. As an instructor and someone who really loves to learn I love watching the other dogs, and hearing what she has to say. I learn alot that way. Wicca is such a whirlwind compared to the boys- I got some good ideas for Vito and some good tips for Boone- even when it wasn't my turn. Seminars are great because there are lots of different types of dogs and it can be a great learning experience. It is an outside perspective and if you can get one good thing from it then it was money well spent.